Director, Center for Transnational Business and the Law, Georgetown University Law Center
Professor Carter has an extensive background in international trade and business, U.S. and international law, and foreign policy. In 2006 he received Georgetown Law's excellence in teaching award. Mr. Carter also teaches frequently in other countries.
He returned to Georgetown in 1996 after over three years as the Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration. He implemented and enforced a variety of trade and nonproliferation laws, and he also helped reorganize his 370-person Bureau. Mr. Carter also served during that time as the U.S. vice chair to Secretary of Defense William Perry on bilateral defense conversion committees with Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and other countries to help eliminate the nuclear weapons in Kazakhstan and Ukraine and to secure nuclear and other dangerous materials in several countries. He also served on committees with China.
Before entering the government, Mr. Carter had been a Georgetown professor since 1979 and was Executive Director of the American Society of International Law during 1992-93. He was a visiting law professor at Stanford in 1990. He served as a senior counsel on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Activities in 1975. He was a Fellow at the Institute of Politics at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and an International Affairs Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in 1972. A member of Dr. Henry Kissinger's National Security Council staff from 1970?72, he worked on nuclear arms negotiations and other foreign policy matters. While an Army officer, he was a program analyst in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. He has also been a trial and appellate lawyer in private practice in California and Washington, D.C.
Mr. Carter, a native Californian, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University, received a master's degree in economics and public policy from Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and graduated from Yale Law School, where he was the Projects Editor of the Yale Law Journal.
Prof. Carter's book on International Economic Sanctions: Improving the Haphazard U.S. Legal Regime (Cambridge Univ. Press: 1988) received the 1989 annual award from the American Society of International Law (ASIL) for the outstanding new book on international law subjects. He is the co-author of the widely-used casebook on International Law (Aspen: 5th ed. 2007) and the editor of the accompanying Selected Documents (Aspen: 9th ed. 2009). He has also written chapters in books as well as publishing articles in the California Law Review, Yale Law Journal, Scientific American, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and other periodicals.
He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Law Institute, the American Bar Association, and ASIL. He is on the U.S. Department of State's Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy, the advisory council of a major insurance company, and was on the board of directors of a U.S. international trading company. He has served on two binational arbitration panels that reviewed Chapter 19 trade matters under the North American Free Trade Agreement. He has also been the Chairman of the Advisory Committee of the Defense Budget Project and the Vice President of the Arms Control Association.
Senior Of Counsel, Covington & Burling LLP and Executive Chairma, The Chertoff Group
Michael Chertoff concentrates in the area of White Collar Defense and Investigations. In recent years, he has handled a series of federal investigations, including complex criminal and civil regulatory matters. He has advised major clients on SEC and Justice Department investigations and successfully served as the independent monitor of a major national healthcare company under criminal and civil investigation.
In addition to his legal work, Mr. Chertoff is Founder and Chairman of The Chertoff Group, a security and risk management firm, where he provides high-level strategic counsel to corporate and government leaders on a broad range of security issues, from risk identification and prevention to preparedness, response and recovery.
In April of 2012, Mr. Chertoff was elected as the new Chairman of the Board of Directors of BAE Systems, Inc. He also sits on the board of directors or board of advisors of a number of companies and nonprofits.
Previously, Mr. Chertoff served as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. As Secretary, he led a 218,000 person department with a budget of $50 billion. Mr. Chertoff developed and implemented border security and immigration policy; promulgated homeland security regulations; and spearheaded a national cyber security strategy. He also served periodically on the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council, and on the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.
Prior to his appointment to the Cabinet, Mr. Chertoff served from 2003 to 2005 on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Before becoming a federal judge, Mr. Chertoff was the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. In that position, he oversaw the investigation of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and formed the Enron Task Force, which produced more than 20 convictions, including those of CEOs Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay.
Mr. Chertoff’s career includes more than a decade as a federal prosecutor, including service as U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, and Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. As a federal prosecutor, Mr. Chertoff investigated and personally prosecuted significant cases of political corruption, organized crime, and corporate fraud.
From 1994-2001, Mr. Chertoff represented major corporations and individuals in numerous white collar investigations and trials. Among other matters, he successfully represented the nation’s largest hospital company in a four year, multi-jurisdictional criminal and civil investigation, represented major corporations in corruption scandals, and obtained acquittals at trial for individual criminal defendants.
Mr. Chertoff has received numerous awards including the Department of Justice Henry E. Petersen Memorial Award (2006); the Department of Justice John Marshall Award for Trial of Litigation (1987); NAACP Benjamin L. Hooks Award for Distinguished Service (2007); European Institute Transatlantic Leadership Award (2008); and two honorary doctorates. His trial experiences have been featured in over half a dozen books and many news articles.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Associate Director, St. John
Peggy McGuinness joined the St. John's faculty in 2010. Her course offerings include international human rights, international business transactions, conflicts of law and international dispute resolution.
Professor McGuinness graduated with distinction from Stanford Law School, where she was an articles editor for the Stanford Law Review and a graduate fellow at the Stanford Center on Conflict and Negotiation. Afterwards, she clerked for Judge Colleen McMahon in the Southern District of New York and worked as a litigator for Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP. Her career in the law follows an early career as a Foreign Service Officer with the State Department, which included service in Germany, Pakistan and Canada, and as a Special Assistant to Secretary of State Warren Christopher.
With scholarly interests and expertise in international law and international human rights law, Professor McGuinness has published on the subjects of international human rights law, international security and the resolution of armed conflict, and the role and influence of international law in U.S. courts. She is a member of the Executive Council of the American Society of International Law. She co-founded -and regularly contributes to- Opinio Juris, the leading international law blog..
Professor McGuinness previously taught at the University of Missouri School of Law. She has also been a visiting professor at the University of Georgia and Temple University, and a visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
Edward B. Burling Professor of International Law and Diplomacy, Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies
Member of the World Bank International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes; served on the U.S. Secretary of State’s advisory committees on private and public international law and on the CIA historical review panel; U.S. delegate to the U.N. Human Rights Committee (Geneva and New York, 2003–11); member of U.S. delegations to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the Wehrkunde security conference; member of the Pentagon Defense Policy Advisory Board (2003–09) and the Hart-Rudman Commission on National Security in the 21st Century; was independent expert for U.N. criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia; formerly director of studies at Hague Academy for International Law, tenured professor at Yale Law School, visiting professor at the University of Paris (Sorbonne) and Charles H. Stockton professor at the U.S. Naval War College; named Berlin Prize Fellow of the American Academy; was vice president of the American Society of International Law, serves as president of the American branch of the International Law Association and vice chair of Freedom House and is on the board of editors for American Journal of International Law, Journal of Strategic Studies, American Interest, World Policy Journal, National Defense University Prism and National Interest; was law clerk to Judge Henry Friendly of the U.S. Court of Appeals (Second Circuit) and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun; commentator for BBC, NPR and PBS; J.D., Yale University.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Senior Research Fellow, School of Civic Leadership, Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Nonresident Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law. He is also Distinguished Visiting Scholar, School of Civic Leadership and Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War, Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare, and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University in South Korea, the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel, Keio University in Japan, Trento University in Italy, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and been the Edwin Meese III Originalism Lecturer at the Heritage Foundation.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Director, Center for Transnational Business and the Law, Georgetown University Law Center
Professor Carter has an extensive background in international trade and business, U.S. and international law, and foreign policy. In 2006 he received Georgetown Law's excellence in teaching award. Mr. Carter also teaches frequently in other countries.
He returned to Georgetown in 1996 after over three years as the Deputy Under Secretary of Commerce for Export Administration. He implemented and enforced a variety of trade and nonproliferation laws, and he also helped reorganize his 370-person Bureau. Mr. Carter also served during that time as the U.S. vice chair to Secretary of Defense William Perry on bilateral defense conversion committees with Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, and other countries to help eliminate the nuclear weapons in Kazakhstan and Ukraine and to secure nuclear and other dangerous materials in several countries. He also served on committees with China.
Before entering the government, Mr. Carter had been a Georgetown professor since 1979 and was Executive Director of the American Society of International Law during 1992-93. He was a visiting law professor at Stanford in 1990. He served as a senior counsel on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence Activities in 1975. He was a Fellow at the Institute of Politics at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and an International Affairs Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in 1972. A member of Dr. Henry Kissinger's National Security Council staff from 1970?72, he worked on nuclear arms negotiations and other foreign policy matters. While an Army officer, he was a program analyst in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. He has also been a trial and appellate lawyer in private practice in California and Washington, D.C.
Mr. Carter, a native Californian, graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University, received a master's degree in economics and public policy from Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, and graduated from Yale Law School, where he was the Projects Editor of the Yale Law Journal.
Prof. Carter's book on International Economic Sanctions: Improving the Haphazard U.S. Legal Regime (Cambridge Univ. Press: 1988) received the 1989 annual award from the American Society of International Law (ASIL) for the outstanding new book on international law subjects. He is the co-author of the widely-used casebook on International Law (Aspen: 5th ed. 2007) and the editor of the accompanying Selected Documents (Aspen: 9th ed. 2009). He has also written chapters in books as well as publishing articles in the California Law Review, Yale Law Journal, Scientific American, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, and other periodicals.
He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the American Law Institute, the American Bar Association, and ASIL. He is on the U.S. Department of State's Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy, the advisory council of a major insurance company, and was on the board of directors of a U.S. international trading company. He has served on two binational arbitration panels that reviewed Chapter 19 trade matters under the North American Free Trade Agreement. He has also been the Chairman of the Advisory Committee of the Defense Budget Project and the Vice President of the Arms Control Association.
Senior Of Counsel, Covington & Burling LLP and Executive Chairma, The Chertoff Group
Michael Chertoff concentrates in the area of White Collar Defense and Investigations. In recent years, he has handled a series of federal investigations, including complex criminal and civil regulatory matters. He has advised major clients on SEC and Justice Department investigations and successfully served as the independent monitor of a major national healthcare company under criminal and civil investigation.
In addition to his legal work, Mr. Chertoff is Founder and Chairman of The Chertoff Group, a security and risk management firm, where he provides high-level strategic counsel to corporate and government leaders on a broad range of security issues, from risk identification and prevention to preparedness, response and recovery.
In April of 2012, Mr. Chertoff was elected as the new Chairman of the Board of Directors of BAE Systems, Inc. He also sits on the board of directors or board of advisors of a number of companies and nonprofits.
Previously, Mr. Chertoff served as Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. As Secretary, he led a 218,000 person department with a budget of $50 billion. Mr. Chertoff developed and implemented border security and immigration policy; promulgated homeland security regulations; and spearheaded a national cyber security strategy. He also served periodically on the National Security Council and the Homeland Security Council, and on the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States.
Prior to his appointment to the Cabinet, Mr. Chertoff served from 2003 to 2005 on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. Before becoming a federal judge, Mr. Chertoff was the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division of the U.S. Department of Justice. In that position, he oversaw the investigation of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and formed the Enron Task Force, which produced more than 20 convictions, including those of CEOs Jeffrey Skilling and Kenneth Lay.
Mr. Chertoff’s career includes more than a decade as a federal prosecutor, including service as U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, First Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of New Jersey, and Assistant U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. As a federal prosecutor, Mr. Chertoff investigated and personally prosecuted significant cases of political corruption, organized crime, and corporate fraud.
From 1994-2001, Mr. Chertoff represented major corporations and individuals in numerous white collar investigations and trials. Among other matters, he successfully represented the nation’s largest hospital company in a four year, multi-jurisdictional criminal and civil investigation, represented major corporations in corruption scandals, and obtained acquittals at trial for individual criminal defendants.
Mr. Chertoff has received numerous awards including the Department of Justice Henry E. Petersen Memorial Award (2006); the Department of Justice John Marshall Award for Trial of Litigation (1987); NAACP Benjamin L. Hooks Award for Distinguished Service (2007); European Institute Transatlantic Leadership Award (2008); and two honorary doctorates. His trial experiences have been featured in over half a dozen books and many news articles.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Associate Director, St. John
Peggy McGuinness joined the St. John's faculty in 2010. Her course offerings include international human rights, international business transactions, conflicts of law and international dispute resolution.
Professor McGuinness graduated with distinction from Stanford Law School, where she was an articles editor for the Stanford Law Review and a graduate fellow at the Stanford Center on Conflict and Negotiation. Afterwards, she clerked for Judge Colleen McMahon in the Southern District of New York and worked as a litigator for Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison LLP. Her career in the law follows an early career as a Foreign Service Officer with the State Department, which included service in Germany, Pakistan and Canada, and as a Special Assistant to Secretary of State Warren Christopher.
With scholarly interests and expertise in international law and international human rights law, Professor McGuinness has published on the subjects of international human rights law, international security and the resolution of armed conflict, and the role and influence of international law in U.S. courts. She is a member of the Executive Council of the American Society of International Law. She co-founded -and regularly contributes to- Opinio Juris, the leading international law blog..
Professor McGuinness previously taught at the University of Missouri School of Law. She has also been a visiting professor at the University of Georgia and Temple University, and a visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies.
Edward B. Burling Professor of International Law and Diplomacy, Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies
Member of the World Bank International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes; served on the U.S. Secretary of State’s advisory committees on private and public international law and on the CIA historical review panel; U.S. delegate to the U.N. Human Rights Committee (Geneva and New York, 2003–11); member of U.S. delegations to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe and the Wehrkunde security conference; member of the Pentagon Defense Policy Advisory Board (2003–09) and the Hart-Rudman Commission on National Security in the 21st Century; was independent expert for U.N. criminal tribunal for the former Yugoslavia; formerly director of studies at Hague Academy for International Law, tenured professor at Yale Law School, visiting professor at the University of Paris (Sorbonne) and Charles H. Stockton professor at the U.S. Naval War College; named Berlin Prize Fellow of the American Academy; was vice president of the American Society of International Law, serves as president of the American branch of the International Law Association and vice chair of Freedom House and is on the board of editors for American Journal of International Law, Journal of Strategic Studies, American Interest, World Policy Journal, National Defense University Prism and National Interest; was law clerk to Judge Henry Friendly of the U.S. Court of Appeals (Second Circuit) and U.S. Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun; commentator for BBC, NPR and PBS; J.D., Yale University.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Senior Research Fellow, School of Civic Leadership, Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Nonresident Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law. He is also Distinguished Visiting Scholar, School of Civic Leadership and Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War, Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare, and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University in South Korea, the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel, Keio University in Japan, Trento University in Italy, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and been the Edwin Meese III Originalism Lecturer at the Heritage Foundation.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and James. E. Beasley Profes, Temple University Beasley School of Law
Duncan B. Hollis is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and James E. Beasley Professor of Law at Temple Law School. His scholarship focuses on issues of authority in international and foreign affairs law, asking who exercises authority in the formation, interpretation and application of international law, and who is it that has the authority to apply such law to, or for, national actors. Hollis has focused on treaties and cyberspace as the key subjects for his studies of authority. He is the editor of the Oxford Guide to Treaties (OUP, 2012) which was awarded the 2013 ASIL Certificate of Merit for high technical craftsmanship and utility to practicing lawyers. He also co-edited National Treaty Law & Practice (ASIL & Martinus Nijhoff, 2005), which examined how various countries incorporate treaty rules into their national laws. His cyber-related research has involved studying international law’s role in regulating cyberthreats and the future of cybernorms. Professor Hollis’s scholarship has appeared in various books and journals, including the Texas Law Review, the Southern California Law Review, the Virginia Journal of International Law, and the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Professor Hollis is a regular contributor to the premier international law blog, Opinio Juris. His expertise on treaty issues has been sought or used by all three branches of the federal government as well as several international organizations.
Professor Hollis received an A.B., summa cum laude, from Bowdoin College. In 1996, he completed a joint-degree program, receiving a Masters in International Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School at Tufts University and a Juris Doctor,summa cum laude, from Boston College Law School. At Boston College, he was an Executive Editor of the Law Review and received the James W. Smith Award for Highest Academic Rank.
Following graduation, Professor Hollis worked for the International Department of Steptoe & Johnson LLP. In 1998, Professor Hollis joined the Office of the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State, where he worked until joining the Temple faculty in 2004. During his tenure at the State Department, Professor Hollis served for several years as the attorney-adviser for treaty affairs, working on various legal and constitutional issues associated with the negotiation, conclusion and implementation of U.S. treaties. Later, Professor Hollis acted as legal counsel for the Department's Bureau of Oceans, International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, specializing in U.S.-Canada environmental issues and U.S. participation in multilateral environmental agreements. Professor Hollis's practice has also included international litigation before the International Court of Justice. In particular, he served as Counsel to the United States in the provisional measures phase of theCase Concerning Avena and Other Mexican Nationals (Mexico v. United States)and contributed to the U.S. presentation in the Oil Platforms Case (Iran v. United States).
Maurice A. Deane Distinguished Professor of Constitutional Law and Faculty Director of International Programs, Hofstra University School of Law
Professor Ku’s primary research interest is the relationship of international law to constitutional law. He has also conducted academic research on a wide range of topics including international dispute resolution, international criminal law, and China’s relationship with international law. He teaches courses such as U.S. constitutional law, U.S. foreign affairs law, transnational law, and international trade and business law. Since 2014, he has served as the faculty director of international programs, overseeing Hofstra Law’s study abroad, exchange and LL.M. programs. Professor Ku also teaches Constitutional Law in our online degree programs: Master of Laws in American Law and Master of Arts in American Legal Studies. He has also been selected as the John DeWitt Gregory Research Scholar and as a Hofstra Law Research Fellow. He is a member of the American Law Institute.
He is the co-author, with John Yoo, of Taming Globalization: International Law, the U.S. Constitution, and the New World Order (Oxford University Press 2012). He also has published more than 40 law review articles, book chapters and symposia essays. He has given dozens of academic lectures and workshops at major universities and conferences in the United States, Europe and Asia.
He co-founded the leading international law weblog Opinio Juris, which is read daily by thousands worldwide. His essays and op-eds have been published in major news publications such as the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the NYTimes.com. He has been frequently interviewed for television news programs and quoted in print and electronic media. He has also signed or submitted amicus briefs to national and international courts and served as an expert witness in both domestic and international proceedings.
Before joining the Hofstra Law faculty, Professor Ku served as a law clerk to the Honorable Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and as an Olin Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Virginia Law School. Professor Ku also practiced as an associate at the New York City law firm of Debevoise & Plimpton, specializing in litigation and arbitration arising out of international disputes. He has been a visiting professor at the College of William & Mary Marshall- Wythe School of Law in Williamsburg, Virginia; a Fulbright Distinguished Lecturer in Law at East China University of Political Science and Law in Shanghai, China; and a Taiwan Fellow at National Taiwan University in Taipei, Taiwan. He is a member of the New York Bar and a graduate of Yale College and Yale Law School.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Global Law and P, Santa Clara Law
Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and James. E. Beasley Profes, Temple University Beasley School of Law
Duncan B. Hollis is Associate Dean for Academic Affairs and James E. Beasley Professor of Law at Temple Law School. His scholarship focuses on issues of authority in international and foreign affairs law, asking who exercises authority in the formation, interpretation and application of international law, and who is it that has the authority to apply such law to, or for, national actors. Hollis has focused on treaties and cyberspace as the key subjects for his studies of authority. He is the editor of the Oxford Guide to Treaties (OUP, 2012) which was awarded the 2013 ASIL Certificate of Merit for high technical craftsmanship and utility to practicing lawyers. He also co-edited National Treaty Law & Practice (ASIL & Martinus Nijhoff, 2005), which examined how various countries incorporate treaty rules into their national laws. His cyber-related research has involved studying international law’s role in regulating cyberthreats and the future of cybernorms. Professor Hollis’s scholarship has appeared in various books and journals, including the Texas Law Review, the Southern California Law Review, the Virginia Journal of International Law, and the Berkeley Journal of International Law. Professor Hollis is a regular contributor to the premier international law blog, Opinio Juris. His expertise on treaty issues has been sought or used by all three branches of the federal government as well as several international organizations.
Professor Hollis received an A.B., summa cum laude, from Bowdoin College. In 1996, he completed a joint-degree program, receiving a Masters in International Law and Diplomacy from the Fletcher School at Tufts University and a Juris Doctor,summa cum laude, from Boston College Law School. At Boston College, he was an Executive Editor of the Law Review and received the James W. Smith Award for Highest Academic Rank.
Following graduation, Professor Hollis worked for the International Department of Steptoe & Johnson LLP. In 1998, Professor Hollis joined the Office of the Legal Adviser at the U.S. Department of State, where he worked until joining the Temple faculty in 2004. During his tenure at the State Department, Professor Hollis served for several years as the attorney-adviser for treaty affairs, working on various legal and constitutional issues associated with the negotiation, conclusion and implementation of U.S. treaties. Later, Professor Hollis acted as legal counsel for the Department's Bureau of Oceans, International Environmental and Scientific Affairs, specializing in U.S.-Canada environmental issues and U.S. participation in multilateral environmental agreements. Professor Hollis's practice has also included international litigation before the International Court of Justice. In particular, he served as Counsel to the United States in the provisional measures phase of theCase Concerning Avena and Other Mexican Nationals (Mexico v. United States)and contributed to the U.S. presentation in the Oil Platforms Case (Iran v. United States).
Maurice A. Deane Distinguished Professor of Constitutional Law and Faculty Director of International Programs, Hofstra University School of Law
Professor Ku’s primary research interest is the relationship of international law to constitutional law. He has also conducted academic research on a wide range of topics including international dispute resolution, international criminal law, and China’s relationship with international law. He teaches courses such as U.S. constitutional law, U.S. foreign affairs law, transnational law, and international trade and business law. Since 2014, he has served as the faculty director of international programs, overseeing Hofstra Law’s study abroad, exchange and LL.M. programs. Professor Ku also teaches Constitutional Law in our online degree programs: Master of Laws in American Law and Master of Arts in American Legal Studies. He has also been selected as the John DeWitt Gregory Research Scholar and as a Hofstra Law Research Fellow. He is a member of the American Law Institute.
He is the co-author, with John Yoo, of Taming Globalization: International Law, the U.S. Constitution, and the New World Order (Oxford University Press 2012). He also has published more than 40 law review articles, book chapters and symposia essays. He has given dozens of academic lectures and workshops at major universities and conferences in the United States, Europe and Asia.
He co-founded the leading international law weblog Opinio Juris, which is read daily by thousands worldwide. His essays and op-eds have been published in major news publications such as the Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times, and the NYTimes.com. He has been frequently interviewed for television news programs and quoted in print and electronic media. He has also signed or submitted amicus briefs to national and international courts and served as an expert witness in both domestic and international proceedings.
Before joining the Hofstra Law faculty, Professor Ku served as a law clerk to the Honorable Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and as an Olin Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Virginia Law School. Professor Ku also practiced as an associate at the New York City law firm of Debevoise & Plimpton, specializing in litigation and arbitration arising out of international disputes. He has been a visiting professor at the College of William & Mary Marshall- Wythe School of Law in Williamsburg, Virginia; a Fulbright Distinguished Lecturer in Law at East China University of Political Science and Law in Shanghai, China; and a Taiwan Fellow at National Taiwan University in Taipei, Taiwan. He is a member of the New York Bar and a graduate of Yale College and Yale Law School.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Global Law and P, Santa Clara Law
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Executive Vice President of Global Governance, Chief Legal Officer and Corporate Secretary, Walmart Inc.
Rachel Brand is Walmart’s executive vice president of global governance, chief legal officer, and corporate secretary. She oversees the company’s global legal, compliance, ethics, corporate governance, digital citizenship, aviation, investigative, and corporate security functions, including Walmart’s Emergency Operations Center.
Immediately before joining Walmart, Rachel served as the United States Associate Attorney General and holds the distinction of being the first woman to serve in this role. She had previously served in the U.S. Department of Justice as the Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Policy during President George W. Bush’s administration. Her other government service includes an appointment by President Obama to serve as a Member of the U.S. Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, service as an Associate Counsel to the President at the White House, and judicial clerkships with Justice Charles Fried of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts and Justice Anthony Kennedy at the Supreme Court of the United States. In the private sector, Rachel was a lawyer in private practice at two law firms in Washington, D.C. and served as the Vice President and Chief Counsel for Regulatory Litigation at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Litigation Center.
Rachel serves on the board of directors for the Walmart Foundation and is the executive sponsor for Walmart’s Tribal Voices Associate Resource Group. Outside of Walmart, she serves on the board of directors for the International Justice Mission and is a member of The American Law Institute.
Rachel earned her Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Minnesota-Morris and her J.D. from Harvard Law School.
William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law, Yale School of Law
Stephen L. Carter is the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law at Yale Law School, where he has been a member of the faculty since 1982. Among his recent courses are Contracts, Evidence, Law and Religion, the Ethics of War, Slavery and the Law, and Libertarian Legal Theory. He is the author of fifteen books, including, among others, The Violence of Peace: America’s Wars in the Age of Obama (2010); God’s Name in Vain: The Wrongs and Rights of Religion in Politics (2000); Civility: Manners, Morals, and the Etiquette of Democracy (1998); The Dissent of the Governed: A Meditation on Law, Religion, and Loyalty (1998); The Confirmation Mess: Cleaning up the Federal Appointments Process (1994); and The Culture of Disbelief: How American Law and Politics Trivialize Religious Devotion (1993). His most recent volume, published in 2018, is Invisible: The Forgotten Story of the Black Woman Lawyer who Took Down America’s Biggest Mobster. He recently delivered the W. E. B. Du Bois Lectures at Harvard, which he is writing up for publication.
Professor Carter is also the author of six novels, including The Emperor of Ocean Park, which spent eleven weeks on the New York Times bestseller list, and The Impeachment of Abraham Lincoln, a fictional account of a trial of Lincoln in the Senate for high crimes and misdemeanors. In addition to his scholarship, he has published hundreds of opinion pieces. He was a long-time columnist for the Daily Beast and currently writes regularly for Bloomberg, mainly about law, but also about ethics and about popular culture. In addition, he formerly blogged about professional football for the Washington Post.
Professor Carter is a graduate of Stanford University and Yale Law School. He served as a law clerk for Justice Thurgood Marshall at the United States Supreme Court, and earlier for Judge Spottswood W. Robinson, III, of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was the interviewer for Justice Marshall’s official oral history. Among the prizes Professor Carter’s work has received are the Louisville-Grawemeyer Award in Religion, the Anisfield-Wolf Award for Fiction, and the Paul M. Bator Award. He has also served on the Pulitzer Prize fiction jury. Professor Carter is a fellow of several learned societies and a life member of the American Law Institute. He is a trustee of the Aspen Institute, where for fifteen years he moderated seminars. He has received eight honorary degrees.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Associate Justice, United States Supreme Court
Laurence A. Tisch Professor of Law and Director, Classical Liberal Institute, New York University School of Law; Director, Classical Liberal Institute, Civitas Institute University of Texas at Austin
Richard A. Epstein is the Laurence A. Tisch Professor of Law, at New York University, a senior research fellow at the Civitas Institute at the University of Texas Austin, and a senior Lecturer, the University of Chicago. He received an LL.D., h.c . from the University of Ghent, 2003 , and an LLD h.c . from the University of Siegen in 2018 and the Bradley Prize in 2011. He has been a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences since 1985. He has edited both the Journal of Legal Studies (1981-1991) and the Journal of Law and Economics (1991-2001). He is also a founder and director of the Classical Liberal Institute at NYU Law School. His most recent book is The Classical Liberal Constitution: The Uncertain Quest for Limited Government (2014). His other books include Takings: Private Property and the Power of Eminent Domain ( 1985); Bargaining with the State (1993); Simple Rules for a Complex World (1995); Principles for a Free Society: Reconciling Individual Liberty and the Common Good (1998); Skepticism and Freedom: A Modern Theory of Classical Liberalism (2003); Design for Liberty: Private Property, Public Administration and the Rule of Law (2011), and most recently, The Myth of Birthright citizenship—and Beyond (2026). He has taught courses in , administrative law, antitrust, constitutional, contracts, environmental law, land use planning; real property, torts and water law. He has written and spoken extensively on a wide range of topics, and is writes a regular column for Defining Ideas.
William T. Comfort, III Professor of Law, New York University School of Law
Roderick Hills teaches and writes in public law areas, including constitutional law, local government law, land-use regulation, administrative law, and statutory interpretation. His focus in each area is on the rules and policies governing division of powers between central and subcentral governments. He holds bachelor’s and law degrees from Yale University. Following law school, he served as a law clerk for Judge Patrick Higginbotham of the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and practiced law in Colorado. Hills previously taught at the University of Michigan Law School from 1994 to 2006. He is a member of the state bar of New York and the U.S. Supreme Court.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Partner, Baker Hostetler LLP
David Rivkin is a member of the firm's litigation, international and environmental teams and is co-leader of the firm's national appellate practice. He has extensive experience in constitutional, administrative and international law litigation and has been involved in numerous high-profile cases. With his prior experience in the government sector, David draws on a wealth of knowledge when providing compliance advice to companies and handling enforcement proceedings before government agencies on issues arising out of multilateral and unilateral sanctions, the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), anti-boycott issues, bankruptcy and financial fraud matters, and environmental and energy issues.
David has developed and implemented legislative, regulatory and litigation initiatives for two presidential administrations. Over the years, he has published hundreds of articles, op-eds, book reviews and book chapters on a variety of international, legal, constitutional, defense, arms control, foreign policy, environmental and energy issues for various newspapers and magazines, including The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, The New York Times, USA Today and The Los Angeles Times, and has been a frequent commentator and guest on TV and radio shows including ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News, NPR and PBS.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Senior Research Fellow, School of Civic Leadership, Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Nonresident Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law. He is also Distinguished Visiting Scholar, School of Civic Leadership and Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War, Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare, and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University in South Korea, the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel, Keio University in Japan, Trento University in Italy, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and been the Edwin Meese III Originalism Lecturer at the Heritage Foundation.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Partner, Supreme Court Attorney, Cabinet Briard LLP
François-Henri Briard is a Knight of the Legion of Honor, an Officer of the National Order of Merit and a Knight of the Palmes Académiques.
He was a member of the Governing Board of the Bar of the French Supreme Courts (2003-2005).
François-Henri Briard was a trustee of Sarah Lawrence College in New York for eight years. He is President of the Institut Vergennes, a member of the U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society and an honorary member of the Society of the Cincinnati and of the Sons of the American Revolution. He is also an expert with the Federalist Society, a U.S. think tank that focuses on constitutional and judicial issues.
He is a member of the Institute of Consulting Tax Attorneys (IACF) and an associate member of the Academy of Moral Sciences, Letters and Arts of Versailles and Ile de France.
He is a member of the French Navy civilian reserve with the rank of frigate captain and has been awarded a medal by the voluntary military services. On behalf of the Firm, he received the Military Reserve Prize (2011).
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
Judge Rao was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in March 2019. She graduated from Yale College in 1995 and the University of Chicago Law School in 1999. Following graduation, she served as a law clerk to Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and, in the 2001 October Term, as law clerk to Justice Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court. Between her clerkships, Judge Rao served as counsel for nominations and constitutional law to the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary. In 2002, she joined the international arbitration group of Clifford Chance LLP in London, England. From 2005-2006, she served as Special Assistant and Associate White House Counsel to President George W. Bush. From 2006 to 2017, Judge Rao was a professor at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University, where she taught constitutional law, legislation and statutory interpretation, and the history and foundations of the administrative state. In 2014, she founded the Center for the Study of the Administrative State, a non-profit Center that promotes academic scholarship and public policy debates about administrative law. In July 2017, she was appointed to serve as the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Office of Management Budget. She served in this position until her appointment to the D.C. Circuit.
Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
ILYA SOMIN is Professor of Law at George Mason University and the B. Kenneth Simon Chair in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute. His research focuses on constitutional law, property law, democratic theory, federalism, and migration rights. He is the author of Free to Move: Foot Voting, Migration, and Political Freedom (Oxford University Press, revised and expanded edition, 2022), Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter (Stanford University Press, revised and expanded second edition, 2016), and The Grasping Hand: Kelo v. City of New London and the Limits of Eminent Domain (University of Chicago Press, 2015, rev. paperback ed., 2016), coauthor of A Conspiracy Against Obamacare: The Volokh Conspiracy and the Health Care Case (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), and co-editor of Eminent Domain: A Comparative Perspective (Cambridge University Press, 2017). Democracy and Political Ignorance has been translated into Italian and Japanese.
Somin’s work has appeared in numerous scholarly journals, including the Yale Law Journal, Stanford Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, Critical Review, and others. Somin has also published articles in a variety of popular press outlets, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, CNN, NBC, The Atlantic, USA Today, Boston Globe, US News and World Report, South China Morning Post, National Law Journal and Reason. He has been quoted or interviewed by the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek, The Economist, the Christian Science Monitor, the Financial Times, The Guardian, the Associated Press, CBS, MSNBC, NPR, BBC, Reuters, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Al Jazeera, and the Voice of America, among other media.
Somin’s writings have been cited in decisions by the United States Supreme Court, multiple state supreme courts and lower federal courts, and the Supreme Court of Israel. He is co-counsel for the plaintiffs in VOS Selections, Inc. v. Trump, a case challenging the constitutionality of President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs. Somin has testified on the use of drones for targeted killing in the War on Terror before the US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights. In 2009, he testified on property rights issues at the United States Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Somin writes regularly for the popular Volokh Conspiracy law and politics blog, now affiliated with Reason magazine (previously affiliated with the Washington Post from 2014 to 2017). From 2006 to 2013, he served as Co-Editor of the Supreme Court Economic Review, one of the country’s top-rated law and economics journals.
Somin has served as a visiting professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He has also been a visiting professor or scholar at the Georgetown University Law Center, the University of Hamburg, Germany, the University of Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Uriel Reichman University in Israel, and Zhengzhou University in China. He is a University Affiliate of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, and an affiliated faculty member of the George Mason University Institute for Immigration Research. Before joining the faculty at George Mason, Somin was the John M. Olin Fellow in Law at Northwestern University Law School in 2002-2003. In 2001-2002, he clerked for the Hon. Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Professor Somin earned his B.A., Summa Cum Laude, at Amherst College, M.A. in Political Science from Harvard University, and J.D. from Yale Law School.
George C. Dix Professor in Constitutional Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
John O. McGinnis is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School where he was an editor of the Harvard Law Review. He also has an MA degree from Balliol College, Oxford, in philosophy and theology. Professor McGinnis clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. From 1987 to 1991, he was deputy assistant attorney general in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. He is the author of Accelerating Democracy: Transforming Government Through Technology (Princeton 2013) and Originalism and the Good Constitution (Harvard 2013) (with M. Rappaport). He is a past winner of the Paul Bator award given by the Federalist Society to an outstanding academic under 40. He has been listed by the United States on the roster of panelists who may be called upon to decide World Trade Organization Disputes.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
Judge Rao was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in March 2019. She graduated from Yale College in 1995 and the University of Chicago Law School in 1999. Following graduation, she served as a law clerk to Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and, in the 2001 October Term, as law clerk to Justice Clarence Thomas of the U.S. Supreme Court. Between her clerkships, Judge Rao served as counsel for nominations and constitutional law to the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary. In 2002, she joined the international arbitration group of Clifford Chance LLP in London, England. From 2005-2006, she served as Special Assistant and Associate White House Counsel to President George W. Bush. From 2006 to 2017, Judge Rao was a professor at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University, where she taught constitutional law, legislation and statutory interpretation, and the history and foundations of the administrative state. In 2014, she founded the Center for the Study of the Administrative State, a non-profit Center that promotes academic scholarship and public policy debates about administrative law. In July 2017, she was appointed to serve as the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Office of Management Budget. She served in this position until her appointment to the D.C. Circuit.
Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
ILYA SOMIN is Professor of Law at George Mason University and the B. Kenneth Simon Chair in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute. His research focuses on constitutional law, property law, democratic theory, federalism, and migration rights. He is the author of Free to Move: Foot Voting, Migration, and Political Freedom (Oxford University Press, revised and expanded edition, 2022), Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government is Smarter (Stanford University Press, revised and expanded second edition, 2016), and The Grasping Hand: Kelo v. City of New London and the Limits of Eminent Domain (University of Chicago Press, 2015, rev. paperback ed., 2016), coauthor of A Conspiracy Against Obamacare: The Volokh Conspiracy and the Health Care Case (Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), and co-editor of Eminent Domain: A Comparative Perspective (Cambridge University Press, 2017). Democracy and Political Ignorance has been translated into Italian and Japanese.
Somin’s work has appeared in numerous scholarly journals, including the Yale Law Journal, Stanford Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Georgetown Law Journal, Critical Review, and others. Somin has also published articles in a variety of popular press outlets, including the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, CNN, NBC, The Atlantic, USA Today, Boston Globe, US News and World Report, South China Morning Post, National Law Journal and Reason. He has been quoted or interviewed by the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Time, Newsweek, The Economist, the Christian Science Monitor, the Financial Times, The Guardian, the Associated Press, CBS, MSNBC, NPR, BBC, Reuters, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Al Jazeera, and the Voice of America, among other media.
Somin’s writings have been cited in decisions by the United States Supreme Court, multiple state supreme courts and lower federal courts, and the Supreme Court of Israel. He is co-counsel for the plaintiffs in VOS Selections, Inc. v. Trump, a case challenging the constitutionality of President Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs. Somin has testified on the use of drones for targeted killing in the War on Terror before the US Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights, and Human Rights. In 2009, he testified on property rights issues at the United States Senate Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor. Somin writes regularly for the popular Volokh Conspiracy law and politics blog, now affiliated with Reason magazine (previously affiliated with the Washington Post from 2014 to 2017). From 2006 to 2013, he served as Co-Editor of the Supreme Court Economic Review, one of the country’s top-rated law and economics journals.
Somin has served as a visiting professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School. He has also been a visiting professor or scholar at the Georgetown University Law Center, the University of Hamburg, Germany, the University of Torcuato Di Tella in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Uriel Reichman University in Israel, and Zhengzhou University in China. He is a University Affiliate of the Schar School of Policy and Government at George Mason University, and an affiliated faculty member of the George Mason University Institute for Immigration Research. Before joining the faculty at George Mason, Somin was the John M. Olin Fellow in Law at Northwestern University Law School in 2002-2003. In 2001-2002, he clerked for the Hon. Judge Jerry E. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Professor Somin earned his B.A., Summa Cum Laude, at Amherst College, M.A. in Political Science from Harvard University, and J.D. from Yale Law School.
International: America as Hegemon and International Law
Barry E. Carter, Michael Chertoff, John O. McGinnis, Margaret E. McGuinness, Ruth J. Wedgwood, John C. Yoo
2010 National Lawyers Convention
Prof. Barry E. Carter, Director, Center for Transnational Business and the Law, Georgetown University Law...
International: America as Hegemon and International Law
Barry E. Carter, Michael Chertoff, John O. McGinnis, Margaret E. McGuinness, Ruth J. Wedgwood, John C. Yoo
2010 National Lawyers Convention
Prof. Barry E. Carter, Director, Center for Transnational Business and the Law, Georgetown University Law...
Panel 3: Constitutional and Prudential Limits on the Treaty Power: Federalism, Delegation, or Some Other Principle?
Duncan Hollis, Julian Ku, John O. McGinnis, David L. Sloss
12th Annual Faculty Conference
Prof. Duncan Hollis, Temple University Beasley School of Law Prof. John McGinnis, Northwestern University Law...
Panel 3: Constitutional and Prudential Limits on the Treaty Power: Federalism, Delegation, or Some Other Principle?
Duncan Hollis, Julian Ku, John O. McGinnis, David L. Sloss
12th Annual Faculty Conference
Prof. Duncan Hollis, Temple University Beasley School of Law Prof. John McGinnis, Northwestern University Law...
Office of Legal Counsel Releases Opinions
John O. McGinnis
New Federal Initiatives Project
Brought to you by the International & National Security Law Practice GroupOn March 1, 2009, the Department...
Panel III: Confirmation Battles and Presidential Nominations
Nan Aron, Rachel L. Brand, Stephen L. Carter, John O. McGinnis, Sonia Sotomayor
2009 National Student Symposium
The Federalist Society's Student Division presented this panel at the 2009 Annual Student Symposium on...
Luncheon Debate: When should FDA Regulation Preempt State Tort Liability
Richard A. Epstein, Roderick M. Hills, John O. McGinnis
11th Annual Faculty Conference
Prof. Richard Epstein, University of Chicago School of Law Prof. Roderick Hills, New York University...
International & National Security Law: International Law & the Separation of Powers
John O. McGinnis, Randy Moss, David B. Rivkin, John C. Yoo, François-Henri Briard
2008 National Lawyers Convention
Just as the modern state is the administrative state, so global governance will inevitably devolve...
Panel I: Executive Discretion & the Rule of Law
Harvey Mansfield, John O. McGinnis, Neomi Rao, Ilya Somin
10th Annual Faculty Conference
This panel discussion took place on January 3, 2008, at the Federalist Society's 10th Annual...
Panel I: Executive Discretion & the Rule of Law
Harvey Mansfield, John O. McGinnis, Neomi Rao, Ilya Somin
10th Annual Faculty Conference
This panel discussion took place on January 3, 2008, at the Federalist Society's 10th Annual...