In Memoriam: Ken I. Kersch
Professor of Political Science Ken I. Kersch, a highly respected constitutional scholar who was founding director of Boston College’s Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy, died on November 27. He was 60.
Ken I. Kersch (Peter Julian)
Dr. Kersch, who joined the Political Science faculty in 2007, researched, wrote about, and taught American political and constitutional development, American political thought, and the politics of courts. He was particularly interested in the clash between conservative and liberal interpretations of the United States Constitution during the 20th century, in areas such as civil liberties, freedom of speech, separation of powers, and church-vs-state issues.
In addition to numerous articles in academic, intellectual, and popular journals, he authored or co-authored the books American Political Thought: An Invitation; Conservatives and the Constitution: Imagining Constitutional Restoration in the Heyday of American Liberalism; The Supreme Court and American Political Development; Constructing Civil Liberties: Discontinuities in the Development of American Constitutional Law; and Freedom of Speech: Rights and Liberties Under the Law.
The classes he taught at BC included U.S. Constitutional Development, Civil Liberties, and Conservatism in Modern America.
Taking a big-picture approach and drawing on history and constitutional law (he was a member of the bar of New York, Massachusetts, and the District of Columbia) as well as political science, Dr. Kersch traced evolutions in the American ideological realm and their relation to the Constitution: for example, the changes in progressives’ attitudes toward civil rights during the course of the 20th century; or how, in the wake of the Supreme Court desegregation ruling and 1960s civil rights legislation, the conservative movement distanced itself from Southern conservatives and sought to position itself as “the polity’s foremost champion of constitutional liberty and equality,” as he explained in a 2020 interview with the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal.
With the current Supreme Court makeup, said Dr. Kersch in a 2022 interview on the National Constitution Center program “We the People,” the conservative movement appeared to be on the brink of realizing one of its long-held goals: eradicating the New Deal constitutionalism. But he was skeptical as to what degree that might happen.
“I would say there’s a huge question mark there,” he explained. “The world has changed. And the question is, as it often is for conservatives, how much are they willing to dismantle? Because the world without New Deal constitutionalism, and the federal government without New Deal constitutionalism, would look completely different. There would be no federal agencies. There would be no FDA. There would be maybe even no Federal Aviation Administration. There would be no Securities and Exchange Commission. The government would look radically different, and the question becomes, however conceptually they may be committed to this, how far are they willing to go?”
In 2008, Dr. Kersch became the founding director for the University's Clough Center for the Study of Constitutional Democracy, which was established through a donation by Gloria Clough M.Div. ’90, M.S. ’96 and Charles Clough ’64, a University trustee associate. The center promotes interdisciplinary reflection on constitutional government in the United States and throughout the world through campus and virtual events featuring distinguished scholars and experts—including BC faculty—from a variety of fields and professions, among them David Brooks, Doris Kearns Goodwin, David McCullough, R. Nicholas Burns ’78, Mary Robinson, F.W. de Klerk, and Shirin Ebadi.
During its early years under Dr. Kersch, the Clough Center welcomed distinguished scholar James Q. Wilson as a senior fellow, sponsored two undergraduates to participate in an international conference on NATO, and initiated a Junior Fellows Program for BC students with a strong interest in constitutional democracy.
Dr. Kersch expounded on the center’s “touchstones” in a 2009 newsletter: Reflecting BC’s character as a liberal arts university, the center “will place significant emphasis on the participation and formation of its undergraduates” while striving to be interdisciplinary and “to play a leadership role in breaking down the walls that have characterized intellectual life, not only at BC but in academia more generally.”
In addition, he said, the center “will endeavor to enhance our understanding of the nature and practice of democratic constitutional government, not only in the U.S., but also around the world” and “welcome the participation of scholars, students, and practitioners approaching the study of constitutionalism from a range of political, ideological, intellectual, and personal perspectives.”
Charles Clough called Dr. Kersch, "a wonderful person who built the center in its early days. It was his selfless determination that allowed it to get going.”
He added, “Ken had a permanently implanted smile on his face."
Dr. Kersch’s two successors praised his leadership and dedication to the center.
“Ken was a scholar of tremendous erudition and integrity and a person of deep humanity,” said BC Law Professor Vlad Perju, who took over the post from Dr. Kersch in 2012. “It was a great honor to succeed him at the Clough Center. He was the first person I would reach out to for advice as I started in my new position, and over the following years. Along with so many others, I’ve admired deeply Ken’s pathbreaking work on American constitutional development. It is truly tragic that we will not be able to reach out to him again for insight and understanding as the American Republic enters perilous times.”
“Ken Kersch brought the Clough Center to life with his intellectual force and his infectious enthusiasm for American political institutions,” said Professor of Political Science Jonathan Laurence, the center’s director since 2022. “His presence in any conversation immediately raised the level of discussion and his absence is felt deeply within the Boston College community and the political science and legal disciplines more widely."
Although he never had a class with him, Dennis Wieboldt III ’22, M.A.’23 said he was grateful to Dr. Kersch, who participated in Wieboldt’s legal history workshops and frequently offered advice on his research.
“I am greatly indebted to his mentorship and friendship,” said Wieboldt, who is now a J.D./Ph.D. student at the University of Notre Dame. “Many of the questions about the history of American political thought that animated Dr. Kersch's scholarship have similarly animated my own research. I don't know that I would have pursued a J.D./Ph.D. program if not for his support and guidance.”
Among the honors Dr. Kersch earned were the American Political Science Association's Edward S. Corwin Award, the J. David Greenstone Prize from APSA's politics and history section, the C. Herman Pritchett Award from APSA’s law and courts section, and the Hughes-Gossett Award from the Supreme Court Historical Society.
Dr. Kersch earned a bachelor’s degree from Williams College, a juris doctorate from Northwestern University, and master’s and doctoral degrees from Cornell University. Prior to BC, he taught at Lehigh University, Princeton University, and Harvard University; he also served as a Tallman Scholar in Government at Bowdoin University and a Distinguished Research Fellow at the University of Missouri Kinder Institute on Constitutional Democracy.
He is survived by his parents, Robert and Barbara Kersch, of Great River, NY.
An on-campus tribute to Dr. Kersch is being planned for the spring semester.