Dr. David Ellenson is president of Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion. Dr. Ellenson was ordained as a rabbi at HUC JIR and received his Ph D from Columbia University. His book After Emancipation: Jewish Religious Responses to Modernity won the National Jewish Book Award. His most recent book, Pledges of Jewish Allegiance: Conversion, Law, and Policymaking in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Orthodox Responsa, was coauthored with Daniel Gordis.