C. Edwin “Ed” Baker -- Communications Law Scholar

C. Edwin (Ed) Baker was a Madisonville, Kentucky resident throughout his childhood, Ed attended Stanford University, Yale College of Law, and was a Fellow at Harvard on three different occasions. C. Edwin Baker, the Nicholas F. Gallicchio Professor of Law and Communication at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and a leading scholar in the fields of constitutional law, communications law and free speech, who died suddenly on December 8, 2009 in New York City, where he had lived the past 20 years. He was 62. He collapsed while exercising and could not be revived.

Ed Baker’s four published books, Human Liberty and Freedom of Speech, Advertising and a Democratic Press, Media, Markets, and Democracy, and Media Concentration and Democracy: Why Ownership Matters, dealt with the First Amendment and with media policy. He also authored over 70 professional articles and book chapters, as well as numerous Op Ed pieces over the years, including two published in the New York Times. Yale Professor Jack Balkin describes Ed Baker as “the finest media law scholar of his generation.” His current work focused on the threats to democracy poised by the concentration of media ownership and the loss of active newspaper reporters. He testified before Congress last year on these issues. Professor Robert McChesney, co-founder of SavetheNews.org, writes that: “It is impossible to gauge the immensity of the loss with Ed Baker's passing. He has been the leading constitutional scholar on matters of freedom of the press for two decades. His commitment to a strong free press and a vibrant democracy guided all of his work.” Professor Baker was working on his fifth book at the time of his death as well as preparing to present a paper at the International Human Rights Conference in Israel.

Since his death, the University of Pennsylvania Law School Class of 2010 has awarded Ed Baker the prize for Outstanding Professor. Additionally, the law school has named an award honoring public service by students to be presented annually at the Law School graduation the C. Edwin Baker Award for Public Service. Several Symposia, including one that the recent International Human Rights conference in Israel have also been dedicated to Ed’s memory, and he has been remembered by scholars and friends around the world.

Ed Baker, known as Eddie during his childhood, was the son of the late Falcon O. Baker, Jr, and Ernestine Magagna Baker. Professor Baker is survived by his sister, Nancy Baker, of El Granada, Calif., who is on the faculty of Fielding Graduate University; her spouse, Cathy Hauer; and seven first cousins with whom he was very close. 

From Wikipedia:

C. Edwin Baker (May 28, 1947 – December 8, 2009), the Nicholas F. Gallicchio Professor of Law and Communication at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, was a leading scholar of constitutional law, communications law, and free speech. 

Biography

Baker was considered one of the country's foremost authorities on the First Amendment and on mass media policy.[1] His most recent scholarship focused on the economics of the news business, political philosophy, and jurisprudential questions concerning the egalitarian and libertarian bases of constitutional theory.

Baker was a native of Madisonville, Kentucky. He received his bachelor's degree from Stanford University and his law degree from Yale Law School. He was a law and humanities fellow at Harvard University in 1974, a fellow at Harvard's Shorenstein Barone Center in 1992, and a Radcliffe fellow there in 2006.

Baker served as a staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union and was a professor at the University of Oregon and an assistant professor at the University of Toledo. He joined the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1981, and since 2007 held a joint appointment at the Annenberg School for Communication at Penn. He was also a visiting professor at New York University, the University of Chicago, Cornell University, Harvard University, and the University of Texas.

Baker was survived by his sister, Nancy L. Baker, Ph.D., a member of the faculty at Fielding Graduate University. He was predeceased by his parents, Falcon O. Baker, Jr. and Ernestine Magagna Baker.

Books

• Human Liberty and Freedom of Speech (Oxford, 1989) defends interpreting First Amendment freedom of speech as concerned primarily with individual freedom and autonomy rather than the more traditional understanding of it being about a marketplace of ideas
• Advertising and a Democratic Press (Princeton, 1994)
• Media, Markets, and Democracy (Cambridge, 2002), 2002 winner of the Donald McGannon Award for Social and Ethical Relevance in Communications Policy Research.^[2] This book has been translated into Chinese and a number of other languages.
• Media Concentration and Democracy: Why Ownership Matters (Cambridge, 2007)

 

 THE LINEAGE:

(C. Edwin "Ed" Baker was the son of Falcon Olero, Jr. and Ernestine Maria Theresa Magagna Baker, grandson of Falcon Olero, Sr. and Myrtle Golladay Baker and grandson of James Richard and Ida Thomas Golladay.  Ida was the first child of Alfred Marshall and Eliza Anne Martin Thomas.  Alfred was the fifth child of Starkie and Mary Bridges Thomas.  Starkie was the fourth child of James and Mary Standley Thomas.  Mary Bridges was the seventh child of Drury and Charity Cohoon Bridges.)