Earlier today, I blogged this post about this National Review Online op-ed by Hunter Baker, who is described in the preface of the article as a “Texas freelance writer.” Mr. Baker’s article is highly critical of UT Law Professor, Brian Leiter, for Professor Leiter’s earlier criticism of the student author of a Harvard Law Review note that was complimentary of Baylor philosophy professor Francis Beckwith‘s new book, “Law, Darwinism, & Public Education.” Professor Leiter subscribes to Darwin’s Theory of Evolution, while Professor Beckwith is as proponent of what is known as the “Intelligent Design Theory,” which is an outgrowth of creationism.
At any rate, my earlier blog was critical of Professor Leiter, not so much because of his views on evolution, which he presents very well. Rather, I was critical of the Professor’s accusation that the student author of the Harvard Law Review note had engaged in academic fraud, which I did not think was clearly reflected by the note.
Well, the student reviewer may be pristine as driven snow, but Mr. Baker — the author of the National Review Online piece — is not. Turns out that Mr. Baker is a graduate student of Baylor Professor Beckwith! And to make matters worse, Mr. Baker did not bother to disclose his close association with Professor Beckwith in his NRO article.
In the last paragraph of his NRO article, Mr. Baker suggests that Professor Leiter owes the student author of the Harvard Law Review note an apology. I initially agreed with that sentiment. However, now I apologize to Professor Leiter for my earlier post, and suggest to Mr. Baker that he owes him one, too.

Brian Leiter is the Joseph D. Jamail Centennial Chair in Law, Professor of Philosophy, and Director of the Law & Philosophy Program at the University of Texas at Austin. Professor Leiter advocates a Darwinian materialist vision of the world from his weblog, The Leiter Reports. Professor Leiter is also the author of The Philosophical Gourmet Report, which is a respected ranking of graduate philosophy programs in academia.
Hunter Baker reports in this NRO article, Professor Leiter recently criticized Harvard Law Review and Harvard law student Lawrence VanDyke for giving Baylor professor Francis Beckwith‘s new book, “Law, Darwinism, & Public Education,” a positive review in the January 2004 issue of the Harvard Law Review. In the following passage, Professor Leiter accuses Mr. VanDyke of “scholarly fraud”, which Mr. Baker reasonably interprets as an indictment if the student reviewer were ever to seek an academic position after finishing his education at Harvard:

The author of this incompetent book note . . . is one Lawrence VanDyke, a student editor of the Review. Mr. VanDyke may yet have a fine career as a lawyer, but I trust he has no intention of entering law teaching: scholarly fraud is, I fear, an inauspicious beginning for an aspiring law teacher. And let none of the many law professors who are readers of this site be mistaken: Mr. VanDyke has perpetrated a scholarly fraud, one that may have political and pedagogical consequences.

Mr. VanDyke is not backing off of his positive review despite Professor Leiter’s criticism:

He defends the substance of his book note and charges that Leiter’s attack represents “an effort to make sure all students recognize that if they step outside the bounds of Leiter’s orthodoxy, their careers will be in serious jeopardy.” He adds, “This is pretty amazing considering my book note actually talks about the ‘hostility and censorship of the evolutionary establishment.’ If anything, Mr. Leiter acts as if it his goal to prove me correct.”

Mr. Baker closes his NRO article with the following observation:

Unless he gets his temper under control, Brian Leiter won’t continue to have the influence in the academy he currently enjoys. Threatening the career of a young law student because he dared to differ is a sorry spectacle. Let’s hope a chastened Leiter will get a lesson in freedom of inquiry and expression from his fellows and then will be man enough to apologize to the promising student whose destruction he proposed.

Subsequently, Professor Leiter has penned responses on his blog to criticism over his attack on Harvard Law Review and Mr. VanDyke, which can be reviewed here and here. To his credit, Professor Leiter’s responses are well-prepared and contain many good links to the scientific basis for the theory of evolution, the lack of which is his main criticism of the Intelligent Design theory espoused by Professor Beckwith and others.
Thanks to Logos for the pointer to Mr. Baker’s article.