Lance Morrow

Henry Grunwald Senior Fellow

Lance Morrow is the Henry Grunwald Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. His work focuses on the moral and ethical dimensions of public events, including developments in regard to freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and political correctness on American campuses, with a view to the future consequences of such suppressions.

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Lance Morrow is the Henry Grunwald Senior Fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. His work focuses on the moral and ethical dimensions of public events, including developments in regard to freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and political correctness on American campuses, with a view to the future consequences of such suppressions.

Morrow’s award-winning essays, appearing in TimeSmithsonianThe New York TimesThe Atlantic, and other publications, have offered probing analyses of American culture and politics in the transition from the 20th to the 21st century.

Morrow wrote about every presidential election from Nixon to Obama, wars from Vietnam to Bosnia to the Middle East. Morrow was the author of more than 150 cover stories for Time, including eight Man of the Year articles.

He is currently writing a book about Henry Luce and his magazines’ role in shaping American culture and opinions in the middle third of the 20th century. Morrow is a strong believer in the role of journalism in sustaining freedom and democracy.

The son of an editor of the old Saturday Evening Post and of a Washington columnist for the Knight syndicate, Morrow grew up in Washington. He attended Gonzaga High School, and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University. For nine years (1996-2005), he was a University Professor at Boston University, where he taught presidential history and the art of the essay.

The author of seven books, Morrow is a two-time winner of the National Magazine Award—the first for his original coverage in essay form of American cultural affairs, the second for his essay that was part of Time‘s special coverage of September 11th.

Morrow’s study of the question of evil, arising among other things from his travel in the Bosnian war zone with Elie Wiesel, was a finalist for the National Magazine Award.  Later, he turned the article into a critically acclaimed book—Evil: An Investigation.

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Christmas in the Midst

Lance Morrow

Estrangement has become a theme on all political sides—a psychology of exile even in one’s own country.

Articles

City Journal / December 24, 2021

An Age of Violated Boundaries

Lance Morrow

The obliteration of boundaries and norms in the 21st century has released powerful energies that are sometimes creative, sometimes destructive, and often merely bizarre.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / November 10, 2021

The Woke, Elvis and America’s Great Awakenings

Lance Morrow

This isn’t the first time in history that a wave of youthful righteousness has tried to transform America.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / October 17, 2021

Race and Friendship at Harvard, 1963

Lance Morrow

“The Last Negroes at Harvard” is a wary, complicated, handsomely judicious book smoldering with a racial grievance that is both soothed and exacerbated by the condescension and privilege that Harvard lavished on the author and the 17 other black students.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / October 8, 2021

Not That Long Ago, ‘Evil’ Really Meant Something

Lance Morrow

Progressives now see no difference between history’s monsters and people they don’t like on TV.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / September 26, 2021

Two Decades of War in Afghanistan

Lance Morrow

The 20 years since 9/11 have produced two tragic outcomes: Afghanistan has reverted to the Taliban, and—unexpectedly—America has disappeared down a rabbit hole. Barbarism, in different forms, is on the march in both countries.

Articles

City Journal / September 9, 2021

You Are Living in the Golden Age of Stupidity

Lance Morrow

The convergence of many seemingly unrelated elements has produced an explosion of brainlessness.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / August 29, 2021

‘Kicking Jim Jordan’ Isn’t Healthy—Even at the Gym

Lance Morrow

A lurid fantasy of political violence at a fancy exercise class for nice people: This is the way we live now.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / August 4, 2021

The Hedgehogs of Critical Race Theory

Lance Morrow

They start with important truths—slavery was wicked—and get carried away into monomania.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / July 19, 2021

Can Freedom Survive the Narratives?

Lance Morrow

The Age of Information is the era of hysterical story lines. Twenty-first-century technology supercharges feelings, not thoughts, and registers them instantaneously on hundreds of millions of screens and minds. Such narratives serve neither history nor justice.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / May 17, 2021

The Jury’s Answer in the Derek Chauvin Trial

Lance Morrow

An officer’s cruelty, a mob’s threats and a long, tragic history add up to a conviction for murder.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / April 22, 2021

Joe Biden’s American Grandstand

Lance Morrow

The president panders to the young, like the Dick Clark of 21st-century statesmen.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / April 4, 2021