Jacksonville, AL – On Tuesday, September 20, Dr. Elizabeth Kaufer Busch (Christopher Newport University) will present, “Restoring the Constitutional Integrity of Title IX”. This lecture and Q&A are hosted entirely through Zoom. It starts at 5:30 pm CDT and should end around 7:00 pm. You can register for the event through this link.
This presentation focuses on the need to align all laws with the requirements of the U.S. Constitution. Using Title IX as the case study, this presentation frames Title IX’s history as a conflict between two competing philosophies that she terms “Constitutionalist” and Anti-Constitutionalist.” Title IX’s legacy tells two stories—one of the federal bureaucracy stretching and transforming Title IX, with the other struggling to maintain Title IX’s constitutional integrity.
After examining the Anti-Constitutional means by which Title IX has been altered over its 5-decade tenure, Busch discusses why laws like Title IX must comply with the Constitution. Within the space between what the Constitution prohibits and requires, Congress is responsible for passing statutes that the President should enforce through the regulatory rule-making process, Yet significant Title IX policies have been made by judicial innovation, bureaucratic interpretation, and executive decree. Many of these policies also fail to comply with constitutional requirements.
Busch argues not only that interpretations of laws like Title IX should comply with the Constitution’s text, but also that the means used to achieve them but also that lawmaking should only occur by processes mandated by the Constitution and required by law. The constitutional integrity of law must be restored as the nation begins to prepare for its 250th anniversary.
Dr. Elizabeth Kaufer Busch is the Laura and Pete Walker Professor of American Studies at Christopher Newport University, where she also serves as the Director of American Studies and is the Founder and Co-Director of the Center for American Studies. Busch earned her PhD in political science from Michigan State University with specializations in modern and American political thought.
Prior to coming to Christopher Newport, she was assistant professor of government at Berry College. Busch serves on the board of directors of the Jack Miller Center for Founding American Principles and History and the Washington, Jefferson, and Madison Institute; and recently was appointed to serve on the Civics and Civic Engagement Task Force for the U.S. Semiquincentennial Commission (also known as America250), which was created by Congress to prepare for America’s 250th anniversary on July 4th, 2026.
In her research, Busch focuses on the role of civic education in supporting democratic institutions and good governance. She has also done extensive research into evolving conceptions of sex, gender, equality, and feminist thought, and the role those concepts have on public policy. She has published articles, book chapters, and scholarly studies on these subjects and is co-author of Title IX: The Transformation of Sex Discrimination in Education, which explores the non-legislative processes by which the aw has been transformed over five decades, and co-editor of Democracy Revisited: Essays on the American Regime (2009), and Civic Education and the Future of American Citizenship (2012). She is currently working on a number of writing projects focusing on reclaiming what she terms the “Constitutionalist Creed” in an “Anti-Constitutionalist Culture.”
Busch, along with her CAS co-director, has raised over $4 million to support the Center for American Studies, including a prestigious National Endowment for the Humanities “We the People” Challenge Grant in 2008. She was also the 2012 recipient of Christopher Newport University’s Alumni Award for Excellence in Teaching and Mentoring, the University’s most prestigious award given to one faculty member annually.
