Senior class president Benjamin Korom announced Tuesday that Harvey C. Mansfield, Jr. will speak at the Hillsdale College Commencement Exercises on May 13.
“The officers of our class agreed that we wanted a prominent academic to speak to us this spring,” senior class vice president Christopher Walker said. “I am especially excited because of the dimension of Dr. Mansfield’s scholarship that is concerned with character.”
A graduate of Harvard University, Mansfield has translated Machiavelli as well as Tocqueville’s Democracy in America. He has also written on Edmund Burke and the nature of political parties as well as the discovery and development of the theory of executive power. He has written in defense of a defensible liberalism and in favor of a constitutional American political science. He has recently completed a book on manliness.
Hillsdale College President Larry Arnn praised Mansfield as one of the foremost scholars of his time.
“His study of the philosophic questions inherent in political life has been penetrating, tireless and profound,” Arnn said, in a statement. “Working in an age that values fashion and change, his relentless pursuit of the truth is one of its chief adornments.”
The William R. Kenan Junior Professor of Government at Harvard, Mansfield was chairman of the Harvard University Government Department for four years, has held Guggenheim and NEH fellowships and was on the Advisory Council of the NEH.
“I believe he will send us from Hillsdale with a message to challenge our minds, but also our hearts,” Walker said.
Senior Jonathan Graham agreed.
“Harvey Mansfield’s stature in the educational realm makes him a superb choice for Commencement speaker,” he said. “Finally a good decision, Dr. Arnn.”