November 26th 1940 is a prominent date in Dutch history. On that day, the Leiden professor mr. R.P. Cleveringa had his suitcase ready because of the impending possibility of being arrested for addressing a protest against the suspension of his Jewish colleagues at the University. Cleveringa's koffer [Cleveringa's Case: Law, freedom and responsibility] opens with his original speech from 1940. Cleveringa got arrested only days later and the Leiden University was closed down; his lecture has become a symbol of university resistance over the past 70 years. This edited volume compiles nineteen of the yearly 26 November-speeches by significant international speakers. Cleveringa's koffer touches on the importance of remembrance and social commitment. In his preface, Kees Schuyt reconstructs the last November days of 1940 and amplifies on the changing character of the commemoration; in the epilogue, Ineke Sluiter describes how the stirring past shapes the present-day ethos of the academic community in Leiden.