BARNABAS D.
JOHNSON
PUBLICATIONS
Books
From 1985 to 1989 I served as Editor-in-Chief of the Almanac of the Federal Judiciary, a two-volume,
1200-page loose-leaf service (annual, plus updates). I helped start this project in 1983,
my initial responsibility being to develop and employ standard "measures" for
evaluating the work and demeanor, etc., of each judge. I headed the entire enterprise
after 1985. My staff included from 3 to 7 lawyers, plus others.
Basically, the Almanac tracked and summarized the
significant activities, opinions, and writings of and about 800 district (trial, Vol. 1)
and 200 circuit (appellate, Vol. 2) judges; the project also interviewed thousands of
leading litigators and professors, etc., nationwide, regarding these federal judges, with
a view to developing and publishing systematic profiles and evaluations of each judge. The
Almanac was sold to Prentice Hall (
As Editor of the Almanac, I was ultimately responsible for every detail of all content — all biographical summaries, all synopses of each judge's major writings and judicial opinions, and all evaluative summaries including synopses of major news articles about these 1000 judges. This was a huge research and publishing project, and while obviously I could not write all of it, let alone all of each semi-annual update, the fact is that this highly-regarded endeavor had my "fingerprints" all over it.
I should add that during my Almanac years I never
relied on staff summaries of articles by judges regarding their favorite subjects: the job
of a judge, the role of the judiciary. All such articles (and major speeches, etc.) I read
and summarized myself, due to my larger scholarly interest in the judiciary, especially
from a comparative-law perspective. Indeed, my work on the Almanac was a natural progression from my earlier work in
comparative law and the necessity for healthy "feedback processes" in all
systems of governance.
Jurlandia Project
Since 1990-91, when I first drafted a "model
constitution" (at the behest of the Government of Lithuania) aimed at enhancing the
"Conversation of Democracy" in Lithuania and the USSR, etc., various versions of
what has now become the Jurlandia Project at
www.jurlandia.org have existed as an evolving
internet-mediated research and publishing endeavor. That endeavor seeks to create a sort
of "encyclopedia of constitutional democracy" organized not linearly, A through
Z, but, rather, organized as a sort of "hologram of information and insight" that can be
accessed from many points and perspectives, etc., and (in due course) can
cultivate and harvest reliable user-feedback that allows "expert participants"
to propose new links and modified content which over time affects their rating as
"experts" and hence their standing as co-creators of the "virtual
polity" which the Jurlandia Project uses to illuminate the real world. Thus, the
Other Publications
Several of the articles that are now available as Jurlandia
Project writings were first published as stand-alone essays, lectures, etc.; such origins
are indicated in headnotes or footnotes to those essays. In addition, I have published
numerous articles, conference papers, and consulting reports, many of which were
co-authored (to varying degrees) with Lowry Wyman, my wife and professional partner. I was
the sole or principal author of the following:
1. "Notes to
2. "Proposed Constitution of
3. "Comments on the Draft Constitution of
4. "Comments on the Proposed Constitution of
5. "Helping
6. "Building Constitutional Democracy in
7. "Report of the Senior Legal Analyst Regarding
the
8. "Non-Profit, Tax-Exempt Organizations in the
9. "Introduction to the Rights and Privileges of
Association in the
10. "Constitutional and Legal Aspects of
Kazakhstan’s Crisis of Governance with Scenarios and Suggestions for its Judicial
Resolution" (1995). This study was prepared under USAID-Almaty auspices in
English and Russian and delivered (at the U.S. Ambassador's request) to the Chairman of
Kazakhstan’s
11. "The Fundamentals of So-Called 'Western' Law,
Law-Making, and Constitutional Democracy: An Introduction for Law Students, Lawyers, and
Judges in the Former
12. "Non-Governmental Organizations in
13. "Proposed Alternative Draft Constitution of
Kazakhstan" (initial draft prepared privately for translation and discussion
during May-June-July, 1995; eventually published in various contexts, including in the
14. "The Fundamentals of Constitutional Democracy
and the Rule of Law" This was presented in Russian at the November 1995 human
rights conference sponsored by the Kazakhstan-American Bureau on Human Rights and the Rule
of Law. The Russian text was published with the conference materials in mid-1996. This
presentation was the "first draft" of what now appears at
www.jurlandia.org/rol.htm.
See CV