Delivering Elon Law's fall 2009 Bryan Leadership Lecture on November 5, Democratic Leadership Council Chairman Harold Ford, Jr., urged Congress and President Obama to scale down health care legislation and to focus instead on job creation and the war in Afghanistan.

• Harold Ford talks about results of the Nov. 3 elections
• Harold Ford discusses strategy for Afghanistan

At the Second Annual Elon Law Intramural Moot Court Competition, held November 2-5, twenty law students earned an invitation to join the law school's Moot Court Board. Jason Burton and Parker Moore were the competition champions, winning a competitive final round.

At a public debate at Elon Law on October 29, North Carolina Supreme Court Chief Justice (Ret.) Jim Exum urged that North Carolina move to a system of appointing judges, arguing that elections wrongly influence judges to consider the political implications of their decisions, while Elon Law professor Scott Gaylord defended judicial elections, saying an appointive system could create undue influence by the executive and legislative branches on the judiciary.

• Exum on politics in judicial selection
• Gaylord on elections as a check on the judiciary
• Exum on courts as protectors of the rule of law
• Gaylord on judicial activism and elections

Third year law student Jeb Brooks moderated an October 28 candidates forum for Greensboro's Mayoral and City Council offices, and organized two forums on city government and economic development as part of his capstone leadership project at Elon Law.