Professor of Law and Executive Director, Law and Economics Center, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Donald Kochan is Professor of Law and Executive Director of the Law & Economics Center (LEC). Professor Kochan is an elected member of the American Law Institute (ALI) and serves as an Adviser to ALI's Restatement of the Law Fourth, Property project. Professor Kochan is a Nonresident Scholar at the Center for the Constitution at Georgetown University Law Center, where he was a Visiting Scholar in residence during Fall 2018. Before joining the Antonin Scalia Law School faculty, he was the Parker S. Kennedy Professor in Law at Chapman University’s Dale E. Fowler School of Law from 2004 to 2020. From 2003 to 2004, Professor Kochan was an Olin Fellow at the University of Virginia School of Law. During 2002-2003, he was a Visiting Assistant Professor of Law at George Mason’s Scalia Law School.
Professor Kochan’s scholarship focuses on areas of property law, constitutional law, administrative law, local government law, natural resources and environmental law, and law & economics. He has published several books and more than 50 scholarly articles and essays in well-regarded law journals. His work has been cited in more than a dozen state and federal court opinions, in more than 75 briefs filed in state and federal courts including more than 25 filed in the U.S. Supreme Court, in dozens of books and treatises, and in more than 800 scholarly articles.
Professor Kochan received his JD from Cornell Law School, where he was a John M. Olin Scholar in Law and Economics and managing editor of the Cornell International Law Journal. During law school, he also served as editor and executive editor of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy symposium issues in 1997 and 1998. He received his BA from Western Michigan University, magna cum laude, with majors in both political science and philosophy, where he studied as the John W. Gill Medallion Scholar and was honored as the Presidential Scholar (awarded to the top graduate in the political science department).
After graduating from law school, Professor Kochan was a law clerk to The Honorable Richard F. Suhrheinrich of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Following his clerkship, Professor Kochan was an associate with the firm of Crowell & Moring LLP in Washington, D.C., where he specialized in natural resources & environmental law as well as tort, products, and consumer civil litigation & legislative affairs.
Staff Attorney, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance
David Garbett is a staff attorney with the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance in Salt Lake City, Utah. His practice focuses on public lands law, principally as it relates to the Bureau of Land Management. His litigation and administrative work has involved oil and gas leasing and development, air quality issues, wilderness identification and management, rights of way claims, and resource management planning. Mr. Garbett earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School in 2006. He also holds an M.S. in economics from Utah State University and a B.A. in history from Brigham Young University.
Executive Vice President, The Federalist Society
Dean Reuter is Executive Vice President at the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies. He has served in two federal government agency Offices of the Inspector General, as Counsel to the Inspector General and Deputy Inspector General, responsible for policing the use of federal funds granted and contracted through those agencies. As such, he helped conduct and oversee criminal investigations across the country. He is the principal author of the non-fiction book, The Hidden Nazi: The Untold Story of America's Deal with the Devil, and editor of Liberty’s Nemesis: The Unchecked Expansion of the State and Confronting Terror: 9/11 and the Future of American National Security. He was appointed by the President and served as Vice-Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Corporation for National and Community Service, and recently served as an appointee on the U.S. Commission on Presidential Scholars. He is a graduate of Hood College (BA with Honors) and the University of Maryland School of Law.
Vice President & Legal Director, National Right To Work Legal Defense Foundation
Raymond J. LaJeunesse, Jr., is Vice President and Legal Director of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, a non-profit legal aid organization. He was the first Staff Attorney employed by the Foundation and has more than forty-five years of experience helping workers in litigation in federal and state courts and administrative agencies over the abuses of compulsory unionism.
Mr. LaJeunesse has argued four cases in the United States Supreme Court. Those cases include Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Ass’n, 500 U.S. 507 (1991), which limited the purposes for which compulsory union fees collected from public employees may lawfully be spent; Air Line Pilots Ass’n v. Miller, 523 U.S. 866 (1998), which established that unions cannot compel nonmembers to exhaust union-established remedies before going to court to challenge compulsory union fees; and Marquez v. Screen Actors Guild, 525 U.S. 33 (1998), in which the Court recognized that unions must notify employees that they can satisfy the “membership” requirement of “union shop” agreements by just paying fees for union bargaining activities and need not join and pay full dues to keep their jobs. He also was lead attorney in Hohe v. Casey, 956 F.2d 399 (3d Cir. 1992), in which more than $8.3 million in compulsory agency fees was recovered from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees for a class of 57,000 nonmembers.
Mr. LaJeunesse is the author of several published articles about labor law, has testified before Congressional committees several times, and was an Advisor on the Transition Team for Labor- Related Agencies, Office of the President-Elect, in 1980-81 and a legislative aide to a member of the Virginia state legislature. He is a Vice Chairman of the Federalist Society’s Labor and Employment Law Practice Group and has spoken or debated at the Society’s National Lawyers Convention and at many Lawyers and Student Chapters on such topics as Right to Work laws, compulsory unionism arrangements, the misuse of union dues for politics, union organizing tactics (“card check” vs. secret-ballot elections), and the future of the union movement.
Partner, Mayer Brown LLP
Howard Waltzman focuses his practice on communications and Internet law and commercial transactions in the United States and other key international markets. He represents some of the nation's leading communications service providers, manufacturers, and trade associations in commercial transactions, as well as in regulatory and legislative matters, including with respect to Internet services, spectrum policy, privacy, video programming, wireline competition, and communications-related homeland security. He also represents investors on these and other communications-related matters.
Howard's experience includes drafting regulatory pleadings, comments and license applications; legislation, Congressional testimony, and legislative history; and commercial agreements. He appears personally before Members of Congress, Cabinet department officials, FCC Commissioners, and key Congressional and FCC staff. Howard also advises clients and assists them in presenting their positions during major FCC rulemakings, throughout the legislative process, and in the context of commercial transactions. He represents clients on matters involving the International Telecommunication Union's rules and procedures.
Prior to joining Mayer Brown in 2007, Howard served as Chief Counsel, Telecommunications and the Internet, for the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee (2003-2006) and as Telecommunications Counsel (2001-2003). Prior to working for the House Energy and Commerce Committee, he served as General Counsel for Senator Sam Brownback (1996-2001).
Laura Carlisle is an associate in the New Orleans office of Baker Donelson, and a member of the Advocacy Department. She assists in a wide variety of business litigation matters for clients.
Jennifer McNamara, of counsel in the New Orleans office of Baker Donelson, has litigated in state and federal courts for fifteen years and concentrates her practice in the areas of commercial litigation, employment, and intellectual property. Her commercial litigation experience includes representing corporate and individual clients in a variety of business disputes, including class actions, contract disputes, defamation claims, franchise disputes, and unfair trade practices. Ms. McNamara has also represented national insurance companies in class actions and the defense of first-party claims.
Ms. McNamara's employment law experience includes defending employers against claims brought under state discrimination statutes, the Family Medical Leave Act, Title VII, and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act before the EEOC, in mediation, and in state and federal courts. She also counsels employers regarding personnel policies and covenants not to compete.
With respect to her intellectual property practice, Ms. McNamara counsels clients on copyright, trademark, and defamation issues arising from Internet publications and Web sites. She is experienced in handling trademark litigation, including litigation arising from the transfer and use of domain names. Ms. McNamara has also counseled and represented media clients in areas such as access to public records and protection of the reporter's privilege in civil and criminal court.
Associate Professor, Indiana University Maurer School of Law
Professor Scott joined the Indiana University Maurer School of Law faculty in 2009. He teaches and writes on criminal law and procedure, statutory interpretation, and federal courts. Professor Scott's research examines structural and procedural interactions between the judicial branch and other branches of government, particularly in the criminal context. He has written on efforts to control the composition of the judiciary, including the judicial appointments process, legislative strategies for encouraging judicial retirements, and the semi-retirement program of senior judges. Professor Scott also studies efforts to influence judicial decision making directly by placing constraints on judicial discretion. His current project examines changes in inter-judge sentencing disparity under the United States Sentencing Guidelines, one of Congress's most ambitious efforts to restrict judges in the performance of a historically discretionary function.After graduating from law school, Professor Scott clerked for Judge Michael W. McConnell of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. He then served as a Bristow Fellow in the Office of the Solicitor General of the United States. Before joining the faculty, he worked for two years as an associate in the Supreme Court and appellate practice at O'Melveny & Myers LLP in Washington, D.C.
Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame Law School
Emily Bremer teaches and writes in the areas of administrative law, regulatory process, and civil procedure. Her scholarship focuses primarily on matters of procedural design, with a recent focus on the history and interpretation of the Administrative Procedure Act (APA). She is a recipient of the AALS’s award for the year’s best administrative law scholarship by a junior scholar and the AALL’s Joseph L. Andrew’s Legal Literature Award for her contribution to the Bremer-Kovacs Collection of Historical Documents Related to the APA (HeinOnline). Bremer’s articles include a defense forthcoming in the Virginia Law Review of the constitutionality of the APA’s regime for ensuring the competence and impartiality of Administrative Law Judges; a plea in the Yale Journal on Regulation for administrative law to take greater account of the on-the-ground reality of administration; twin articles uncovering the intellectual foundation and meaning of the APA’s adjudication and rulemaking provisions; and three separate studies that served as the basis of recommendations of the Administrative Conference of the United States (ACUS) on the subjects of agency declaratory orders, incorporation by reference, and statutory limitations on the jurisdiction of the Court of Federal Claims. Bremer serves as a Senior Fellow of ACUS, a co-editor of the administrative law section of Jotwell, and a regular contributor to the Yale Journal on Regulation’s Notice & Comment blog.
Executive Director of the Military Law and Policy Institute and AMVETS Legal Clinic
Professor Rotunda is regarded as a leading expert in military law and currently teaches Law of War and a Family Violence Clinic. She is the author of Honor Bound: Inside the Guantanamo Trials, published by Carolina Academic Press (2008). She directed the Clinic for Legal Assistance to Service Members at George Mason School of Law, where she and her students successfully represented military families in various legal disputes, including Physical Evaluation Boards and Traumatic Service Group Life Insurance Appeals. Rotunda has recovered hundreds of thousands of dollars for disabled troops.
Professor Rotunda began her career in the US Army JAG Corps and has since been recruited by the National Veterans Legal Services Program (NVLSP) to produce a series of instructional DVDs about military law. She has also authored a coordinating outline and co-authored NVLSP's forthcoming book regarding military administrative/disability proceedings, to be published by Lexis Nexis. She remains in the Army Reserves and holds the rank of Major. Rotunda has served in several missions related to the Global War on Terror: she served in Guantanamo Bay, was the legal advisor to a team of investigators pursuing leads in the war on terror, served as a prosecutor at the Office of Military Commissions, represented wounded troops at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, and was the lawyer assigned to Jessica Lynch after Lynch's rescue.
Professor Rotunda is an avid writer and advocate for soldiers. She has written op-eds for The Christian Science Monitor, The Wall Street Journal, The Chicago Tribune, and The Washington Times. She is a regular television and radio commentator regarding military law and the ongoing trials in Guantanamo Bay. She has appeared on more than 20 nationally-syndicated radio shows, including The Michael Reagan Show, The Dennis Miller Show, and the Jim Bohannon Show. Rotunda has also appeared on national and international television news programs, including Hannity's America, the Brit Hume Report, and Al Jazeera.
B.A., University of Wyoming; J.D., University of Wyoming College of Law
Professor of Law, Southern Illinois University School of Law
Professor Mark F. Schultz joined the faculty in 2003. He teaches and writes primarily in the area of intellectual property.
Professor Schultz is a frequent author and speaker known for his work on the law and economics of the global intellectual property system. In one of his most influential projects, he worked with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to construct a groundbreaking global trade secret protection index (the TSPI). The TSPI is influencing policy discussions on this cutting-edge topic in capitals around the world. Other recent projects have included an empirical study that quantified for the first time the backlogs in patent offices worldwide, a report on how patented innovation is meeting global health challenges, and the construction of a new global index of copyright strength.
Professor Schultz is an influential voice in public policy debates regarding intellectual property. He has testified before the U.S. Congress on copyright law at the invitation of the House Judiciary Committee and has briefed the staff of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee on trade secret legislation. He speaks frequently around the world about the connection between secure and effective intellectual property rights and flourishing national economies and individual lives, with invitations from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the U.S. Trade Representative, and the U.S. Copyright Office, as well as numerous academic institutions, think tanks, and industry groups. He served as an NGO delegate to the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) for several years during the WIPO Development Agenda talks. He is also one of the organizers of an ongoing multilateral diplomatic dialogue on best practices in national trade secret laws, and is co-founder of the Center for Protection of Intellectual Property (CPIP) at George Mason University in Washington, D.C.
Among the awards and recognition he has received for his scholarship was the School of Law's Outstanding Scholar of the Year award in 2008. He has been a distinguished visiting scholar at the University of Botswana and a visiting professor at DePaul University College of Law.
Professor Schultz graduated with honors from the George Washington University School of Law. Following law school, he was a judicial clerk for the Hon. Daniel M. Friedman of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit in Washington, D.C., and the Hon. Eric G. Bruggink of the United States Court of Federal Claims. Prior to joining academia, he practiced law for a decade, serving as outside general counsel to several tech startups and helping technology companies to expand their businesses and commercialize their intellectual property in dozens of countries. He holds a B.A. in International Economics from George Washington University and has done PhD level coursework in development economics at Southern Illinois University.
He is active in leadership roles in local and national organizations. He has served as chair of the Federalist Society's Intellectual Property Practice Group and the AALS Section on Internet and Computer Law. He is an officer of the American Bar Association's International IP Committee of the International Law Section and the American Intellectual Property Law Association’s Trade Secret Law Committee. He currently is chair of the Academic Advisory Board of the Copyright Alliance.
Professor Schultz teaches Copyright Law, Trade Secret Law, Trademark Law, and a senior seminar on Intellectual Property and Global Development. He established and directs both the Specialization in Intellectual Property Law and the IP Semester in Practice Externship Program. He also co-founded a Legal Globalization Class, offered every other year, that takes students to South Africa and Botswana after spending a semester learning about the legal system, culture, history, and politics of southern Africa. The popular course is a once-in-a-lifetime experience that introduces students to leading lawyers, judges, government officials, and human rights advocates, taking them from Cape Town to Johannesburg to Gaborone as well as many popular destinations including game reserves, national parks, the Cape of Good Hope, and the Cradle of Humankind.
*Dr. Ron D. Katznelson is the President of Bi-Level Technologies, a signal processing technology startup company in Encinitas, CA. He is a technologist, an inventor named on 23 U.S. patents, entrepreneur, an intellectual property development and management expert, and an independent scholar of the patent system. He serves on the IP Committee of IEEE-USA and is a member of the San Diego Intellectual Property Association. He can be reached at ron@bileveltech.com.
Senior Attorney and Counsel for Special Projects, Competitive Enterprise Institute
CEI’s Counsel for Special Projects is Hans Bader. Coming to CEI in 2003, Hans’s prior casework has included suits involving the First Amendment, federalism, and civil rights issues. He graduated from the University of Virginia with a B.A. in economics and history, and later earned his J.D. from Harvard Law School. Just before joining CEI, Hans was Senior Counsel at the Center for Individual Rights.
The Future of Publicly Owned Lands - Podcast
Donald J. Kochan, David Garbett, Dean Reuter
Environmental Law & Property Rights Practice Group Podcast
Recent legislation passed by the State of Utah has demanded that the federal government extinguish...
Union Organizing and the NLRB Under President Obama
Raymond J. LaJeunesse
Engage Volume 13, Issue 3 October 2012
Note from the Editor: This paper analyzes union organizing and the NLRB under the Obama...
The Telecommunications Act of 1996 in the Twenty-first Century
Howard Waltzman
Engage Volume 13, Issue 3 October 2012
I. Introduction Prior to 1996, local telephony was perceived to be a natural monopoly, subjecting...
Individualizing the FLSA: Collective Action Waivers and the Split in the Federal Courts
Laura Carlisle, Amelia W. Koch, Jennifer McNamara
Engage Volume 13, Issue 3 October 2012
Introduction The ability of employees to proceed collectively under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA)...
Alleyne v. United States - Post-Argument SCOTUScast
Ryan Scott
SCOTUScast 2-4-13 featuring Ryan Scott
On January 14, 2013 the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Alleyne v. United States. The...
City of Arlington v. FCC - Post-Argument SCOTUScast
Emily Bremer
SCOTUScast 2-4-13 featuring Emily Bremer
On January 16, 2013, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in City of Arlington v. FCC....
Levin v. United States - Post-Argument SCOTUScast
Kyndra Kaye Rotunda
SCOTUScast 2-4-13 featuring Kyndra Rotunda
On January 15, 2013, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Levin v. United States. The...
Gunn v. Minton - Post-Argument SCOTUScast
Mark F. Schultz
SCOTUScast 2-4-13 featuring Mark Schultz
On January 16, 2013, the Supreme Court heard oral argument in Gunn v. Minton. The question...
The America Invents Act May Be Constitutionally Infirm if It Repeals the Bar Against Patenting After Secret Commercial Use
Ron Katznelson
Engage Volume 13, Issue 3 October 2012
Note from the Editor: This paper analyzes the constitutionality of the new conditions for patentability...
Misconceptions about Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.
Hans Frank Bader
Engage Volume 13, Issue 3 October 2012
Note from the Editor: This article discusses the Supreme Court’s decision in Ledbetter v....