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The University of Texas at Austin - Civitas Institute

Justin Dyer

Justin Dyer

Dean of the School of Civic Leadership

Contact

justin.dyer@austin.utexas.edu

Justin Dyer was the founding director of the Civitas Institute and is the inaugural dean of UT Austin’s School of Civic Leadership. He also holds faculty appointments in the Department of Government and (by courtesy) the Department of Business, Government, and Society. Dyer writes and teaches in the fields of American political thought, jurisprudence and constitutionalism, with an emphasis on the perennial philosophical tradition of natural law. He is the author or editor of eight books and numerous articles, essays and book reviews. His most recent book, with Kody Cooper, is The Classical and Christian Origins of American Politics: Political Theology, Natural Law, and the American Founding, published in 2022 by Cambridge University Press. His previous books with Cambridge University Press include C.S. Lewis on Politics and the Natural Law (2016); Slavery, Abortion, and the Politics of Constitutional Meaning (2013); and Natural Law and the Antislavery Constitutional Tradition (2012). He also is co-editor of the two-volume constitutional law casebook American Constitutional Law (4th edition, West Academic), which has been adopted at leading universities across the country. Previously, he was professor of political science at the University of Missouri, where he served as the founding director of the Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy, a signature academic center for the study of American political thought and history. After attending the University of Oklahoma on a wrestling scholarship, he completed his M.A. and Ph.D. in Government at The University of Texas at Austin.

Areas of Expertise

Political Science

Books:

  • 2023 Dyer, Justin Buckley and Constantine Christos Vassiliou, eds. Liberal Education and Citizenship in a Free Society. University of Missouri Press.
  • 2022 Cooper, Kody W. and Justin Buckley Dyer. The Classical and Christian Origins of American Politics: Political Theology, Natural Law, and the American Founding. New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • 2016 Dyer, Justin Buckley and Micah J. Watson. C.S. Lewis on Politics and the Natural Law. New York: Cambridge University Press. 
  • 2013 Dyer, Justin Buckley. Slavery, Abortion, and the Politics of Constitutional Meaning. New York: Cambridge University Press.
  • 2012 Dyer, Justin Buckley. Natural Law and the Antislavery Constitutional Tradition. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Articles and Chapters:

  • 2024 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Constitutional Aspirationalism Revisited.” In Deciphering the Genome of Constitutionalism: The Foundations and Future of Constitutional Identity, eds. Yaniv Roznai and Ran Hirschl. New York: Cambridge University Press. 
  • 2023 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Harry Jaffa and the Idea that All Men Are Created Equal.” American Political Thought 12(2): 209-221.
  • 2020 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Reason, Revelation, and the Law of Nature in James Wilson’s Lectures on Law.” American Political Thought 9(2): 264-284.
  • 2018 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “James Wilson, Necessary Truths, and the Foundations of Law.” Duquesne Law Review 56(2): 49-71.
  • 2017 Cooper, Kody W. and Justin Buckley Dyer. “Thomas Jefferson, Nature’s God, and the Theological Foundations of Natural-Rights Republicanism.” Politics & Religion 10(3): 662-688.
  • 2017 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Political Science and American Political Thought.” PS: Political Science and Politics 50(3): 784-788.
  • 2017 Dyer, Justin and Micah Watson. “The Old Western Man: C.S. Lewis on Politics and Modernity.” Modern Age 59(4): 27-35.
  • 2015 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Lewis, Barth, and the Natural Law.” Journal of Church and State 57(1): 1-17.
  • 2013 Dyer, Justin Buckley and Kevin E. Stuart. “Public Reason and the Theological Framework of Martin Luther King’s ‘Letter from Birmingham City Jail.’” Politics and Religion 6(1): 145-163.
  • 2010 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Slavery and the Magna Carta in the Development of Anglo-American Constitutionalism.” PS: Political Science and Politics 43(3): 479-482.
  • 2010 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Revisiting Dred Scott: Prudence, Providence, and the Limits of Constitutional Statesmanship.” Perspectives on Political Science 39(3): 166-74.
  • 2009 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “After the Revolution: Somerset and the Antislavery Tradition in Anglo-American Constitutional Development.” Journal of Politics 71(4): 1422-1434.
  • 2009 Dyer, Justin Buckley. “Lincolnian Natural Right, Dred Scott, and the Jurisprudence of John McLean.” Polity 41(1): 63-85.

Commentary:

  • 2024 “Embracing civics can help restore trust in higher education,” National Review (January 6)
  • 2023 “Is America a Christian Nation? Yes and No,” Washington Post (January 4)
  • 2021 “Why Positive Law Needs Natural Law,” Law & Liberty (February 23)
  • 2020 “The Limits of Constitutional Rights,” National Review (May 12)
  • 2020 “Our Promissory Note,” Starting Points (July 4)