Justice, Supreme Court of Arizona
Clint Bolick was appointed by Governor Doug Ducey in January 2016 to serve on the Arizona Supreme Court and was retained by the voters in 2018 and 2024.
Prior to joining the Court, Justice Bolick litigated constitutional cases in state and federal courts from coast to coast, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other positions, he served as Vice President for Litigation at the Goldwater Institute and as Co-founder and Vice President for Litigation at the Institute for Justice. He has litigated in support of school choice, freedom of enterprise, private property rights, freedom of speech, and federalism, and against racial classifications and government subsidies.
Justice Bolick received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of California at Davis, where he has been recognized as a distinguished alumnus, and his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude from Drew University. He serves as a research fellow with the Hoover Institution. Among other honors, he was named one of the 90 Greatest DC Lawyers in the Last 30 Years by Legal Times in 2008, received a Bradley Prize in 2006, and was recognized as one of the nation’s three lawyers of the year by American Lawyer in 2002 for his successful defense of school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.
Justice Bolick is a prolific author of a dozen books and hundreds of articles. Among his most recent books are Unshackled: Freeing America’s K-12 Education System: Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, co-authored with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; and David’s Hammer: The Case for an Activist Judiciary. Bolick serves as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law and has served as a lecturer at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Executive Vice President, Goldwater Institute
Christina Sandefur is the Executive Vice President at the Goldwater Institute. She develops policies and litigates cases advancing healthcare freedom, free enterprise, private property rights, free speech, and taxpayer rights.
Christina is a co-drafter of the Right to Try initiative, now federal law, which protects terminally ill patients' right to try safe investigational treatments that have been prescribed by their physician but are not yet FDA-approved. She has won important victories for property rights in Arizona and works nationally to promote the Institute's Private Property Rights Protection Act, a state-level reform that requires government to pay owners when regulations destroy property rights and reduce property values.
Christina is the co-author of the book Cornerstone of Liberty: Private Property Rights in 21st Century America (2016). She is a frequent guest on national television and radio programs, has provided expert legal testimony to various legislative committees, and is a frequent speaker at conferences. She is the recipient of the 2018 Buckley Award in recognition of her leadership in the freedom movement, and she is an Advisory Board Member of the Network of enlightened Women. Christina serves on the board of the Phoenix Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society and is a member of the executive committee for the Federalist Society's Regulatory Transparency Project: FDA & Health.
Christina is a graduate of Michigan State University College of Law and Hillsdale College.
Former Chief Justice, Arizona Supreme Court
Scott Bales served on the Arizona Supreme Court for fourteen years, including as Chief Justice from July 2014 until July 2019. After retiring from the Court, he was the Executive Director of the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver through July 2020. He now consults on appellate matters and internal investigations and serves as a neutral.
He is the immediate past Chair of the Council of the ABA’s Section on Legal Education and serves on the Council of the American Law Institute and the Board of Trustees for the National Conference of Bar Examiners. He previously chaired the Appellate Judges Conference of the ABA’s Judicial Division. Justice Bales has often taught courses at the law schools at Arizona State University and the University of Arizona.
Before his appointment to the Court, he had practiced law in Arizona for nearly 20 years as a private and public lawyer. He was a partner in Phoenix firms that later became Osborn Maledon P.A. and Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie. He also served as Arizona’s Solicitor General from 1999-2001 and as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Policy Development from 1998-1999, a Special Investigative Counsel for the Justice Department’s Inspector General from 1995-97, and as a federal prosecutor.
He clerked for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Joseph T. Sneed III on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. After graduating from Michigan State University with degrees in history and economics, he received a master’s degree in economics and his law degree from Harvard.
Clinical Professor of Law, Cornell Law School
William A. Jacobson is a Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Securities Law Clinic.
He is a 1981 graduate of Hamilton College and a 1984 graduate of Harvard Law School. At Harvard he was Senior Editor of the Harvard International Law Journal and Director of Litigation for the Harvard Prison Legal Assistance Project.
Prior to joining the Cornell law faculty in 2007, Professor Jacobson had a highly successful civil litigation and arbitration practice in Providence, Rhode Island, concentrating in investment, employment, and business disputes in the securities industry, including many high profile cases reported in leading newspapers and magazines.
Professor Jacobson has argued cases in numerous federal and state courts, including the Courts of Appeal for the First, Fifth and Sixth Circuits, and the Rhode Island Supreme Court.
Professor Jacobson has a national reputation as a leading practitioner in securities arbitration. He was Treasurer, and is a former member of the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, a professional organization of attorneys dedicated to protecting public investors. He frequently is quoted in national media on issues related to investment fraud and investor protection, and in the past has served as one of a small number of private practice attorneys who trained new arbitrators for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.
Professor Jacobson is co-author of the Securities Arbitration Desk Reference (Thomson-Reuters), updated annually.
Professor Jacobson also is the founder and publisher of Legal Insurrection, a popular politics and law website. He is frequently quoted in the media on political and legal topics, has authored many Op-Eds in major publications, and appears on television and radio to discuss politics and the law.
MD, JD, Georgetown Scholar
Nicholas D. Lawson, M.D., J.D., is a disability advocate and a person with a disability having lived experience of disability discrimination as a psychiatry resident. He is also a Georgetown Law Scholar and an aspiring disability studies professor who writes about disability rights issues within the academic medical and legal literatures. Dr. Lawson draws from an interdisciplinary background in medicine, law, research, and clinical care to critically appraise expert authorities on persons with disabilities and to fight medical models that contribute to disability oppression. Lawson is particularly interested in reducing structural stigma, in the inclusion of persons with disabilities in positions of leadership and within the professions, and in negative rights and privacy issues.
Lawson’s contributions to law reviews include “To Be a Good Lawyer, One Has to Be a Healthy Lawyer”: Lawyer Well-Being, Discrimination, and Discretionary Systems of Discipline in the Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics. The Article critiqued professional wellness (aka well-being) policies encouraging surveillance and reporting of persons suspected of having mental health conditions and disabilities. Dr. Lawson’s more recent Article, Suicide Screening and Surveillance of Students, Discrimination, and Privacy: The Garrett Lee Smith Memorial Act, is forthcoming in the Journal of Law and Education. It argues that suicide surveillance policies in high schools, colleges, and universities are counterproductive and lead to discrimination on the basis of suicidality. Lawson argues that institutions can “support” persons with disabilities, including mental health conditions, by complying with disability affirmative action requirements under the Rehabilitation Act, including persons with disabilities in leadership positions, and by investing in disability studies programs and courses within their academic curriculums.
Judge, United States District Court, District of Columbia
Judge Trevor N. McFadden was appointed to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in 2017. He received his B.A. in 2001 from Wheaton College, IL, magna cum laude. In 2006, he received his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he graduated Order of the Coif and was an editor for the Virginia Law Review.
Following graduation from law school, Judge McFadden clerked for Judge Steven Colloton, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He then joined the U.S. Department of Justice, where he served as Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General and as Assistant U.S. Attorney in the District of Columbia. Judge McFadden subsequently became a partner at Baker & McKenzie LLP in Washington, DC, where he focused on white collar investigations. He is also co-author of a treatise, Corporate Settlement Tools: DPAs, NPAs, and Cooperation Agreements.
After four years in private practice, Judge McFadden returned to the U.S. Department of Justice, where he was Deputy Assistant Attorney General and acted as the second-in-command of the Department's Criminal Division. As Deputy Assistant Attorney General, he managed the Division's Fraud and Appellate Sections.
Judge McFadden also has extensive experience in law enforcement. He served as an officer with the Fairfax County, VA, Police Department and as a deputy sheriff in Madison County, VA.
Professor of Law, Notre Dame Law School
Professor Derek Muller is a nationally-recognized scholar in the field of election law. His research focuses on the role of states in the administration of federal elections, the constitutional contours of voting rights and election administration, the limits of judicial power in the domain of elections, and the Electoral College.
He has published more than two dozen academic works, and his op-eds have appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal. He has testified before Congress, and he is a contributor at the Election Law Blog. He is a co-author on a Federal Courts casebook published by Carolina Academic Press. He is also the co-reporter on a new Restatement of the Law, Election Litigation, an effort led by the American Law Institute.
Professor Muller teaches Election Law, Civil Procedure, and Evidence.
Justice, Supreme Court of Arizona
Clint Bolick was appointed by Governor Doug Ducey in January 2016 to serve on the Arizona Supreme Court and was retained by the voters in 2018 and 2024.
Prior to joining the Court, Justice Bolick litigated constitutional cases in state and federal courts from coast to coast, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other positions, he served as Vice President for Litigation at the Goldwater Institute and as Co-founder and Vice President for Litigation at the Institute for Justice. He has litigated in support of school choice, freedom of enterprise, private property rights, freedom of speech, and federalism, and against racial classifications and government subsidies.
Justice Bolick received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of California at Davis, where he has been recognized as a distinguished alumnus, and his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude from Drew University. He serves as a research fellow with the Hoover Institution. Among other honors, he was named one of the 90 Greatest DC Lawyers in the Last 30 Years by Legal Times in 2008, received a Bradley Prize in 2006, and was recognized as one of the nation’s three lawyers of the year by American Lawyer in 2002 for his successful defense of school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.
Justice Bolick is a prolific author of a dozen books and hundreds of articles. Among his most recent books are Unshackled: Freeing America’s K-12 Education System: Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, co-authored with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; and David’s Hammer: The Case for an Activist Judiciary. Bolick serves as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law and has served as a lecturer at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Justice, Michigan Supreme Court
Stephen Markman was appointed Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court on October 1, 1999. He served as the Chief Justice from 2017-2019. Before his appointment, he served as Judge on the Michigan Court of Appeals from 1995-1999. Prior to this, he practiced law with the firm of Miller, Canfield, Paddock & Stone in Detroit.
From 1989-1993, Justice Markman served as United States Attorney, or federal prosecutor, in Michigan, after having been nominated by President George H. W. Bush and confirmed by the United States Senate. From 1985-1989, he served as Assistant Attorney General of the United States, after having been nominated by President Ronald Reagan and confirmed by the United States Senate. In that position, he headed the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Policy, which served as the principal policy development office within the Department, and which coordinated the federal judicial selection process. Prior to this, he served for seven years as Chief Counsel of the United States Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, and as Deputy Chief Counsel of the United States Senate Judiciary Committee.
Justice Markman has authored articles for such publications as the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, the Detroit College of Law Review, the Stanford Law Review, the University of Chicago Law Review, the American Criminal Justice Law Review, the Barrister’s Law Journal, the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, and the American University Law Review. He has also served as a contributing editor of National Review magazine, and has authored chapters in such books as “In the Name of Justice: The Aims of the Criminal Law,” “Still the Law of the Land,” and “Originalism: A Quarter Century of Debate.”
Justice Markman has taught constitutional law at Hillsdale College since 1993. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Western Michigan University Thomas M. Cooley Law School. He traveled to Ukraine on two occasions on behalf of the State Department, to provide assistance in the development of that nation’s post-Soviet constitution. He is a Fellow of the Michigan Bar Foundation, a Master of the Bench of the Inns of Court, and a member of the One Hundred Club. He has spoken before hundreds of youth, civic, charitable, and legal groups throughout Michigan and nationally, and has coached Little League baseball and basketball. He lives with his wife Mary Kathleen in Mason, and has two sons, James and Charles.
Justice Markman was re-elected to the Supreme Court in 2000, 2004, and 2012. His present term expires January 1, 2021.
Justice of the Supreme Court, Michigan Supreme Court
Justice Brian K. Zahra was appointed by Governor Rick Snyder to the Michigan Supreme Court on January 14, 2011. The people of Michigan subsequently elected him in November 2012 to a partial term and then re-elected him in November 2014 to a full term.
Justice Zahra received his undergraduate degree in 1984 from Wayne State University. To finance his education, he opened and operated a small health and personal care retail store in downtown Detroit. Justice Zahra later opened a grocery outlet, also in Detroit, with two partners. In 1987, he graduated with honors from the University Of Detroit School Of Law, where he served as a member of the Law Review and as Articles Editor of the State Bar of Michigan’s Corporation and Finance Business Law Journal. Upon graduation he served as law clerk to Judge Lawrence P. Zatkoff of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan before joining and eventually becoming a partner in the law firm of Dickinson, Wright, Moon, Van Dusen & Freeman. In 1994, Governor John Engler appointed him to the Wayne County Circuit Court where in 1996 he was elected to a six-year term. In December of 1998, he was appointed to the Michigan Court of Appeals by Governor Engler. He was elected to six-year terms in 2000 and 2006. From December 2005 to January 2007, he served as the Court of Appeals’ Chief Judge Pro Tem.
Justice Zahra has been active in many civic and charitable organizations, including Boys and Girls Clubs of Southeastern Michigan, Kiwanis Club International, Leadership Detroit, the Knights of Columbus, the Maltese American Community Club, and the Maltese American Benevolent Society, of which he is a past officer. He is a former board member and officer of the Catholic Lawyers Society, and past officer of the Federalist Society, where he currently serves as a member of the Advisory Board to the Michigan chapter. He also serves as the judicial advisor to the Hillsdale College Federalist Society Chapter.
Justice, Supreme Court of Arizona
Clint Bolick was appointed by Governor Doug Ducey in January 2016 to serve on the Arizona Supreme Court and was retained by the voters in 2018 and 2024.
Prior to joining the Court, Justice Bolick litigated constitutional cases in state and federal courts from coast to coast, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other positions, he served as Vice President for Litigation at the Goldwater Institute and as Co-founder and Vice President for Litigation at the Institute for Justice. He has litigated in support of school choice, freedom of enterprise, private property rights, freedom of speech, and federalism, and against racial classifications and government subsidies.
Justice Bolick received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of California at Davis, where he has been recognized as a distinguished alumnus, and his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude from Drew University. He serves as a research fellow with the Hoover Institution. Among other honors, he was named one of the 90 Greatest DC Lawyers in the Last 30 Years by Legal Times in 2008, received a Bradley Prize in 2006, and was recognized as one of the nation’s three lawyers of the year by American Lawyer in 2002 for his successful defense of school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.
Justice Bolick is a prolific author of a dozen books and hundreds of articles. Among his most recent books are Unshackled: Freeing America’s K-12 Education System: Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, co-authored with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; and David’s Hammer: The Case for an Activist Judiciary. Bolick serves as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law and has served as a lecturer at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
JEFFREY S. SUTTON is the Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He has served as Chair of the Federal Judicial Conference Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, Chair of the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules, and Chair of the Supreme Court Fellows Commission. He currently serves as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. Since 1993, Chief Judge Sutton has been an adjunct professor at The Ohio State University College of Law, where he teaches seminars on State Constitutional Law, the United States Supreme Court, and Appellate Advocacy. He also teaches a class on State Constitutional Law at Harvard Law School. Among other publications, he is the author of Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation and 51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law. He is the co-author of a casebook, State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience, as well as The Law of Judicial Precedent. He is also the co-editor of The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law. In 2006, Chief Judge Sutton was elected to the American Law Institute, and in 2017 he was elected to its Council.
Former Chief Justice, Arizona Supreme Court
Scott Bales served on the Arizona Supreme Court for fourteen years, including as Chief Justice from July 2014 until July 2019. After retiring from the Court, he was the Executive Director of the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System at the University of Denver through July 2020. He now consults on appellate matters and internal investigations and serves as a neutral.
He is the immediate past Chair of the Council of the ABA’s Section on Legal Education and serves on the Council of the American Law Institute and the Board of Trustees for the National Conference of Bar Examiners. He previously chaired the Appellate Judges Conference of the ABA’s Judicial Division. Justice Bales has often taught courses at the law schools at Arizona State University and the University of Arizona.
Before his appointment to the Court, he had practiced law in Arizona for nearly 20 years as a private and public lawyer. He was a partner in Phoenix firms that later became Osborn Maledon P.A. and Lewis Roca Rothgerber Christie. He also served as Arizona’s Solicitor General from 1999-2001 and as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the U.S. Department of Justice’s Office of Policy Development from 1998-1999, a Special Investigative Counsel for the Justice Department’s Inspector General from 1995-97, and as a federal prosecutor.
He clerked for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the U.S. Supreme Court and Judge Joseph T. Sneed III on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. After graduating from Michigan State University with degrees in history and economics, he received a master’s degree in economics and his law degree from Harvard.
Clinical Professor of Law, Cornell Law School
William A. Jacobson is a Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Securities Law Clinic.
He is a 1981 graduate of Hamilton College and a 1984 graduate of Harvard Law School. At Harvard he was Senior Editor of the Harvard International Law Journal and Director of Litigation for the Harvard Prison Legal Assistance Project.
Prior to joining the Cornell law faculty in 2007, Professor Jacobson had a highly successful civil litigation and arbitration practice in Providence, Rhode Island, concentrating in investment, employment, and business disputes in the securities industry, including many high profile cases reported in leading newspapers and magazines.
Professor Jacobson has argued cases in numerous federal and state courts, including the Courts of Appeal for the First, Fifth and Sixth Circuits, and the Rhode Island Supreme Court.
Professor Jacobson has a national reputation as a leading practitioner in securities arbitration. He was Treasurer, and is a former member of the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, a professional organization of attorneys dedicated to protecting public investors. He frequently is quoted in national media on issues related to investment fraud and investor protection, and in the past has served as one of a small number of private practice attorneys who trained new arbitrators for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.
Professor Jacobson is co-author of the Securities Arbitration Desk Reference (Thomson-Reuters), updated annually.
Professor Jacobson also is the founder and publisher of Legal Insurrection, a popular politics and law website. He is frequently quoted in the media on political and legal topics, has authored many Op-Eds in major publications, and appears on television and radio to discuss politics and the law.
MD, JD, Georgetown Scholar
Nicholas D. Lawson, M.D., J.D., is a disability advocate and a person with a disability having lived experience of disability discrimination as a psychiatry resident. He is also a Georgetown Law Scholar and an aspiring disability studies professor who writes about disability rights issues within the academic medical and legal literatures. Dr. Lawson draws from an interdisciplinary background in medicine, law, research, and clinical care to critically appraise expert authorities on persons with disabilities and to fight medical models that contribute to disability oppression. Lawson is particularly interested in reducing structural stigma, in the inclusion of persons with disabilities in positions of leadership and within the professions, and in negative rights and privacy issues.
Lawson’s contributions to law reviews include “To Be a Good Lawyer, One Has to Be a Healthy Lawyer”: Lawyer Well-Being, Discrimination, and Discretionary Systems of Discipline in the Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics. The Article critiqued professional wellness (aka well-being) policies encouraging surveillance and reporting of persons suspected of having mental health conditions and disabilities. Dr. Lawson’s more recent Article, Suicide Screening and Surveillance of Students, Discrimination, and Privacy: The Garrett Lee Smith Memorial Act, is forthcoming in the Journal of Law and Education. It argues that suicide surveillance policies in high schools, colleges, and universities are counterproductive and lead to discrimination on the basis of suicidality. Lawson argues that institutions can “support” persons with disabilities, including mental health conditions, by complying with disability affirmative action requirements under the Rehabilitation Act, including persons with disabilities in leadership positions, and by investing in disability studies programs and courses within their academic curriculums.
Judge, United States District Court, District of Columbia
Judge Trevor N. McFadden was appointed to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in 2017. He received his B.A. in 2001 from Wheaton College, IL, magna cum laude. In 2006, he received his J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law, where he graduated Order of the Coif and was an editor for the Virginia Law Review.
Following graduation from law school, Judge McFadden clerked for Judge Steven Colloton, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He then joined the U.S. Department of Justice, where he served as Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General and as Assistant U.S. Attorney in the District of Columbia. Judge McFadden subsequently became a partner at Baker & McKenzie LLP in Washington, DC, where he focused on white collar investigations. He is also co-author of a treatise, Corporate Settlement Tools: DPAs, NPAs, and Cooperation Agreements.
After four years in private practice, Judge McFadden returned to the U.S. Department of Justice, where he was Deputy Assistant Attorney General and acted as the second-in-command of the Department's Criminal Division. As Deputy Assistant Attorney General, he managed the Division's Fraud and Appellate Sections.
Judge McFadden also has extensive experience in law enforcement. He served as an officer with the Fairfax County, VA, Police Department and as a deputy sheriff in Madison County, VA.
Professor of Law, Notre Dame Law School
Professor Derek Muller is a nationally-recognized scholar in the field of election law. His research focuses on the role of states in the administration of federal elections, the constitutional contours of voting rights and election administration, the limits of judicial power in the domain of elections, and the Electoral College.
He has published more than two dozen academic works, and his op-eds have appeared in the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Wall Street Journal. He has testified before Congress, and he is a contributor at the Election Law Blog. He is a co-author on a Federal Courts casebook published by Carolina Academic Press. He is also the co-reporter on a new Restatement of the Law, Election Litigation, an effort led by the American Law Institute.
Professor Muller teaches Election Law, Civil Procedure, and Evidence.
Justice, Supreme Court of Arizona
Clint Bolick was appointed by Governor Doug Ducey in January 2016 to serve on the Arizona Supreme Court and was retained by the voters in 2018 and 2024.
Prior to joining the Court, Justice Bolick litigated constitutional cases in state and federal courts from coast to coast, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other positions, he served as Vice President for Litigation at the Goldwater Institute and as Co-founder and Vice President for Litigation at the Institute for Justice. He has litigated in support of school choice, freedom of enterprise, private property rights, freedom of speech, and federalism, and against racial classifications and government subsidies.
Justice Bolick received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of California at Davis, where he has been recognized as a distinguished alumnus, and his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude from Drew University. He serves as a research fellow with the Hoover Institution. Among other honors, he was named one of the 90 Greatest DC Lawyers in the Last 30 Years by Legal Times in 2008, received a Bradley Prize in 2006, and was recognized as one of the nation’s three lawyers of the year by American Lawyer in 2002 for his successful defense of school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.
Justice Bolick is a prolific author of a dozen books and hundreds of articles. Among his most recent books are Unshackled: Freeing America’s K-12 Education System: Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, co-authored with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; and David’s Hammer: The Case for an Activist Judiciary. Bolick serves as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law and has served as a lecturer at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Justice, Michigan Supreme Court
Stephen Markman was appointed Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court on October 1, 1999. He served as the Chief Justice from 2017-2019. Before his appointment, he served as Judge on the Michigan Court of Appeals from 1995-1999. Prior to this, he practiced law with the firm of Miller, Canfield, Paddock & Stone in Detroit.
From 1989-1993, Justice Markman served as United States Attorney, or federal prosecutor, in Michigan, after having been nominated by President George H. W. Bush and confirmed by the United States Senate. From 1985-1989, he served as Assistant Attorney General of the United States, after having been nominated by President Ronald Reagan and confirmed by the United States Senate. In that position, he headed the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Policy, which served as the principal policy development office within the Department, and which coordinated the federal judicial selection process. Prior to this, he served for seven years as Chief Counsel of the United States Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, and as Deputy Chief Counsel of the United States Senate Judiciary Committee.
Justice Markman has authored articles for such publications as the University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform, the Detroit College of Law Review, the Stanford Law Review, the University of Chicago Law Review, the American Criminal Justice Law Review, the Barrister’s Law Journal, the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, and the American University Law Review. He has also served as a contributing editor of National Review magazine, and has authored chapters in such books as “In the Name of Justice: The Aims of the Criminal Law,” “Still the Law of the Land,” and “Originalism: A Quarter Century of Debate.”
Justice Markman has taught constitutional law at Hillsdale College since 1993. He has served on the Board of Directors of the Western Michigan University Thomas M. Cooley Law School. He traveled to Ukraine on two occasions on behalf of the State Department, to provide assistance in the development of that nation’s post-Soviet constitution. He is a Fellow of the Michigan Bar Foundation, a Master of the Bench of the Inns of Court, and a member of the One Hundred Club. He has spoken before hundreds of youth, civic, charitable, and legal groups throughout Michigan and nationally, and has coached Little League baseball and basketball. He lives with his wife Mary Kathleen in Mason, and has two sons, James and Charles.
Justice Markman was re-elected to the Supreme Court in 2000, 2004, and 2012. His present term expires January 1, 2021.
Justice of the Supreme Court, Michigan Supreme Court
Justice Brian K. Zahra was appointed by Governor Rick Snyder to the Michigan Supreme Court on January 14, 2011. The people of Michigan subsequently elected him in November 2012 to a partial term and then re-elected him in November 2014 to a full term.
Justice Zahra received his undergraduate degree in 1984 from Wayne State University. To finance his education, he opened and operated a small health and personal care retail store in downtown Detroit. Justice Zahra later opened a grocery outlet, also in Detroit, with two partners. In 1987, he graduated with honors from the University Of Detroit School Of Law, where he served as a member of the Law Review and as Articles Editor of the State Bar of Michigan’s Corporation and Finance Business Law Journal. Upon graduation he served as law clerk to Judge Lawrence P. Zatkoff of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan before joining and eventually becoming a partner in the law firm of Dickinson, Wright, Moon, Van Dusen & Freeman. In 1994, Governor John Engler appointed him to the Wayne County Circuit Court where in 1996 he was elected to a six-year term. In December of 1998, he was appointed to the Michigan Court of Appeals by Governor Engler. He was elected to six-year terms in 2000 and 2006. From December 2005 to January 2007, he served as the Court of Appeals’ Chief Judge Pro Tem.
Justice Zahra has been active in many civic and charitable organizations, including Boys and Girls Clubs of Southeastern Michigan, Kiwanis Club International, Leadership Detroit, the Knights of Columbus, the Maltese American Community Club, and the Maltese American Benevolent Society, of which he is a past officer. He is a former board member and officer of the Catholic Lawyers Society, and past officer of the Federalist Society, where he currently serves as a member of the Advisory Board to the Michigan chapter. He also serves as the judicial advisor to the Hillsdale College Federalist Society Chapter.
Justice, Supreme Court of Arizona
Clint Bolick was appointed by Governor Doug Ducey in January 2016 to serve on the Arizona Supreme Court and was retained by the voters in 2018 and 2024.
Prior to joining the Court, Justice Bolick litigated constitutional cases in state and federal courts from coast to coast, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Among other positions, he served as Vice President for Litigation at the Goldwater Institute and as Co-founder and Vice President for Litigation at the Institute for Justice. He has litigated in support of school choice, freedom of enterprise, private property rights, freedom of speech, and federalism, and against racial classifications and government subsidies.
Justice Bolick received his Juris Doctor degree from the University of California at Davis, where he has been recognized as a distinguished alumnus, and his Bachelor of Arts degree magna cum laude from Drew University. He serves as a research fellow with the Hoover Institution. Among other honors, he was named one of the 90 Greatest DC Lawyers in the Last 30 Years by Legal Times in 2008, received a Bradley Prize in 2006, and was recognized as one of the nation’s three lawyers of the year by American Lawyer in 2002 for his successful defense of school vouchers in Zelman v. Simmons-Harris.
Justice Bolick is a prolific author of a dozen books and hundreds of articles. Among his most recent books are Unshackled: Freeing America’s K-12 Education System: Immigration Wars: Forging an American Solution, co-authored with former Florida Governor Jeb Bush; and David’s Hammer: The Case for an Activist Judiciary. Bolick serves as an adjunct professor of constitutional law at Arizona State University’s Sandra Day O’Connor School of Law and has served as a lecturer at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
Deputy Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Policy, Department of Justice
GianCarlo Canaparo serves as Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Office of Legal Policy at the Department of Justice. There, he oversees the Office's regulatory work and is the Department's liaison to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. He also assists the White House in the process of selecting nominees for federal judgeships and advises Department leadership on policy and legal matters.
Before joining the Department, Canaparo was a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies where he researched constitutional law, administrative law, and civil rights.
Canaparo’s scholarship has appeared in various law reviews including the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy, the Notre Dame Law Review, the Georgetown Journal of Law and Public Policy, the Texas Review of Law and Politics, and the Administrative Law Review. His research has been cited by Justice Neil Gorsuch and featured in the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post. His analysis has appeared in Law & Liberty, Civitas, Fox News, The National Review, Law 360, FedSoc Blog, and other outlets.
Canaparo co-hosted The Heritage Foundation’s SCOTUS 101 podcast, which follows the Supreme Court’s arguments and opinions and features interviews with judges, advocates, and scholars.
After graduating Georgetown law, Canaparo spent three years at the law firm of Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom and two years as a federal law clerk. He earned his bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of California at Davis.
Canaparo is a classical pianist and organist.
SCOTUS REVIEW with Justice Bolick and Judge Eckerstrom
Arizona Student Chapter
Tucson, AZ2022 Arizona Supreme Court Review
Phoenix Lawyers Chapter
Phoenix, AZBreakout Panel: ABA Accreditation of Law Schools
Scott Bales, William Jacobson, Nicholas Lawson, Trevor N. McFadden, Derek T. Muller
The U.S. Department of Education provides oversight of postsecondary institutions or program accreditation by reviewing...
Breakout Panel: ABA Accreditation of Law Schools
Tenth Annual Executive Branch Review
Washington, DCTenth Annual Executive Branch Review Conference —EBRX
The Administrative State, Law, and Culture
Washington, DCFeddie Night Fights: Dueling Perspectives On State Constitutionalism
Clint Bolick, Steve J. Markman, Brian K. Zahra
The Federalist Society's Student Division &Hillsdale College Student Chapter present Feddie Night Fights:Dueling Perspectives On...
Feddie Night Fights: Dueling Perspectives On State Constitutionalism
Hillsdale College Student Chapter
Who Decides? States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation
Phoenix, AZPrinciples of State Constitutional Interpretation
Clint Bolick
State constitutionalism—the practice of state courts deciding cases on independent state constitutional grounds—is a vital...
State Court Docket Watch: Rogers v. Honorable Mroz
GianCarlo Canaparo
On February 1, 2022, the Arizona Supreme Court held that the First Amendment barred a...