October 3rd marks James M. Buchanan’s centennial birthday. Nobel Prize winner in 1986 and past President of the Mont Pelerin Society, Buchanan is best known for his contributions to the fields of Public Choice and Constitutional Political Economy.

The University Honors College and the new Political Economy Research Institute is organizing a special conference. PERI is housed at Middle Tennessee State University (Buchanan’s alma mater). The event has attracted former colleagues and students of Buchanan as well as young scholars already doing interesting work on his tradition.

Dr. Daniel J. Smith has done an excellent job putting this event together. The (early) drafts of the papers being presented are available at the conference site [contact the authors for permission to cite or quote].

My paper with Ed Lopez on Buchanan’s deeper motivation behind his research program can be found here.

As a final comment, on October 3rd the town and county has declared October 3rd as James M. Buchanan Day.