Senior Fellow and Director of Constitutional Studies, Manhattan Institute
Biography
Ilya Shapiro is a senior fellow and director of constitutional studies at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. Previously he was executive director and senior lecturer at the Georgetown Center for the Constitution, and before that a vice president of the Cato Institute.
Shapiro has testified many times before Congress and state legislatures and has filed more than 500 amicus curiae “friend of the court” briefs in the Supreme Court. He lectures regularly on behalf of the Federalist Society, is a member of the board of fellows of the Jewish Policy Center, was an inaugural Washington Fellow at the National Review Institute, and has been an adjunct law professor at the George Washington University and University of Mississippi. He is also the chairman of the board of advisers of the Mississippi Justice Institute, a barrister in the Edward Coke Appellate Inn of Court, and a former member of the Virginia Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights.
Earlier in his career, Shapiro was a special assistant/adviser to the Multi-National Force in Iraq on rule-of-law issues and practiced at Patton Boggs and Cleary Gottlieb. Before entering private practice, he clerked for Judge E. Grady Jolly of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He holds an AB from Princeton University, an MSc from the London School of Economics, and a JD from the University of Chicago Law School.
Christopher D. Kratovil is a member of Dykema’s Litigation practice in the firm’s Dallas office. Prior to joining Dykema, Mr. Kratovil was a partner at K&L Gates. Mr. Kratovil is a former law clerk to the Honorable Edith H. Jones, Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.
Mr. Kratovil focuses his practice on appellate matters, representing clients in complex commercial disputes before tribunals ranging from small town Texas trial courts to the U.S. Supreme Court, with a particular concentration on matters in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and in the Texas courts of appeals. He has considerable experience in federal and state mandamus practice, including serving as the lead draftsman of the winning briefs in the landmark Fifth Circuit case that authorized the use of mandamus to compel convenience-based venue transfers, In re Volkswagen II, 545 F.3d 304 (5th Cir. 2008)(en banc).
In addition to his extensive appellate work, Mr. Kratovil regularly handles case dispositive briefing and argument, jury charges, complex motions, research intensive legal issues and error preservation in the trial courts. He also regularly assists in the white collar defense of clients accused of financial, securities and tax crimes. Mr. Kratovil is the author of several high-profile amicus curiae briefs, including on behalf United States Senator John Cornyn and, separately, for the Texas state representative who sponsored the so-called “Pole Tax” user fee on patrons of adult entertainment.
A frequent author and lecturer, Mr. Kratovil earned a B.A. magna cum laude from University of Notre Dame and a J.D. with honors from University of Texas at Austin School of Law, where he was an editor of the Texas Law Review. He has been recognized repeatedly as a “Rising Star” by Texas Monthly and was recently named one of the “Best Lawyers in Dallas” by D Magazine.
Chairman, Supreme Court and Constitutional Law Practice, Baker Botts LLP
Biography
Aaron Streett is the Chairman of Baker Botts’ Supreme Court and Constitutional Law Practice. He has presented oral argument in scores of appeals, covering the U.S. Supreme Court and courts around the country—including over 40 arguments between the Fifth and D.C. Circuits alone. Mr. Streett’s practice involves virtually all substantive areas of the law, including commercial litigation, statutory interpretation, constitutional law, administrative law, securities, and jurisdictional issues. Mr. Streett maintains an active practice in the Supreme Court of the United States, having represented parties in merits cases seven times since 2010, as well as filing numerous amicus and certiorari-stage briefs. Mr. Streett was named one of only six “Appellate MVPs” for 2014 by Law360, which had previously recognized him in 2011 as one of the top five appellate “Rising Stars” under age 40. Mr. Streett has been featured on National Law Journal’s Appellate Hot List three times in recent years and in 2021 was named Houston’s “Lawyer of the Year” for Appellate Practice by Best Lawyers magazine. Mr. Streett is an elected member of the American Law Institute and a fellow of the American Academy of Appellate Lawyers. He serves on the Board of Directors for the Fifth Circuit Bar Association and previously served as President of the Houston Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society. Mr. Streett speaks regularly on the Supreme Court and constitutional law to attorneys and law students around the country. Following graduation from Hillsdale College and University of Texas School of Law, Mr. Streett served as a law clerk to the Honorable David B. Sentelle of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and to the Honorable William H. Rehnquist, Chief Justice of the United States.
Vice President for Litigation, Institute for Free Speech
Biography
Alan joined the Institute for Free Speech as Vice President for Litigation in February 2021. In this role, Alan directs the Institute’s litigation and legal advocacy, leads our in-house legal team, and manages and works to expand our network of volunteer attorneys.
Prior to joining the Institute, Alan litigated complex federal matters for twenty years, in his own practice and as a partner in various Washington-area firms. He argued and won landmark constitutional cases in the United States Supreme Court and has appeared before numerous appellate and district courts throughout the country. Alan often speaks at law schools and continuing legal education seminars. He also teaches strategic/public interest litigation as an adjunct professor at the Georgetown University Law Center.
Alan began his career clerking for the Hon. Terrence W. Boyle, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of North Carolina. He has also served as a Deputy Attorney General for the State of California, a litigation associate at the Washington office of Sidley Austin, and as counsel to the United States Senate Judiciary Committee.
Alan earned his J.D. at Georgetown (1995) and his B.A. at Cornell University (1992). He is an active member in good standing of the Virginia, District of Columbia, and California bars, the Bar of the United States Supreme Court, and various federal appellate and district court bars.
Frank Edwards Tyler Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Kansas School of Law
Biography
Stephen Ware is the author of five books, over 60 law review articles and many other publications. His writings have been cited by the Supreme Court of the United States and in at least 37 other cases. Ware teaches and writes on:
Arbitration, Mediation, and Alternative Dispute Resolution,
Bankruptcy, Insolvency, and Debt Collection,
Contracts and Commercial Law, and
Judicial Selection,
each with an international or comparative dimension. An experienced teacher of lawyering skills exercises in which student groups negotiate, mediate, and draft legal documents, Professor Ware takes this approach in his Transnational Dispute Resolution course, which he has customized for universities from Beijing to Istanbul to Kansas.
Ware has testified before both houses of the U.S. Congress, several state legislatures and, as an expert witness, in court. He is a frequent guest lecturer and speaker at academic and professional conferences—having given such presentations throughout the U.S. and in several other countries. He has appeared on numerous television and radio stations and been quoted in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Financial Times, National Law Journal and many other news outlets. He is an elected member of the American Law Institute (ALI) and has served, at various times in his career, on the editorial board of the Journal of Legal Education and as an arbitrator for the American Arbitration Association.
Ware was named as the Frank Edwards Tyler Distinguished Professor of Law in 2019.
Doug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute, specializing in foreign policy and civil liberties. He worked as special assistant to President Reagan and editor of the political magazine Inquiry. He writes regularly for leading publications such as Fortune magazine, National Interest, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Times. Bandow speaks frequently at academic conferences, on college campuses, and to business groups. Bandow has been a regular commentator on ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News Channel, and MSNBC. He holds a J.D. from Stanford University.