Kansas Securities Commissioner
Aaron Jack, J.D., M.B.A., is the Kansas Securities Commissioner, a position he was appointed to by Kansas Governor Sam Brownback in 2011. Aaron was previously the West-Central Zone Director for New York Life where his 3,200 registered representatives produced over $1.5 billion in sales annually. Aaron was the first director in the history of New York Life to raise $1 billion in new assets for the company's investment management subsidiary, NYLIM.
Retired
Tom Gede retired in 2023 as a principal in Morgan Lewis Consulting LLC and of counsel to the firm. He currently consults on a variety of legal and policy matters for both public and private clients. Tom has a national reputation and distinguished background in federal Indian law. Prior to retirement, he represented clients in complex governmental matters in litigation, administrative and regulatory proceedings, including high-profile matters involving state governments. A former senior deputy in the California Attorney General’s office, Tom was amicus coordinator and Supreme Court counsel, and argued cases in the US Supreme Court, the California Supreme Court, and numerous state and federal appellate courts.
Tom also served as executive director of the Conference of Western Attorneys General (CWAG), coordinating activities on key legal and policy issues, such as federal Indian law, energy, environmental, public lands, financial services, and telecommunications, for the attorneys general of 18 western states and territories. In 2016, Tom was elected as a Member of the American Law Institute (ALI), and served as an Adviser on the Restatement of the Law Third - The Law of American Indians. Tom also taught federal Indian law as an adjunct law professor at the University of the Pacific - McGeorge School of Law. He served as an assistant editor for and the author of the Indian gaming chapter in CWAG’s American Indian Law Deskbook (2d & 3d eds.). He has been engaged in Indian gaming and Indian law matters for more than three decades, having focused on the gaming compacts with Indian tribes, as well as complex civil and criminal jurisdiction, land, natural resources, water and law enforcement issues in Indian country. He has testified before Congress on American Indian and Native Alaskan issues. In 2012 he was appointed by Speaker John Boehner to serve on the United States Indian Law and Order Commission, where he examined criminal justice issues in Indian country and Alaska, resulting in the issuance of an important report to the President and Congress.
Partner, Wiley Rein, LLP
Megan L. Brown is a partner at Wiley Rein LLP. She has significant litigation, appellate and regulatory experience before state and federal courts and agencies.
Ms. Brown helps businesses respond to federal, state and local regulation and investigations raising administrative law, statutory interpretation, and constitutional issues, including the First Amendment.
Executive Vice President and General Counsel, Battery Council International
Of Counsel, Wimberly, Lawson, Steckel, Schneider & Stine P.C.
Elizabeth K. (Betsy) Dorminey is of counsel with the firm. She received a B.A. magna cum laude from the University of Georgia in 1976, a license ès lettres from the Sorbonne in 1978, a J.D. from UGA’s Law School in 1981, and an LL.M. from Columbia in 1984. She clerked for the Hon. Ed Carnes on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and worked for the U.S. Departments of Justice and Commerce prior to joining the firm. Ms. Dorminey is a member of the State Bars of Georgia, Connecticut, and New York, and is admitted to practice in Federal District and Appellate Courts throughout the Southeast. With Larry Stine and Mark Waschak, she is co-author of “Occupational Safety & Health Law: Compliance and Practice” (Thomson/West 2008). Her practice concentrates in all aspects of employer defense, including but not limited to litigation the Fair Labor Standards Act, Title VII employment discrimination, and occupational safety and health. She is a member of the Executive Committee of the Labor & Employment Practice Group of the Federalist Society, and serves on the Board of the Friends of the Georgia Museum of Art.
Professor of Law, Ohio Northern University Pettit College of Law
Scott Gerber clerked for U.S. District Judge Ernest C. Torres of the District of Rhode Island and practiced with the Boston-based law firm Bingham, Dana & Gould. He is a member of the Massachusetts, Colorado and Virginia bars as well as the U.S. Supreme Court bar. He is the 2002, 2009, 2011 and 2012 winner of the Fowler V. Harper Award for excellence in legal scholarship and the 2004, 2013 and 2016 recipient of the Daniel S. Guy Award for excellence in legal journalism. He held the Ella & Ernest Fisher chair in law at Ohio Northern University from 2008-10. He has served on the Ohio Advisory Committee of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights since 2008 and was appointed to the Association of American Law Schools Committee to Review Scholarly Papers for the 2018 Annual Meeting. He is an associated scholar at Brown University's Political Theory Project. StateStats.org named him one of the top law professors in Ohio. He was on sabbatical as a visiting professor at Brown University's Political Theory Project during the 2018-19 academic year.
Owen L. Coon Professor of Law, Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law
James E. Pfander has focused his teaching and research on the role of the federal judiciary under Article III of the Constitution. His latest book, Constitutional Torts and the War on Terror (Oxford U. Press 2017), documents and evaluates the failure of the federal courts to address the merits of the claims of individuals who were subjected to extraordinary rendition, military detention, and torture during the Bush Administration’s war on terror. Other books include Civil Procedure: A Modern Approach (7th ed. 2018) (with Marcus, Redish & Sherman); Federal Courts: Cases, Comments, and Questions (8th ed. 2018) (with Redish & Sherry), Principles of Federal Jurisdiction (3d ed. 2017).
Pfander’s recent scholarship explores the role of non-contentious jurisdiction in a federal system otherwise largely devoted to the resolution of disputes between adverse parties; the forgotten distinction between “cases” and “controversies” in defining the work of the federal judiciary; the lessons available from Scotland’s civil-law-inflected approach to the problem of litigant standing; the origins and meaning of the anti-injunction act of 1793; and the possible influence of the Scottish judicial system on the structure of the federal court system.
A member of the American Law Institute, Pfander recently concluded his work as reporter/consultant to the Federal-State Jurisdiction Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States. He has served as chair of both the federal courts and civil procedure sections of the Association of American Law Schools.
Joseph Kushner Distinguished Professor of Civil Liberties Law, Hofstra University School of Law
After graduation from Harvard Law School, Professor Friedman worked for the New York City law firm of Kaye Scholer, Fierman Hays & Handler. He left the firm when his play, The Trial of Lee Harvey Oswald , was produced on Broadway and was later made into a television movie. He became general counsel of a New York publishing firm, Chelsea House Publishers, and then was selected as associate director of the Committee on Courtroom Conduct for the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, where he and Norman Dorsen wrote Disorder in the Court , the leading work on the subject. Thereafter, he was the director of the Committee for Public Justice and staff attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union during the Watergate era, where he litigated numerous cases dealing with national security, misuse of government power, the legality of the Vietnam War and the draft, and the First Amendment. He continues to write amicus briefs on important Supreme Court cases for the ACLU, PEN American Center, the Association of the Bar of the City of New York, and other public interest groups. He has testified before Congress on numerous occasions.
Professor Friedman is the author of more than 100 law journal articles and newspaper columns in such publications as The New York Times, The Nation, The New Republic, and The American Scholar. His bookThe Justices of the United States Supreme Court, 1789-1969 , won the annual Scribes Award for the best book on a legal subject. Among his other books areThe Supreme Court Confronts Abortion, Unquestioning Obedience to the President, The Wise Minority and Southern Justice .He is a leading copyright lawyer and has represented such entertainers as Kathleen Turner and James Brown as well as many authors such as John McPhee, I.B. Singer, Stephen Spender, Hunter Thompson, Susan Sontag, Oscar Hijuelos and the Estates of T.S. Eliot and Edith Wharton. He has also represented Jean Harris in an important First Amendment case dealing with the "Son of Sam" law, and Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, for whom he obtained a writ of habeas corpus, freeing him from 19 years of imprisonment. His activities on behalf of Hurricane Carter were featured in the film "The Hurricane" starring Denzel Washington. He acts as general counsel to PEN American Center, a leading writers group fighting censorship.
He lectures regularly to federal judges around the country, under the auspices of the Federal Judicial Center, on civil rights and criminal procedure. He frequently lectures at continuing legal education gatherings, such as those sponsored by the Practising Law Institute, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the American Bar Association/American Law Institute, on subjects such as civil rights, civil procedure, criminal procedure and the First Amendment.
Founding Partner, Lally & Misir, LLP
Deborah Misir is a founding partner of Lally & Misir, LLP. She specializes in complex civil and white collar trial and appellate litigation before federal, state and administrative courts. In addition, she provides advice on regulatory compliance, and public policy issues. In addition to her practice with the firm, Ms. Misir is a professor at Touro Law School, where she has taught constitutional and administrative law, and directs the Veterans Clinic.
Ms. Misir’s clients have included employers, unions, trade associations, local governments, and companies in the finance, hospitality, technology and energy sectors. She has also represented many individuals, including other lawyers, in white collar criminal, ethics and employment matters.
A leading federal litigator and expert on constitutional and government regulatory law, Ms. Misir has over twenty years of experience in both government and private practice, including briefing over seventy federal Circuit Courts of Appeals cases up to and including writs of certiorari and amicus briefs before the U.S. Supreme Court, making numerous federal appellate oral arguments, and serving as lead counsel on many federal civil and criminal district court matters. She has won several cases with published decisions in the federal courts.
Before entering private practice, Ms. Misir served in the Administration of President George W. Bush as U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Policy at the U.S. Department of Labor, ethics attorney at the White House Counsel’s Office, and Chief of Staff of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Ms. Misir started her career at the U.S. Department of Justice, serving in the Executive Office for Immigration Review, headquarters of the former U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), and the Civil Division. At the Justice Department, among other things, she was specially assigned as counsel to the U.S. Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force, the counter-terrorism and intelligence task force created in the immediate wake of 9/11 to prevent future attacks, and as counsel to the U.S. delegation to the United Nation’s International Maritime Organization (IMO).
Ms. Misir graduated with a B.A. with honors in political science from the University of Chicago, and an M.A. from the University of Chicago’s Masters of Arts Program in the Social Sciences. She earned her law degree from the University of Minnesota Law School. After law school, Ms. Misir served honorably in the U.S. Marine Corps until an injury cut short her service.
Ms. Misir is President of the Indian American Bar Association of Long Island and Queens. She serves on the National Alumni Board of the University of Chicago’s Master of Arts Program in the Social Sciences (MAPSS), and previously served on the National Board of Governors of the Republican National Lawyers Association. She is a member of the American Bar Association, the Federal Bar Council, and the Nassau County Bar Association.
Research Director, Independence Institute
David B. Kopel is Research Director at the Independence Institute; Adjunct Scholar at the Cato Institute; and Senior Fellow at the University of Wyoming College of Law, Firearms Research Center. He received his B.A. in history with Highest Honors from Brown University and his J.D. magna cum laude from the University of Michigan Law School.
He is the author of over 20 books, including the textbook Firearm Law and the Second Amendment: Regulation, Rights, and Policy (Aspen Pubs. 4th ed. forthcoming 2026). His scholarship and briefs have been cited 7 Supreme Court cases--including Heller, McDonald, and Bruen--and in 140 lower courts opinions. He is the author of 120 scholarly articles. His shorter articles often appear on The Volokh Conspiracy blog, hosted by Reason magazine. His topics of interest include the right to arms throughout history, the Colorado Constitution, and law enforcement policy.
Partner, Jackson Walker
Arthur offers clients a winning combination of trial and appellate experience gained as a federal prosecutor and more than 20 years of experience in handling patent, copyright, trademark, and trade secrets litigation.
While his practice concentrates on intellectual property litigation, Arthur also has significant experience in internal investigations, False Claims Act suits, partnership and breach of fiduciary duty, breach of contract, and employment litigation. Arthur also has represented clients testifying before Congressional committees.
Arthur writes and speaks frequently on topics ranging from the case against Boston bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to patent litigation reform.
Prior to joining Michael Best, Arthur served as an Assistant United States Attorney in the Southern District of New York, where he was the lead prosecutor in criminal trials, including federal intellectual property crimes. He also argued numerous appeals.
Professor of Law, Antonin Scalia Law School
Professor of Law Michael S. Greve joined the faculty of the Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University in fall 2012 after having served as John G. Searle Scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), where he specialized in constitutional law, courts, and business regulation and served as chairman of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. Prior to joining AEI, Greve was founder and co-director of the Center for Individual Rights, a public interest law firm specializing in constitutional litigation.
Greve has served previously as an adjunct professor at a number of universities, including Cornell and Johns Hopkins Universities, and has been a visiting professor at Boston College since 2004. He was awarded a PhD and an MA in government by Cornell University. Greve also earned a Diploma from the University of Hamburg in Germany.
A prolific writer, Greve is the author of nine books and a multitude of articles appearing in scholarly publications, as well as numerous editorials, short articles, and book reviews. He is a frequent speaker for professional and scholarly organizations and has made many appearances on radio and television.
In addition Greve has provided congressional and state legislative testimony, has lobbied and consulted in federal agency proceedings, and has provided litigation services and management in over 30 cases, including matters before the U.S. Supreme Court.
The Economic Freedom Amendment: A States-Based Response to the Nationalizing Effects of Bailouts and Federal Ownership of Corporate Stock
Aaron Jack
Note from the Editor: This paper discusses a proposed state constitutional amendment that would deny...
Criminal Jurisdiction of Indian Tribes: Should Non-Indians Be Subject to Tribal Criminal Authority Under VAWA?
Thomas F. Gede
Ever since the U.S. Supreme Court issued its 1978 decision in Oliphant v. Suquamish Tribe,1...
Global Warming Nuisance Suits Given a Cool Reception in Court
Megan L. Brown, Roger H. Miksad
For the better part of a decade, courts have confronted several global warming nuisance suits...
A Debate: Does the Texas Voter ID Law Violate the U.S. Constitution?
Austin, TexasVeiled Meaning: Tolerance and Prohibition of the Hijab in the U.S. and France
Elizabeth K. Dorminey
Introduction France and the U.S. have much in common. Both nations share a commitment to...
A Distinct Judicial Power - Faculty Book Podcast
Scott D. Gerber, James E. Pfander
This Federalist Society Faculty Book Podcast features Professor Scott Gerber’s new book, A Distinct Judicial...
Was the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act a Proper Exercise of Congressional Authority Under the U.S. Constitution's Commerce Clause?
R Cozzens, Leon Friedman, Deborah Misir
The Long Island Lawyers Chapter hosted this debate on May 22, 2012, at The Davenport...
The Upside-Down Constitution: How Progressives and Originalists Are Getting Federalism Wrong, and How To Get It Right
Mexico's Federal Law of Firearms and Explosives
David B. Kopel
In recent years, gun control has become an important international issue. For example, some persons...
Local Patent Rules - Certainty and Efficiency or a Crazy Quilt of Substantive Law?
Arthur Gollwitzer
More than a decade ago, the United States District Court for the Northern District of...