Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit
On March 20, 2018, Judge Elizabeth L. Branch (Lisa) was sworn in as a United States Circuit Judge for the Eleventh Circuit.
Judge Branch attended and graduated from Davidson College in North Carolina (B.A., cum laude, 1990), and Emory University School of Law (J.D., with distinction, 1994).
After graduating from law school, Judge Branch served as a federal law clerk to The Honorable J. Owen Forrester of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Georgia from 1994 to 1996. Following her clerkship, Judge Branch joined the litigation department of Smith, Gambrell & Russell, LLP in Atlanta as an associate and then a partner.
From 2004 to 2008, Judge Branch was a senior official in the Administration of President George W. Bush in Washington, D.C. She served first as the Associate General Counsel for Rules and Legislation at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and then as the Counselor to the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs at the U. S. Office of Management and Budget.
She returned to Smith Gambrell in 2008 as a litigation partner. Judge Branch then was appointed to the Court of Appeals of Georgia by Governor Nathan Deal, taking office on September 4, 2012, where she served until March 19, 2018.
Judge Branch is a member of the Board of Advisors of the Atlanta Lawyers Chapter for the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies.
Howard M. Holtzmann Professor of International Law, Yale Law School
Lea Brilmayer is the Howard M. Holtzmann Professor of International Law at Yale Law School. In addition to teaching Contracts to first-year students, she also teaches Conflict of Laws and International Courts and Tribunals, as well as seminars on the laws of war and on African current affairs. Her degrees include a B.A. in mathematics and a J.D. from the University of California at Berkeley, as well as an LL.M. from Columbia Law School. Brilmayer has taught at a number of different law schools as either a professor or visiting professor, including the University of Texas, the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan, Columbia Law School, Harvard Law School, and the New York University School of Law (where she led a weekly seminar on International Jurisprudence.) She is a member of the Texas and Supreme Court bars. She has given numerous endowed lectures at other American law schools and has also taught twice at the summer session of the Hague Academy of International Law.
During her first decade of teaching, her writing interests mainly concerned conflict of laws (in particular, personal jurisdiction and choice of law); federal jurisdiction; and jurisprudence. Her conflict of laws writings have included one theoretical book on the subject and a leading casebook (in the more recent editions, co-authored with Jack Goldsmith). Together with a group of Yale student contributors, she published An Introduction to Jurisdiction in the American Federal System. Her writings on the conflict of laws have resulted in her being asked on a number of occasions to testify before Congressional committees, most recently on the Full Faith and Credit implications of same sex marriage. More recently, her interests have gradually turned to international law and international relations, and she is frequently cited for her academic writings about nationalism and the international legal status of secessionist movements. Her research in international jurisprudence has also led to two books, Justifying International Acts and American Hegemony: Political Morality in a One-Superpower World.
In addition to her academic interests, Brilmayer carries on an active life in interstate and international adjudication. In addition to contributing to amicus briefs, she has served as counsel of record before the United States Supreme Court and has been an expert consultant on many lower and intermediate appellate court cases. For the last decade she has served as lead counsel in several international public (state-to-state) arbitrations dealing with island sovereignty, maritime delimitation, land boundaries, and mass claims for violations of the laws of war.
John D. Ayer Chair in Business Law and Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Law, UC Davis School of Law
Professor Dodge is a leading expert on international law, international transactions, and international dispute resolution. He served as Counselor on International Law to the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State from 2011 to 2012 and as Co-Reporter for the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Fourth) of Foreign Relations Law from 2012 to 2018. He is currently a member of the State Department’s Advisory Committee on International Law and an Adviser to the American Law Institute’s Restatement (Third) of the Conflict of Laws.
Professor Dodge is co-author (with Detlev Vagts, Hannah Buxbaum, and Harold Koh) of the casebook Transnational Business Problems (6th ed. Foundation Press 2019) and co-editor (with David Sloss and Michael Ramsey) of International Law in the U.S. Supreme Court: Continuity and Change (Cambridge University Press 2011), which won the American Society of International Law’s 2012 certificate of merit. He has more than 60 other publications in books and law reviews, including the Columbia Law Review, the Duke Law Journal, the Georgetown Law Journal, the Harvard Law Review, the Michigan Law Review, and the Yale Law Journal. The U.S. Supreme Court and the Supreme Court of Canada have relied on his work, as have state courts and lower federal courts in the United States.
Professor Dodge teaches International Business Transactions, International Litigation and Arbitration, Conflict of Laws, and Contracts. He has won the Rutter Distinguished Teaching Award both at UC Davis and at UC Hastings, where he was previously Roger J. Traynor Professor of Law.
Professor Dodge received his B.A. in History, summa cum laude, from Yale University in 1986. After teaching English in Tianjin, China, he attended Yale Law School, where he was a Notes Editor of the Yale Law Journal, served as Director of the Lowenstein International Human Rights Project, and earned his J.D. in 1991. Professor Dodge clerked for Judge William A. Norris of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and for Justice Harry A. Blackmun of the U.S. Supreme Court. From 1993 to 1995, he was an attorney at Arnold & Porter in Washington, D.C.
He is a member of the American Law Institute.
Andrea M. Leelike is working at the intersection of generative AI and the law as a Strategic Business Development Lead at Harvey AI. She previously worked as a Private Credit Associate at Proskauer Rose LLP in New York City and as a Finance Associate at Winston & Strawn LLP in Dallas.
Andrea attended the University of Pennsylvania Law School where she served as President of Penn’s Federalist Society chapter. She also served as an Associate Editor and Community Relations Board Member on the Journal of Law and Innovation. She is a native of eastern Long Island and earned her B.S.B.A. in Business Management and Administration at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business.
Sterling and Eleanor Colton Endowed Chair in Law; Associate Director, International Center for Law and Religion Studies, BYU Law
Professor Moore is a scholar of foreign relations law, international law, international human rights, and international development. His publications have appeared in the Harvard, Columbia, Virginia, and Northwestern Law Reviews, among others. Professor Moore has taught international law, international human rights, U.S. foreign relations law, civil procedure, legal scholarship, a plenary powers colloquium, and an international religious freedom clinic. As a teacher, he has been recognized with the University's R. Wayne Hansen Teaching and Learning Fellowship, the BYU Law Alumni Association Teacher of the Year Award, and the Student Bar Association First Year Professor of the Year Award. He is a member of the American Law Institute.
As a human rights expert, Professor Moore serves on the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s Moscow Mechanism. In 2020, he was elected to a brief term on the Human Rights Committee, a body of independent experts that oversees states’ compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Professor Moore also serves as an Associate Director of the International Center for Law and Religion Studies, which seeks to secure the blessings of religious freedom and belief for everyone.
Between 2017 and 2019, Professor Moore served, variously, as the Acting Deputy Administrator and General Counsel of the U.S. Agency for International Development, the federal government’s lead agency for international development and humanitarian assistance. From 2016 to 2017, he was the Associate Dean for Research and Academic Affairs at Brigham Young University Law School. He was a Visiting Professor at the George Washington University Law School from 2008 to 2009.
Before joining BYU, Professor Moore clerked for Justice Samuel A. Alito, Jr. during the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2007 Term. From 2003 to 2007, Professor Moore was an assistant and then associate professor at the University of Kentucky College of Law. He arrived at the University of Kentucky after researching and teaching at the University of Chicago Law School as an Olin Fellow from 2001 to 2003. From 2000 to 2001, Professor Moore clerked for Judge Samuel A. Alito, Jr. on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. From 1996 to 2000, he was an Honor Program trial attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Division, Federal Programs Branch.
Professor Moore is a summa cum laude graduate of Brigham Young University Law School, where he served as Editor in Chief of the Law Review and graduated first in his class. He received his BA from Brigham Young University, where he was a Benson scholar and graduated summa cum laude, with University Honors, and as co-valedictorian of his college. He and his wife Natalie are the parents of seven wonderful children.
Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center
Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz teaches constitutional law and federal jurisdiction, and he writes articles for the Harvard Law Review and the Stanford Law Review.
He is currently developing a new theory of constitutional interpretation and judicial review. The first installment, entitledThe Subjects of the Constitution, was published in the Stanford Law Review in May of 2010, and it is among the most downloaded articles about constitutional interpretation, judicial review, and/or federal courts in the history of SSRN. The second installment, The Objects of the Constitution, was published in May of 2011, also in the Stanford Law Review. And the comprehensive version is forthcoming as a book by Oxford University Press.
Rosenkranz has served and advised the federal government in a variety of capacities. He clerked for Judge Frank H. Easterbrook on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (1999-2000) and for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy at the U.S. Supreme Court (October Term 2001). He served as an Attorney-Advisor at the Office of Legal Counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice (November 2002 - July 2004). He often testifies before Congress as a constitutional expert—most recently before the House Financial Services Oversight Subcommittee, regarding the Obama Administration's use of bank settlement agreements to circumvent the Appropriations Clause. He has also filed briefs and presented oral argument before the U.S. Supreme Court. His most recent Supreme Court brief, in Los Angeles v. Patel, was cited by Justice Alito in dissent.
Rosenkranz is a member of the New York Bar and the U.S. Supreme Court Bar. He is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE). He is a founding member of Heterodox Academy and a member of its Executive Committee. He also serves on the Board of Directors of the Federalist Society and as the faculty advisor to the Georgetown chapter.
Dean and Bernard G. Segal Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania Law School
Theodore Ruger brings fresh insight to the study of some of the oldest questions of American law – namely the theoretical justifications for, and empirical contours of, the application of judicial authority. In exploring these issues, Ruger supplements traditional legal analysis with the methods of other disciplines, including history and political science. His work has appeared in the Harvard Law Review, the Columbia Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law, the Northwestern Law Review, and as the centerpiece of a symposium in Perspectives on Politics, a leading peer-reviewed political science journal. In addition to his interests in constitutional law and legislation, Ruger also teaches and writes in the area of health law and pharmaceutical regulation. His current research in that field draws on his broader work on judicial power and constitutionalism, and addresses the manner in which American legal institutions – including the U.S. Supreme Court – have shaped the field of health law over the past two centuries.
Senior Attorney, Institute for Justice
Paul Avelar is the Managing Attorney of the Institute for Justice Arizona Office. He joined the Institute in March 2010 and litigates free speech, property rights, economic liberty, school choice and other constitutional cases in federal and state courts.
As the head of IJ’s national Braiding Freedom Initiative, Paul represents natural hair braiders across the country to protect their right to earn an honest living. The Initiative uses lawsuits, activism and research to remove laws that require potential braiders to undergo hundreds of costly training hours just to braid hair. Since IJ launched the Braiding Freedom Initiative in 2014, 12 additional states have freed braiders from unnecessary licensing burdens. Paul drafted the model Natural Hair Braiding Protection Act, which has been adopted in Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Kentucky, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Texas and South Dakota. He is currently representing braiders in Missouri, where state laws infringe upon their right to earn an honest living.
In his free speech work, Paul has challenged numerous laws that trample First Amendment rights. In Arizona Freedom Club PAC v. Bennett, he represented candidates and independent groups in a successful U.S. Supreme Court challenge to the “matching funds” provision of Arizona’s publicly financed elections system. He represented grassroots groups and individuals in Arizona, Mississippi and Washington, where state laws burdened their political speech by requiring them to register with the government, to navigate complex regulations and to face fines and possible criminal penalties merely because they talked about political issues. In Washington, Paul protected a lawyer’s right to defend, pro-bono, the First Amendment rights of political speakers. Through litigation and legislation, Paul leads the fight against abusive civil forfeiture laws in Arizona and elsewhere.
Paul also co-authored the most comprehensive published study of economic liberty protections in the Arizona Constitution. The Chief Justice of the Arizona Supreme Court appointed Paul to the Task Force on the Review of the Role and Governance Structure of the State Bar of Arizona, where he dissented from the majority report and called on leaders to substantially reform the Bar and state regulation of the practice of law. He often speaks at law schools across the country about constitutional issues and his work at IJ.
Prior to joining IJ-AZ, Paul worked as an attorney in Philadelphia. He clerked for Judge Roger Miner on the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Justice Andrew Hurwitz on the Arizona Supreme Court, and Judge Daniel Barker on the Arizona Court of Appeals.
Paul graduated manga cum laude from the Arizona State University College of Law in 2004 and was elected to the Order of the Coif. He received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in 2000.
Mr. Pekron’s practice is primarily devoted to complex business, tort, and class action litigation. Mr. Pekron is listed in The Best Lawyers in America® in the area of Commercial Litigation, recognized as a Rising Star in the area of Business Litigation by Mid-South Super Lawyers, and a Future Star in Litigation by Benchmark Litigation. He has represented companies and individuals in cases throughout the nation involving breach of contract, professional liability, consumer fraud, products liability, and ERISA issues. He has significant experience in representing accounting firms, publicly-traded companies, and corporate officers and directors in securities litigation, regulatory matters, professional malpractice actions, and internal investigations.
Mr. Pekron also has an active appellate practice and has appeared in numerous state and federal appellate courts, including the Supreme Court of Illinois, the New York Court of Appeals, and the United States Courts of Appeals for the Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Circuits. He has argued cases before the Arkansas Supreme Court, the Arkansas Court of Appeals, and the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. He has also been responsible for petitions for certiorari and amicus briefs in the United States Supreme Court.
Mr. Pekron received his law degree from Yale Law School, where he served as Book Reviews Editor of the Yale Law Journal. His work has been published in the Hamline Law Review.
After graduating from law school, Mr. Pekron clerked for Judge Morris Sheppard Arnold of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. During his clerkship, he served as an adjunct professor of law at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock School of Law. He then worked as an associate at the Chicago law firm of Sidley Austin LLP.
Partner, Robbins Ross Alloy Belinfante Littlefield LLC
Josh Belinfante represents clients in commercial and administrative disputes, and he is one of Georgia’s most knowledgeable attorneys on appellate matters and questions of governmental law and policy. He represents governmental and non-governmental clients, and those in the highly regulated fields of healthcare, gaming, land use, and energy.
Josh brings to bear his experience in all three branches of government, having served as the Executive Counsel or Chief Legal Advisor to Governor Sonny Perdue, Georgia’s 81st Governor (2007-2009), Legal Counsel to the Georgia House Judiciary Committee (2006), and Law Clerk to Judge J.L. Edmondson of the Eleventh Circuit (2004-2005).
In litigation matters, Josh’s practice involves commercial disputes and representation of government and those challenging governmental acts. He has successfully argued cases that have shaped the Georgia healthcare and gaming industries. Josh also represents clients involved in procurement matters and bid protests, cases before the public service commission, and in precedent-setting challenges to annexations and local ordinances. He has long been a go-to lawyer of the State of Georgia in numerous high stakes cases against the United States Department of Justice, and private parties challenging Georgia’s Medicaid and special education programs.
Outside of litigation, Josh has significant experience in in campaign finance and election law matters. He represents entities governed by federal and state campaign finance laws, including campaigns and political action committees. He also has specific experience drafting laws governing Certificate of Need, gaming, the Georgia Lottery, restrictive covenants and non-compete agreements, and eminent domain.
The Atlanta Business Chronicle described Josh as the “go-to guy for Georgia healthcare policy and legislation.” In 2011, the Atlanta Business Chronicle named Josh one of the 40 Under 40 of Atlanta’s Rising and Business Leaders. In 2010, The Fulton County Daily Report named Josh one of 10 attorneys “On the Rise,” and Georgia Trend named him one of Georgia’s “Legal Elite.” Atlanta Magazine named Josh a “Super Lawyer” since 2015, and it frequently named him a Georgia “Rising Star Super Lawyer.” James Magazine has repeatedly identified Josh as one of the “Best Lawyers in Georgia.”
Josh serves on the University of Georgia Law School Alumni Council, the Board of Directors of the Atlanta Chapter of the Federalist Society, and he is a graduate of Leadership Atlanta (2012), Leadership Sandy Springs (2015), and the Coverdell Leadership Institute (2007).
Josh is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Georgia School of Law. He also taught high school at Pace Academy in Atlanta.
Senior Counsel, Alston & Bird, LLP
A former Justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia, Keith Blackwell is senior counsel with Alston & Bird LLP in Atlanta. His practice is focused principally on the representation of clients in federal and state courts in appeals and litigation involving issues of first impression, the application of settled law to emerging industries and technologies, novel constitutional questions, conflicting precedents, and other complex legal issues. He also represents law firms and lawyers in professional liability matters, and he represents clients in connection with criminal and regulatory investigations and proceedings.
Justice Blackwell served for more than eight years on the Supreme Court, and he previously served as a Judge of the Court of Appeals of Georgia. In the course of his judicial service, he authored more than 400 published opinions and participated in the disposition of approximately 4,500 appeals, as well as 8,000 petitions for writs of certiorari and other applications for leave to appeal. In addition, Justice Blackwell served as the liaison between the Supreme Court and the State Bar of Georgia, the Office of Bar Admissions, the Board of Bar Examiners, and the Board to Determine the Fitness of Bar Applicants. Justice Blackwell retired from judicial service in November 2020 to return to the private practice of law.
Prior to his judicial service, Justice Blackwell practiced law with Parker, Hudson, Rainer & Dobbs LLP in Atlanta, where his practice was focused on complex business litigation. He also served for several years as an assistant district attorney in Cobb County, Georgia, where he was responsible for hundreds of felony prosecutions and appeared regularly as lead trial counsel. In addition, he served as a law clerk for Judge J.L. Edmondson at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Justice Blackwell graduated summa cum laude from the University of Georgia School of Law as first honor graduate in 1999. He also received a degree in political science from the University of Georgia in 1996.
Justice Blackwell is a member of the Board of Advisors and a former president of the Atlanta Lawyers’ Chapter of the Federalist Society.
Professor Emeritus, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University
In memoriam
Dr. John Baker is Professor Emeritus of Law, and previously the Dale E. Bennett Professor of Law, at Louisiana State University Law School. He is currently Visiting Professor at Peking University School of Transnational Law (via Zoom) and has been Visiting Professor at The Center for the Constitution, Georgetown Law School (2013-2020). He has also been a Visiting Fellow at Oriel College, the University of Oxford (2012-2014) and taught at Blackfriars Hall, Oxford in 2014. Dr. Baker has also been an adjunct Fellow at the Heritage Foundation (Spring, 2008) and a Distinguished Scholar at the Catholic University of America Law School (2011-12). He has taught at Tulane Law School, George Mason Law School, Pepperdine Law School, New York Law School, Hong Kong University, and the University of Dallas, School of Management and also taught and/or lectured in 17 foreign countries. Notable among his foreign visits are the
following: Visiting Professor at the University of Lyon III (France) (1999-2011); Visiting Professor at the Universidad de los Andes, Chile (2012), as a Fulbright Specialist (2006); and a Fulbright Scholar at various universities in the Philippines. Dr. Baker received his J.D., with honors, from the University of Michigan Law School and his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Dallas. He also earned a Ph.D. in Political Thought from the University of London. Baker has taught over a dozen different subjects, mostly courses in public law. His main areas of interest are Constitutional Law (particularly federalism and separation of powers), Criminal Law, Anti-Terrorism Law, International Law, Health Care Law, Mediation, and Comparative Law.
In addition to law review articles and book chapters, Dr. Baker’s academic publications include Hall's Criminal Law: Cases and Materials (with Benson, Force and George; 5th ed. Michie, 1993); An Introduction to the Law of the United States (ed. with Levasseur; University Press of America, 1992). He has also published on Forbes.com, FoxNews.com, in The Washington Times, and a number of times in The Wall Street Journal. He argues in federal court, including two oral arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court. For many years, he co-taught courses for the Federalist Society on separation of powers with the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. In September 2016, he co-taught a Supreme Court seminar in China with Justice Samuel Alito. Following law school, he served as a law clerk in federal district court and as an assistant district attorney in New Orleans before joining LSU in 1975. While a professor, he has been as a consultant to USAID, USIA (since rolled into the State Department), the Justice Department, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Powers, and the Office of Planning in the White House. He served on an ABA Task Force which issued the report, The Federalization of Crime (1998) and later as a consultant to the “Bi-Partisan Task Force on the Over- federalization of Crime” (2012-2014) created by the U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime. Dr. Baker was a co-founder of the first iteration (1995) of Stratfor Inc., a global intelligence agency. He co-authored its first book: The Intelligence Edge (with Friedman, Friedman and Chapman; Crown Books/Random House 1997). In 2022, he began a short, weekly video podcast available on YouTube and Rumble, The Baker Brief.
Senior Fellow, R Street Institute
Prior to R Street, Adam spent 12 years as a senior fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Before the Mercatus Center, he served as the president of the Progress and Freedom Foundation. Adam has also worked for the Adam Smith Institute, the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute.
Adam has published 10 books on a wide range of topics, including online child safety, internet governance, intellectual property, telecommunications policy, media regulation and federalism.
In 2008, Adam received the Family Online Safety Institute’s “Award for Outstanding Achievement.”
Partner, Nelson Mullins Riley & Scarborough LLP
Miles practices in the areas of appeals, business litigation, and First Amendment law. In addition to representing clients in complex civil and criminal litigation and appeals, Miles advises and represents public and private universities and serves as outside general counsel to several business and educational clients. He also represents and counsels private entities and government agencies and officials, including multiple current and former governors of South Carolina and members of Congress, on issues relating to the constitutional and statutory freedoms of speech, religion, and association. His First Amendment work has been cited by the United States Supreme Court.
Vice President for Legal Strategy, Stand Together
Casey Mattox is Vice President for Legal Strategy at Stand Together and Senior Advisor at
Americans for Prosperity. In these roles he advocates for and creates strategies and
partnerships to ensure a constitutionally limited government that protects the civil liberties of all
Americans. Prior to joining Stand Together and AFP Casey’s legal career focused on defending
the First Amendment rights of students, faculty, healthcare workers and religious organizations.
Casey has a J.D. from Boston College School of Law and an undergraduate degree from the
University of Virginia. You can find him on Twitter at @CaseyMattox_ and on LinkedIn at
@Casey-Mattox-ST.
Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow, The Hoover Institution, Stanford University; Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus, UCLA School of Law
Eugene Volokh is the Thomas M. Siebel Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution (Stanford), as well as the Gary T. Schwartz Distinguished Professor of Law Emeritus and Distinguished Research Professor at UCLA School of Law. He recently retired from teaching at UCLA, after 30 years there, and is now focusing on research.
Volokh is the author of the textbooks The First Amendment and Related Statutes (8th ed. 2023), and Academic Legal Writing (5th ed. 2016), as well as over 100 academic law journal articles, mostly on First Amendment law. He is a member of The American Law Institute; the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Free Speech Law; and the creator and coauthor of The Volokh Conspiracy, a leading legal blog founded in 2002 (hosted at the Washington Post from 2014 to 2017 and now at Reason Magazine).
Professor of Political Science, Northeastern University
Professor of Law Emeritus, Brooklyn Law
Henry Mark Holzer received his B.A. degree from New York University where he studied Russian and political science. After graduation in 1954 he served in South Korea with United States Army intelligence, holding top secret clearance as chief order of battle analyst (Chinese Communist Forces) at Eighth Army Headquarters in Seoul. Following Professor Holzer’s military service he earned his Juris Doctor degree at New York University School of Law. After his admission to the New York bar in December 1959 he practiced constitutional and appellate law.
From 1972 to 1993 he taught full time at Brooklyn Law School, and for two years was an associate dean. His courses included Constitutional Law, Administrative Law, Civil Liberties, First Amendment and Appellate Advocacy. In the fall of 1993, he taught as a visiting professor at the University of New Mexico School of Law in Albuquerque.
He is author of approximately 300 articles, essays, and reviews. He has published legal and political commentary on current issues in print and electronic media, and has often been interviewed on radio and television.
Several of his out-of-print books are The Gold Clause: Government’s Money Monopoly; Sweet Land of Liberty? The Supreme Court and Individual Rights; Speaking Freely: The Case Against Speech Codes; Why Not Call it Treason? Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan and Today. With his wife, Erika Holzer, he is co-author of “Aid and Comfort”: Jane Fonda in North Vietnam; and Fake Warriors: Identifying, Exposing, and Punishing Those Who Falsify Their Military Service.
His book The Supreme Court Opinions of Clarence Thomas, 1919-2006, was published in 2007. The second edition, covering the years 1991-2011 was published in 2012. Also published in 2012, in a print edition and eBook, was Professor Holzer’s book The American Constitution and Ayn Rand’s “Inner Contradiction.”
Richard and Frances Mallery Professor of Law and Faculty Director, Constitutional Law Center, Stanford Law School
Michael W. McConnell is the Richard and Frances Mallery Professor and Faculty Director of the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford Law School, and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. From 2002 to 2009, he served as a Circuit Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. He was nominated by President George W. Bush, a Republican, and confirmed by a Democratic Senate by unanimous consent. McConnell has previously held chaired professorships at the University of Chicago and the University of Utah, and visiting professorships at Harvard and NYU. He teaches courses on constitutional law, constitutional history, First Amendment, and interpretive theory. He has published widely in the fields of constitutional law and theory, especially church and state, equal protection, and separation of powers. His book, “The President Who Would Not Be King: Executive Power Under the Constitution,” was published by Princeton University Press in 2020, based on the Tanner Lectures in Human Values, which he delivered at Princeton in 2019. His latest book, co-authored with Nathan Chapman, “Agreeing to Disagree: How the Establishment Clause Protects Religious Diversity and Freedom of Conscience,” was published by Oxford University Press in mid-2023. McConnell has argued sixteen cases in the United States Supreme Court, most recently Carney v. Adams (2020). defending a provision of the Delaware Constitution requiring political balance on that state’s courts. More recently, he was co-counsel in Gonzalez v. Google. He earned his B.A. from Michigan State University and his J.D. from the University of Chicago, and has received honorary degrees from Notre Dame University and Michigan State. He served as law clerk to Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. and D.C. Circuit Chief Judge J. Skelly Wright. He has been Assistant General Counsel of the Office of Management & Budget, Assistant to the Solicitor General of the Department of Justice, and a member of the President’s Intelligence Oversight Board. He is Senior of Counsel to the law firm Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati, and is co-chair of Meta’s Oversight Review Board.
Senior Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit
John T. Noonan, Jr. was a federal judge on senior status with the United States Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit. He joined the court in 1985 after being nominated by President Ronald Reagan. He assumed senior status on December 27, 1996, and served as a senior judge until his death on April 17, 2017.
Senior Counsel, American Civil Liberties Union
Arthur B. Spitzer was the Legal Director of the ACLU of the District of Columbia from April Fool’s Day, 1980 until April 2020, when he became Senior Counsel. His work has spanned the range of ACLU issues, including freedom of speech and religion, police misconduct, national security, due process, privacy, prisoners’ rights, the rights of government employees, freedom of information, discrimination based on race, sex, religion, sexual orientation and gender preference, and more.
He has represented such varied clients as Mohamedou Ould Slahi (a Guantánamo detainee held without charge for 14 years), Louis Farrakhan (when he was barred from attending then-D.C. Mayor Marion Barry’s criminal trial), the Ku Klux Klan (when it was denied a permit to march in D.C.), the National Black Police Association (challenging ultra-low D.C. election campaign contribution limits), the White House Vigil for the Equal Rights Amendment (challenging restrictive regulations for demonstrating near the White House), People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (when its design for an abused circus elephant was rejected from a public art display), Milo Yiannopoulos (whose advertisement for his new book was denied advertising by the D.C. transit authority), and both John and Jane Doe.
In Abbate v. Ramsey, Art represented some of the nearly 400 protestors arrested at an anti-World Bank demonstration in Pershing Park in 2002, challenging their illegal arrest and inhumane detention, and resulting in a settlement that included major changes in D.C. police practices in demonstration situations. He also had a major hand in crafting the legislation that created the D.C. police civilian review board (now known as the Office of Police Complaints) and the First Amendment Rights and Police Practices Act, a model statute governing D.C. police conduct during the peaceful exercise of free speech rights.
Other cases include Harmon v. Thornburgh (challenging random drug testing of Justice Department employees), Walsh v. Montrose Christian School (representing longtime school secretaries and a cafeteria worker at a Christian School who were fired because they were not members of the church), Schroer v. Billington (representing a trans woman who was fired by the Library of Congress when she disclosed her status), Center for National Security Studies v. U.S. Department of Justice (challenging the secret detention of immigrants after 9/11), Wimberly v. D.C. Board of Elections and Ethics (blocking a proposed ballot initiative to permit organized group prayer in D.C. public schools), and LaShawn A. v. Bowser (a still-ongoing class action filed in 1989 to reform D.C.’s dysfunctional foster care system).
In the Supreme Court, Art successfully argued Ake v. Oklahoma, which ruled that poor criminal defendants are entitled to free expert witnesses when needed for their defense, just as they’re entitled to free lawyers.
Art was born in Brooklyn (yay!), raised in Queens, and educated at Cornell University and Yale Law School. Before ascending to the ACLU, he practiced for several years at the law firm now known as WilmerHale. He has taught a course in “Demonstration Law” at the University of the District of Columbia School of Law.
His dog is Taxi; his cats are Tigris and Euphrates. He is not and has never been related to former New York governor Elliot Spitzer.
Professor Emeritus, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University
In memoriam
Dr. John Baker is Professor Emeritus of Law, and previously the Dale E. Bennett Professor of Law, at Louisiana State University Law School. He is currently Visiting Professor at Peking University School of Transnational Law (via Zoom) and has been Visiting Professor at The Center for the Constitution, Georgetown Law School (2013-2020). He has also been a Visiting Fellow at Oriel College, the University of Oxford (2012-2014) and taught at Blackfriars Hall, Oxford in 2014. Dr. Baker has also been an adjunct Fellow at the Heritage Foundation (Spring, 2008) and a Distinguished Scholar at the Catholic University of America Law School (2011-12). He has taught at Tulane Law School, George Mason Law School, Pepperdine Law School, New York Law School, Hong Kong University, and the University of Dallas, School of Management and also taught and/or lectured in 17 foreign countries. Notable among his foreign visits are the
following: Visiting Professor at the University of Lyon III (France) (1999-2011); Visiting Professor at the Universidad de los Andes, Chile (2012), as a Fulbright Specialist (2006); and a Fulbright Scholar at various universities in the Philippines. Dr. Baker received his J.D., with honors, from the University of Michigan Law School and his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Dallas. He also earned a Ph.D. in Political Thought from the University of London. Baker has taught over a dozen different subjects, mostly courses in public law. His main areas of interest are Constitutional Law (particularly federalism and separation of powers), Criminal Law, Anti-Terrorism Law, International Law, Health Care Law, Mediation, and Comparative Law.
In addition to law review articles and book chapters, Dr. Baker’s academic publications include Hall's Criminal Law: Cases and Materials (with Benson, Force and George; 5th ed. Michie, 1993); An Introduction to the Law of the United States (ed. with Levasseur; University Press of America, 1992). He has also published on Forbes.com, FoxNews.com, in The Washington Times, and a number of times in The Wall Street Journal. He argues in federal court, including two oral arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court. For many years, he co-taught courses for the Federalist Society on separation of powers with the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. In September 2016, he co-taught a Supreme Court seminar in China with Justice Samuel Alito. Following law school, he served as a law clerk in federal district court and as an assistant district attorney in New Orleans before joining LSU in 1975. While a professor, he has been as a consultant to USAID, USIA (since rolled into the State Department), the Justice Department, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Powers, and the Office of Planning in the White House. He served on an ABA Task Force which issued the report, The Federalization of Crime (1998) and later as a consultant to the “Bi-Partisan Task Force on the Over- federalization of Crime” (2012-2014) created by the U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime. Dr. Baker was a co-founder of the first iteration (1995) of Stratfor Inc., a global intelligence agency. He co-authored its first book: The Intelligence Edge (with Friedman, Friedman and Chapman; Crown Books/Random House 1997). In 2022, he began a short, weekly video podcast available on YouTube and Rumble, The Baker Brief.
Professor, University of Puerto Rico School of Law
William Vazquez Irizarry is a tenured professor at the University of Puerto Rico School of Law, where he teaches Administrative Law, Constitutional Law and Civil Procedure. Before joining the UPR’s faculty, he served as Executive Assistant to Governor Sila Calderon’s Chief of Staff, legal counsel to Governor Sila Calderón and Attorney General of Puerto Rico.
Vazquez obtained an LL.M. from the London School of Economics. He is known for his lectures and publications on the topic of administrative law in Puerto Rico. Most notably, he has made an in-depth study of the powers of the Office of the Governor of Puerto Rico and the use of executive orders: “Los poderes del Gobernador de Puerto Rico y el uso de órdenes ejecutivas”, 76 Rev. Jur. UPR 715 (2007). More recently, he addressed the issue of lockdowns in Puerto Rico in an opinion piece published at El Nuevo Dia newspaper.
Senior Fellow and Director of Constitutional Studies, Manhattan Institute
Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. Previously he was executive director and senior lecturer at the Georgetown Center for the Constitution, and before that a vice president of the Cato Institute.
Shapiro is the author of Lawless: The Miseducation of America’s Elites (2025) and Supreme Disorder: Judicial Nominations and the Politics of America’s Highest Court (2020), coauthor of Religious Liberties for Corporations? (2014), and editor of 11 volumes of the Cato Supreme Court Review (2008-18). He has contributed to a variety of academic, popular, and professional publications, including the Wall Street Journal, Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, USA Today, National Review, and Newsweek. He also regularly provides commentary for various media outlets, writes the Shapiro’s Gavel newsletter on Substack, and once appeared on the Colbert Report.
Shapiro has testified many times before Congress and state legislatures and has filed more than 500 amicus curiae “friend of the court” briefs in the Supreme Court. He lectures regularly on behalf of the Federalist Society, is a member of the board of fellows of the Jewish Policy Center, was an inaugural Washington Fellow at the National Review Institute, and has been an adjunct law professor at the George Washington University and University of Mississippi. He is also the chairman of the board of advisers of the Mississippi Justice Institute, a barrister in the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court, and a former member of the Virginia Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Earlier in his career, Shapiro was a special assistant/adviser to the Multi-National Force in Iraq on rule-of-law issues and practiced at Patton Boggs and Cleary Gottlieb. Before entering private practice, he clerked for Judge E. Grady Jolly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He holds an AB from Princeton University, an MSc from the London School of Economics, and a JD from the University of Chicago Law School.
Attorney
John Ross Serrano is an attorney admitted to the practice of law in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the United States District Court for the District of Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Supreme Court. He is currently an active-duty officer in the U.S. Army’s Judge Advocate General Corps.
Prior to beginning his military service, he clerked at the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the District of Puerto Rico; served as the University of Puerto Rico – Rio Piedras Campus’ Equal Employment Opportunity Compliance Officer; practiced the notarial profession; and undertook pro bono case work. He also taught CLE on issues of bankruptcy and ethics.
He is a founding board member of the Puerto Rico Lawyers’ Chapter of the Federalist Society. Before being admitted to the practice of law, he founded the College Republican Federation of Puerto Rico and was subsequently elected Comptroller of the College Republican National Committee.
John is a product of the University of Puerto Rico, the oldest and largest learning institution in the Caribbean, where he obtained his high school diploma, bachelor of arts, and juris doctor degree.
Deputy Solicitor General of Puerto Rico, Puerto Rico Department of Justice
Oklahoma Senate Judiciary Committee Chair
Senator Julie Daniels was elected to the State Senate in 2016. She is honored to represent the people of District 29, which includes Washington, Nowata and northern Rogers Counties.
Prior to her election Julie spent three decades in volunteer leadership in her adopted hometown of Bartlesville. She currently serves on the boards of the Boys & Girls Club of Bartlesville, Arvest Bank Bartlesville, Bluestem Medical Foundation, and the Oklahoma Alliance of Boys & Girls Clubs. She is a member of the Oklahoma Bar Association.
Daniels is a former Mayor of Bartlesville and served eight years on the City Council. During her council tenure she focused on local government reform, long-term water supply, downtown redevelopment, park and recreation improvements and historic preservation projects.
Senator Daniels served on the Oklahoma Tourism and Recreation Commission and the Oklahoma Centennial Commemoration Commission. She participated in the public phase of the preparation of the 2012 State Water Plan. She is a graduate of Leadership Oklahoma and Leadership Bartlesville.
Julie was born and raised in Oklahoma City. She graduated from the University of Oklahoma and the University of Tulsa College of Law. She and husband Charlie have been married forty years. They have two sons, a lovely daughter-in-law and a beautiful granddaughter. The Daniels are members of Bartlesville First United Methodist Church.
Shareholder and Director, GableGotwals
Solicitor General of Oklahoma
Mithun Mansinghani serves as Solicitor General for the State of Oklahoma. He was appointed by Attorney General Mike Hunter in 2017 after serving for the prior two years as Deputy Solicitor General. As Solicitor General, Mr. Mansinghani leads litigation on behalf of the State in appeals, constitutional matters, and relations with the federal government and other states. This includes representing the State in cases before the Oklahoma Supreme Court and the U.S. Supreme Court.
Prior to joining the Oklahoma Attorney General's Office, Mr. Mansinghani was a lawyer for Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington, D.C., specializing in appeals and administrative law cases. Mr. Mansinghani also served as a law clerk to the Honorable Jerry E. Smith on the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He received his bachelor's degree magna cum laude in both political science and policy studies from Rice University and his law degree with honors from Harvard Law School, where he served as editor of the Harvard Law Review.
Panel I: The Role of International Law in U.S. Constitutional Interpretation
Lisa Branch, Lea Brilmayer, William S. Dodge, Andrea M. Leelike, David Moore, Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz, Theodore Ruger
2021 National Student Symposium
In 1900, the Supreme Court stated that “international law is part of our law” in...
The Right to Earn an Honest Living: Occupational Licensing Versus the American Dream
Paul Avelar, Chad W. Pekron
Little Rock Lawyers Chapter - Online Event
On March 1, 2021, the Federalist Society's Little Rock Lawyers Chapter hosted Paul Avelar to...
The Supreme Court of Georgia, A Retrospective
Josh B. Belinfante, Keith R. Blackwell
Atlanta Lawyers Chapter
On February 25, 2021, The Federalist Society's Atlanta Lawyers Chapter hosted Hon. Keith Blackwell, Former...
Federalist Papers Book Club: The Federalist [Session 8]
John S. Baker
Federalist ##62, 63, 65, 66 (The Senate)
Slide deck I Federalist Papers Book Club will run weekly on Tuesday evenings for 10...
Regulating Big Tech: Lessons from the “Hall of Fallen Giants”
Adam Thierer
A Regulatory Transparency Project Fourth Branch Video
In recent years, concerns about "Big Tech" have sparked debate about competition and monopolies. Are...
Past is Prologue: A Discussion of the First Amendment and a Revised Proposal for Rule 8.4
Miles Coleman, Casey Mattox, Eugene Volokh
Charleston and Columbia Lawyers Chapter - Online Event
On February 19, 2021, the Charleston, Greenville, and Columbia Lawyers Chapters hosted Eugene Volokh and...
Panel II: The Freedom of Religion [Archive Collection]
Robert L. Cord, Mitchell L. Edwards, Henry Mark Holzer, Michael W. McConnell, John T. Noonan, Arthur B. Spitzer
1986 National Student Symposium
On March 7-8, 1986, The Federalist Society hosted its annual National Student Symposium at Stanford...
Federalist Papers Book Club: The Federalist [Session 7]
John S. Baker
Federalist ##52, 55, 56, and 57 (The House of Representatives)
Federalist Papers Book Club will run weekly on Tuesday evenings for 10 one-hour sessions, beginning...
COVID-19: Lockdowns and Other Restrictions on Individual Liberties
William Vazquez Irizarry, Ilya Shapiro, John Ross Serrano, Omar J. Andino-Figueroa
Puerto Rico Lawyers Chapter & the University of Puerto Rico Student Chapter
On February 8, 2021, the Federalist Society's Puerto Rico Lawyers Chapter and Puerto Rico Student...
2021 Oklahoma Legislative Preview
Julie Daniels, Adam Carl Doverspike, Mithun Mansinghani
Tulsa & Oklahoma City Lawyers Chapter - Virtual Event
On February 4, 2021, Oklahoma State Senator Julie Daniels, the Oklahoma Senate Judiciary Committee Chair,...