Legal Reformer Philip Howard on Civility in America

NEW YORK, May 24, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The growth of law has had a corrosive effect on American institutions, from politics to education and business, according to author and legal reformer Philip K. Howard.

This trend has led to a loss of civility and ethics, said Howard, an attorney and chair of Common Good, a nonprofit organization dedicated to restoring common sense to America.

A recent Harris Poll showed that 87 percent of Americans believe the U.S. political system is counterproductive to society.

The lack of civility and the erosion of ethics are also evident in education, where student rights come before the authority of teachers, and in corporate America, where CEOs often put short-term goals and self-interest ahead of the common good, he said.

"If we want to restore civility and ethics, we need to have a system that allows us to judge people," he said. "Responsibility starts from the top."

A social structure must be established that allows those in authority, including educators, managers, and bar associations to exercise their authority responsibly.

America needs a "profound legal overhaul," he said. "We must fundamentally rethink the legal system of our society." He decried the accretion of outdated laws that are impossible to repeal. "It's not so far-fetched to say that our democracy is run by dead people," he said.

Howard was the second speaker in a series of lectures on civility in America at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs. The series is being sponsored by The Dilenschneider Group to mark the firm's 20th anniversary, in conjunction with the Carnegie Council.

Howard is the vice chairman of Covington & Burling and a prominent civic leader in New York City. He has been a special adviser to the Securities and Exchange Commission on regulatory simplification, and worked on environmental and management reforms with former Vice President Al Gore. He has also advised Republican leadership on regulatory reform and worked with several governors on overhauling civil service and other bureaucratic institutions.

He is the author of three books, most recently Liberating Americans from Too Much Law, and he periodically contributes to the op-ed pages in The New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. In the Oxford Companion to American Law, Howard has contributed the section on American law since 1968.

Howard's talk follows columnist and radio/TV commentator Charles Osgood's lecture on civility in media. The series of lectures on civility features speakers from politics, the media, finance, business, and other areas. Some of the nation's most insightful minds will explore the crisis and offer their opinion as to how we can restore civility in society.

The next lecture is June 20th with Henry Kaufman, economist and author, who will speak on civility on Wall Street. All lectures in the series take place at the Carnegie Council's headquarters in New York City at 5:30 PM Eastern Time.

The Dilenschneider Group, Inc. (http://www.dilenschneider.com) provides to a limited and select few access to the finest communications professionals in the world, with experience in fields ranging from mergers and acquisitions and crisis communications to marketing, government affairs and international media.

The Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs (www.carnegiecouncil.org), established in 1914 by Andrew Carnegie, is an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit organization dedicated to increasing understanding of the relationship between ethics and international affairs.

SOURCE Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs