FOREIGN IN A DOMESTIC SENSE:

Reflections on the Centenary of
the United States' Acquisition of Puerto Rico

A conference cosponsored by Yale Law School and The University of Puerto Rico School of Law
March 27 - 28, 1998
New Haven, CT

Schedule

Friday


3:00 p.m.
Insular Views: The U.S. Imperial Imagination in Text and Image
Maps, Photographs, Views
An exhibit of Sterling Memorial Library holdings relating to the Spanish American War
Yale Memorabilia Room, Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University

Opening remarks: Dean Antonio García Padilla, University of Puerto Rico School of Law

4:00 - 6:00 p.m.
Panel 1: Sovereignty Under Scrutiny: National Identity and Territorial Status in the Post-Colonial World
A comparative perspective on questions raised by territorial status in the post-colonial world
Lecture Hall, Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University
Moderator: Rogers M. Smith - Yale University, Department of Political Science
Participants:
  • Roberto Aponte Toro - University of Puerto Rico School of Law; author, NAFTA One Year Later: Are the Cups Half Empty or Half Full?, 10 CONN. J. INT. L. 571 (1995)
  • Ruth Lapidoth - Hebrew University, Faculty of Law; author, Jerusalem: Some Jurisprudential Aspects, 45 CATH. U. L. REV. 661 (1996)
  • Arnold Leibowitz - author, DEFINING STATUS: A COMPREHENSIVE ANALYSIS OF UNITED STATES TERRITORIAL RELATIONS (Martinus Nijhoff, 1989); General Counsel, U.S. Commission on the Status of Puerto Rico; counsel, Guam and U.S.V.I. Constitutional Conventions
  • Juan J. Linz - Yale University, Department of Political Science; author (with Alfred C. Stepan), PROBLEMS OF DEMOCRATIC TRANSITION AND CONSOLIDATION: SOUTHERN EUROPE, SOUTH AMERICA, AND POST-COMMUNIST EUROPE (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996)

7:00 p.m.
Dinner: Recovering the Historical Imagination: Puerto Rico and the United States, 1898-1998
Quinnipiac Club
Opening Remarks: Dean Anthony T. Kronman, Yale Law School
The Honorable José A. Cabranes - United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit; author, CITIZENSHIP AND THE AMERICAN EMPIRE: NOTES ON THE LEGISLATIVE HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES CITIZENSHIP OF PUERTO RICANS (Yale University Press, 1979)
Moderator: Harold Hongju Koh - Yale Law School


Saturday


8:00 - 9:00 a.m.
Breakfast, Yale Law School
Rubén Berríos Martínez - Senator, Puerto Rico Legislative Assembly, and President, Partido Independentista Puertorriqueño (Independence Party)
More or Less Perfect Union: United States Territories in the National Context
Moderator: The Honorable Jose Cabranes - Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

9:15 - 11:15 a.m.
Panel 2: A discussion of U.S. territorial policy and questions concerning self-government, self-determination, and sovereignty
Yale Law School
Moderator: Burke Marshall - Yale Law School
Participants:
  • Nell Jessup Newton - American University, Washington College of Law; author, Indian Claims in the Courts of the Conqueror, 41 AM. U. L. REV. 753 (1992)
  • E. Robert Statham, Jr. - University of Guam, Political Science Department; author, U.S. Citizenship Policy in the Territory of Guam: The Making of One Out of Many, or Many Out of One? 2:1 CITIZENSHIP STUDIES (1998)
  • Ruth Van Cleve - Director, Office of Territorial Affairs, 1977-1981 and Office of Territories, 1964-1969; author, THE OFFICE OF TERRITORIAL AFFAIRS (Praeger 1974)
  • Dick Thornburgh - United States Attorney General, 1988-91; Governor of Pennsylvania, 1978-86

11:15 a.m. - 1:00 p.m.
Panel 3: Following the Flag: United States Territories in the Constitutional Context
An investigation of the constraints the federal Constitution places on the relationships between the United States and the territories
Yale Law School
Participants:
  • Sanford Levinson - University of Texas at Austin School of Law; author (with P. Brest), PROCESSES OF CONSTITUTIONAL DECISIONMAKING (Little Brown & Co. 1994)
  • Gerald Neuman - Columbia University School of Law; author, Whose Constitution? 100 YALE L. J. 909 (1991)
  • Efrén Rivera Ramos - University of Puerto Rico School of Law; author of The Legal Construction of American Colonialism: The Insular Cases (1901-1922), 65:2 REV. JUR. U.P.R. 225 (1996)
  • Mark Tushnet - Georgetown University Law Center; author, What Then Is the American?, 38 ARIZ. LAW REV. 873 (1996)
  • Moderator: Judith Resnik - Yale Law School


1:15 - 2:15 p.m.
Lunch - Yale Law School
Rafael Hernández Colón - former Governor of Puerto Rico, and former President, Partido Popular Democrático (Commonwealth Party)

2:30 - 4:15 p.m.
Moderator: The Honorable Jose Cabranes - Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
Panel 4: A Part Apart: Puerto Rico in its National and Constitutional Contexts An examination of legal, constitutional, and cultural questions surrounding the relationship between the United States and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico
Yale Law School
Moderator: Akhil Reed Amar - Yale Law School
Participants:
  • David M. Helfeld - former Dean, University of Puerto Rico School of Law; author, How Much of the Federal Constitution is Likely to be held Applicable to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico?, 110 F.R.D. 452 (1985)
  • Ivette Ramos Buonomo - University of Puerto Rico School of Law
  • The Honorable Juan R. Torruella - Chief Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit; author, THE SUPREME COURT AND PUERTO RICO: THE DOCTRINE OF SEPARATE AND UNEQUAL (University of Puerto Rico Press, 1985)
  • The Honorable José Trías Monge - Chief Justice, Puerto Rico Supreme Court, 1974-85; Attorney General of Puerto Rico, 1953-57; member of the Constitutional Convention of Puerto Rico, 1950-52; author, PUERTO RICO: THE TRIALS OF THE OLDEST COLONY IN THE WORL D (Yale University Press 1997)


4:30 - 6:30 p.m.
Panel 5: Puerto Rico and the United States, 1998 and Beyond
A discussion of the impact of Puerto Rico's economy, social welfare, culture, language, and national identity on the future of the relationship between Puerto Rico and the United States
Yale Law School
Moderator: Owen M. Fiss - Yale Law School
Participants:
  • Bertram P. Finn - President, Equivest Capital Corporation in San Juan, Puerto Rico
  • José Julián Álvarez González - University of Puerto Rico School of Law; author, The Empire Strikes Out: Congressional Ruminations on the Citizenship Status of Puerto Ricans, 27 HARVARD J. LEGIS. 309 (1990)
  • Angel Oquendo - University of Connecticut School of Law; author, Re-Imagining the Latino/a Race, 12 HARV. BLACKLETTER L. J. 93 (1995)
  • Blanca Silvestrini - University of Puerto Rico, Department of History; author (with Maria Dolores Luque de Sánchez), HISTORIA DE PUERTO RICO: TRAYECTORIA DE UN PUEBLO (Cultural Puertorriqueña, 1987)
  • Jeffrey Farrow - Director, White House Inter-Agency Group on Puerto Rico Ivette Ramos Buonomo - University of Puerto Rico; author, Derecho de Familia, REV. JUR. U.P.R. (1996)


7:00 p.m.
Reception and Dinner
Governor Pedro Rosselló - Partido Nuevo Progresista (Statehood Party)
Speech available online
Moderator: The Honorable Jose Cabranes - Judge, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit


Sunday


9:30 - 11:00 a.m.
Politics and Territorial Status: A Roundtable Discussion
Faculty Lounge



22 February '98