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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A Forbidden Word’s Lost Lessons

Lance Morrow

A professor is under investigation for accurately quoting James Baldwin.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / August 19, 2019

Darker Days Ahead?

Lance Morrow

The El Paso and Dayton shootings brought the 2020 presidential election, and America’s future, into sharp and disturbing focus.

Articles

City Journal / August 5, 2019

A Marriage of Man and Machine

Lance Morrow

Self-driving cars will ruin our connection to the metal beast.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / August 1, 2019

Neil Armstrong’s ‘Small Step’ Brought the Moon Down to Earth

Lance Morrow

Apollo 11 was the apogee of an era of dreams and the start of an age of division and small-mindedness.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / July 19, 2019

The Bus Back to the Future

Lance Morrow

It seemed a little odd that Kamala Harris brought up the long-ago subject of busing during a 2019 Democratic debate. Presidential candidates usually wish to deal in new ideas. Busing is a period piece.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / July 7, 2019

A Reckoning With Martin Luther King

Lance Morrow

A country without heroes becomes either savage or monstrously petty, and dull and mean.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / June 18, 2019

You Have the Right to Bare Arms, but Why Ink Them?

Lance Morrow

It is hard to see the sense in permanently committing one’s flesh to be the billboard of long-ago whims.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / June 7, 2019

D-Day, and a Summer of Anniversaries

Lance Morrow

Always at the heart of America as a moral experiment has been the question of how to make the nation’s power virtuous. On D-Day, June 6, 1944, the two—power and virtue—were neatly aligned.

Articles

City Journal / June 5, 2019

Outsmarted

Lance Morrow

The phone in our pockets sees and hears all.

Articles

City Journal / May 7, 2019

The Danger of Debating Reparations for Slavery

Lance Morrow

Compensation for slavery is an inviting idea in principle but would be a nightmare in practice. Reparations, in current conditions, would not repair anything.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / May 3, 2019

Master of the Craft

Lance Morrow

In his new book, Robert Caro teaches the art of nonfiction writing.

Articles

City Journal / April 26, 2019

Politics as Cartooning: What’s Trump, Doc?

Lance Morrow

Understanding politicians as cartoons is a way to appreciate the surreal quality of 2019. No doubt the cartooning will become increasingly intense as the 2020 campaign unfolds.

Articles

The Wall Street Journal / April 6, 2019