The Moynihan Report at 50 is a robust dialogue among scholars across disciplines and political perspectives as they reflect on Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s 1965 report on the state of the African-American family in the United States. A scholar of both policy and social science, the New York senator explored the structural and cultural pathologies that haunted African American families, and in so doing drew the ire of critics. His report and its frank assessments remain controversial 50 years later. Was Moynihan prescient? Are the challenges facing the African- American family and, more generally, the American family, more or less grave today than they were in 1965? Princeton University’s James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions is pleased to host leading scholars of race, poverty, inequality, criminal justice, religion, marriage, and family for a searching look at the report and its conclusions in light of 50 additional years of social and political observations. The conference features a keynote address by Orlando Patterson, John Cowles Professor of Sociology at Harvard University, as well as interdisciplinary panel discussions of scholars and policy experts.

Saikrishna Bangalore Prakash, James Monroe Distinguished Professor of Law, Horace W. Goldsmith Research Professor, University of Virginia

The Princeton University Constitution Day Lecture by Sean Wilentz, George Henry Davis 1886 Professor of American History, Princeton University. Commentary by Sarah Rivett, Associate Professor of English, Princeton University.

Robert P. George, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence, and Director of the James Madison Program; Michael Smith, McCosh Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Philosophy