One of America’s preeminent investigative reporters and nonfiction authors, Bob Woodward has won nearly every journalism award in the nation, including the 1973 Pulitzer Prize for his work with his Washington Post colleague Carl Bernstein on the Watergate scandal. 

Growing up in Wheaton, Woodward came to know a distinguished family friend, William J. Bauer, President Richard Nixon’s choice for U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois and, eventually, for a federal judgeship. Today, Bauer is a senior judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit. 

The two old friends will reunite on Thursday, May 17, at Bauer’s alma mater, Elmhurst College, to discuss issues at the heart of the American experience in democracy. The event, “Truth and Justice in America,” is the last in 2011–12 Democracy Forum lecture series, the College’s examination of the democratic process and civic life.

Bob Woodward has worked for The Washington Post since 1971 as a reporter, and is currently an associate editor of the newspaper. Last week, he was named the 2012 recipient of the Fourth Estate Award, the National Press Club’s most honored prize. Woodward also has authored or coauthored 16 nonfiction books in the last 36 years. All 16 have been national bestsellers, including All the President’s Men (1974); The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court (1979); The Agenda: Inside the Clinton White House (1994); State of Denial: Bush at War Part III (2006); and Obama’s Wars (2010). 

William J. Bauer has been a member of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit since 1975. Prior to that, he served on the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, judge of the 18th Judicial Circuit of the State of Illinois, and State’s Attorney of DuPage County. 

Bauer is a graduate of Elmhurst College (Class of 1949) and the DePaul University College of Law. He has been a trustee of Elmhurst College since 1976, and over the years he has given fourteen lectures in the College’s highly regarded Rudolf G. Schade speaker series. 

This event is free and the public is invited. For more information, call 630-617-3390.

Other speakers in the Democracy Forum lecture series at Elmhurst College have included cultural critic and sociologist Michael Eric Dyson, legal analyst and author Jeffrey Toobin, historian and political commentator Jon Meacham, activist and author Naomi Wolf, U.S. Senator Mark Kirk of Illinois, national security analyst KT McFarland, and acclaimed Harvard political scientist and author Robert Putnam.

Elmhurst College is a leading liberal arts college located eight miles west of Chicago. The College’s mission is to prepare its students for meaningful and ethical work in a multicultural, global society. Approximately 3,400 full- and part-time students are enrolled in its 22 undergraduate academic departments and nine graduate degree programs.