R. B. Price and Isabelle Wade & Paul C. Lyda Professor Emeritus of Law, University of Missouri School of Law
Carl H. Esbeck is R.B. Price Professor and Isabelle Wade & Paul C. Lyda Professor of Law emeritus at the University of Missouri. After attending Cornell University School of Law where he served as an editor on the Cornell Law Review, he held a judicial clerkship with the Honorable Howard C. Bratton, chief judge of the U.S. District Court in New Mexico.
Professor Esbeck publishes widely in the area of religious liberty and church-state relations. He is recognized as the progenitor of "Charitable Choice," an integral part of the 1996 Federal Welfare Reform Act, later made a part of the faith-based initiative and equal-treatment regulations under presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. In addition, he has taken the lead in recognizing that the modern Supreme Court has applied the Establishment Clause not as a personal right, but as a structural limit on the government's authority in disputes involving church governance. While on leave from 1999 to 2002, Professor Esbeck directed the Center for Law & Religious Freedom (CLRF) and later served as Senior Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General at the U.S. Department of Justice. While directing the CLRF, Professor Esbeck was a central part of the congressional advocacy behind the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 (RLUIPA). While at the Department of Justice one of his duties was to direct a task force to remove barriers to the equal-treatment of faith-based organizations applying for social service grants. He is the author of Disestablishment and Religious Dissent: Church-State Relations in the New American States, 1776 - 1833 (U. of MO Press, 2019).
James L. Oberstar Professor of Law and Public Policy, University of St. Thomas School of Law
Associate Professor, Northern Illinois University
Evan Bernick joined the NIU Law faculty in 2021. He teaches courses in constitutional law, criminal law, criminal procedure, administrative law and legislation.
From 2020 to 2021, Professor Bernick was a visiting professor at the Georgetown University Law Center and the executive director of the Georgetown Center for the Constitution. Before that, he served as a clerk to Judge Diane S. Sykes of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. From April 2017 to April 2019, he was a visiting lecturer at Georgetown and a resident fellow of the Center for the Constitution.
His scholarship covers a range of topics, from constitutional law, to philosophy of law, to social movements, to law enforcement. He has published with the Georgetown Law Journal, the Notre Dame Law Review, the William and Mary Law Review and the George Mason Law Review, among other journals. His book, The Original Meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment: Its Letter and Spirit (2021), with Randy E. Barnett, was published by Harvard University Press under its Belknap imprint "for books of long-lasting importance, superior in scholarship and physical production, chosen whether or not they might be profitable."
Professor Bernick received his bachelor's degree in 2008 from the University of Chicago, where he studied philosophy and graduated with honors. He received his juris doctorate in 2011 from the University of Chicago Law School.
United States Senator, Missouri
U.S. SENATOR JOSH HAWLEY TOOK OFFICE IN JANUARY 2019.
Raised in rural Missouri, U.S. Senator Josh Hawley previously served as Missouri’s Attorney General. There he earned a reputation for taking on the big and the powerful to protect Missouri workers and families. He has battled big government and big business, special interests, organized crime, and anyone who would threaten the well-being of Missourians.
A native of small town Lexington, Missouri in rural Lafayette County, Senator Hawley graduated from Rockhurst High School in Kansas City. After graduating from Stanford University in 2002 and Yale Law School in 2006, he moved back home to mid-Missouri with his wife, Erin, where they started a family. They are the proud parents of two young boys, Elijah and Blaise.
Senator Hawley is recognized as one of the nation’s leading constitutional lawyers. He has litigated at the Supreme Court of the United States, the federal courts of appeals, and in state court, fighting for the people’s liberties. He previously fought Obamacare at the Supreme Court — and won — as one of the lead attorneys in the landmark Hobby Lobby case. He was also a lead attorney in the Hosanna-Tabor case at the Supreme Court, protecting the rights of churches.
As Attorney General, he fought the Washington overreach threatening farms and family businesses, including the Waters of the United States Rule and the Clean Power Plan. Senator Hawley has also taken on big opioid manufacturers, challenging their unethical marketing practices that helped create an epidemic of opioid abuse. He cracked down on human trafficking in Missouri, leading the largest anti-trafficking bust in Missouri history. And he stood up to big tech, launching investigations of the most powerful companies in the world—Google and Facebook—to protect Missourians, their data, and the First Amendment.
The youngest Senator in America, Senator Hawley serves on the Senate Committees on the Judiciary; Armed Services; Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs; Small Business and Entrepreneurship; and the Special Committee on Aging.
Knights of Columbus Professor of Law and the Catholic Tradition, The Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law
Kevin C. Walsh teaches and writes in the areas of federal jurisdiction, constitutional law, and the U.S. Supreme Court. His scholarship explores the doctrines that define—and delimit—the scope of federal judicial power.
Professor Walsh graduated from Harvard Law School, where he was Articles Chair for Volume 115 of the Harvard Law Review. After graduation, he clerked for Judge Paul V. Niemeyer of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit and Associate Justice Antonin Scalia of the Supreme Court of the United States. He then practiced law at Hunton & Williams LLP and taught as a visiting assistant professor at Villanova University School of Law. Walsh received his A.B. from Dartmouth College, and an M.A. in Theological Studies from the University of Notre Dame. He taught at the University of Richmond School of Law for thirteen years prior to joining The Catholic University of America, where he currently resides.
In early 2011, Professor Walsh filed two amicus curiae briefs addressing jurisdictional issues in the State challenges to the individual mandate in the federal healthcare reform legislation: a brief in Virginia v. Sebelius (United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit), and a brief in Florida v. HHS (United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit).
Guy Anderson Chair and Professor of Law, Brigham Young University Law School
Professor Gedicks holds the Guy Anderson Chair, one of three endowed chairs at the Law School. He is widely published on law and religion, constitutional law, and constitutional interpretation, including two books,The Rhetoric of Church and State: A Critical Analysis of Religion Clause Jurisprudence (Duke University Press, 1995), and Choosing the Dream: The Future of Religion in American Public Life (Greenwood Press, 1991) (with Roger Hendrix).
Professor Gedicks is an active defender of the contraception mandate of the Affordable Care Act and opposes efforts by owners of for-profit businesses to obtain religious exemptions from the mandate. See "One Cheer for Hobby Lobby: Improbably Alternatives, Trutly Strict Scrutiny, and Third-Party Employee Burdens," 38 Harvard Journal of Law & Gender 153 (2015); "RFRA Exemptions from the Contraception Mandate: An Unconstitutional Accommodation of Religion," 49 Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review (Spring 2014); (with Rebecca Van Tassell); "Invisible Women" Why an Exemption for Hobby Lobby Would Violate the Establishment Clause," 67 Vanderbilt Law Review En Banc 51 (2014) (with Andrew Koppelman); and "With Religious LIberty for All: A Defense of the Affordable Care Act's Contraception Coverage Mandate," 6 Advance 135 (Fall 2012). He was principal author and counsel of record on a U.S. Supreme Court amicus brief filed for himself and twenty other church-state scholars in the Hobby Lobbyand Conestoga Wood cases, arguing that for-profit employer exemptions would violate the Establishment Clause, and also published a widely read op-ed in the Washington Post making the same argument, "Paying for the Boss's Religion" (January 20, 2014).
Other recent publications include "Cross, Crucifix, Culture: An Approach to the Constitutional Meaning of Confessional Symbols," 13 First Amendment Law Review (forthcoming 2015) (with Pasquale Annicchino); "Incorporation of the Establishment Clause Against the States: A Logical, Textual, and HIstorical Account," 88Indiana Law Journal 699 (2013); and "Narrative Pluralism and Doctrinal Incoherence in Hosanna-Tabor," 64 Mercer Law Review 405 (2013). Professor Gedicks is currently working with Professors Robert Tuttle, Micah Schwartzman, and Nelson Tebbe on a freedom of religion casebook for West Publishing.
Professor Gedicks has lectured in Italian at universities throughout Italy, including the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart (at both its Milan and Piacenza campuses), the Graduate Institute of Sant'Anna in Pisa, and the Universities of Alessandria, Como, Florence, Genoa, Milan, Salerno, Siena, and Turin. He was a Visiting Research Fellow for the ReligioWest project at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy during November and December 2012.
Professor Gedicks grew up in New Jersey and southern California. Following graduation from law school and a clerkship on the Ninth Circuit, he practiced corporation and securities law in Phoenix, Arizona, until he entered law teaching. Professor Gedicks joined the BYU law faculty in 1990 after four years at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia, and a year at the University of Denver. He has been a visiting professor at the law schools of the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), the University of Notre Dame, and the University of Utah.
Vice President & Senior Counsel, Becket
Luke Goodrich is the author of Free to Believe: The Battle over Religious Liberty in America and vice president and senior counsel at the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.
While at Becket, Luke has argued and won precedent-setting cases in the Third, Fifth, Seventh, Ninth, and Eleventh Circuits, and has helped Becket win four major Supreme Court cases in the last seven years: including victories for the Little Sisters of the Poor and Hobby Lobby against the contraception mandate, a victory for a Muslim prisoner under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, and a unanimous victory in the Supreme Court’s first decision ever on the ministerial exception, which The Wall Street Journal called one of “the most important religious liberty cases in a half century.”
He frequently discusses religious freedom on networks such as CNN, Fox News, ABC, and NPR, and in publications like the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and New York Times magazine. He also serves as an adjunct professor at the University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law, where he teaches constitutional law.
Before joining Becket, he clerked for Judge Michael W. McConnell on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and graduated from the University of Chicago Law School with high honors as a member of the Law Review and the Order of the Coif.
Guy Anderson Chair and Professor of Law, Brigham Young University Law School
Professor Gedicks holds the Guy Anderson Chair, one of three endowed chairs at the Law School. He is widely published on law and religion, constitutional law, and constitutional interpretation, including two books,The Rhetoric of Church and State: A Critical Analysis of Religion Clause Jurisprudence (Duke University Press, 1995), and Choosing the Dream: The Future of Religion in American Public Life (Greenwood Press, 1991) (with Roger Hendrix).
Professor Gedicks is an active defender of the contraception mandate of the Affordable Care Act and opposes efforts by owners of for-profit businesses to obtain religious exemptions from the mandate. See "One Cheer for Hobby Lobby: Improbably Alternatives, Trutly Strict Scrutiny, and Third-Party Employee Burdens," 38 Harvard Journal of Law & Gender 153 (2015); "RFRA Exemptions from the Contraception Mandate: An Unconstitutional Accommodation of Religion," 49 Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review (Spring 2014); (with Rebecca Van Tassell); "Invisible Women" Why an Exemption for Hobby Lobby Would Violate the Establishment Clause," 67 Vanderbilt Law Review En Banc 51 (2014) (with Andrew Koppelman); and "With Religious LIberty for All: A Defense of the Affordable Care Act's Contraception Coverage Mandate," 6 Advance 135 (Fall 2012). He was principal author and counsel of record on a U.S. Supreme Court amicus brief filed for himself and twenty other church-state scholars in the Hobby Lobbyand Conestoga Wood cases, arguing that for-profit employer exemptions would violate the Establishment Clause, and also published a widely read op-ed in the Washington Post making the same argument, "Paying for the Boss's Religion" (January 20, 2014).
Other recent publications include "Cross, Crucifix, Culture: An Approach to the Constitutional Meaning of Confessional Symbols," 13 First Amendment Law Review (forthcoming 2015) (with Pasquale Annicchino); "Incorporation of the Establishment Clause Against the States: A Logical, Textual, and HIstorical Account," 88Indiana Law Journal 699 (2013); and "Narrative Pluralism and Doctrinal Incoherence in Hosanna-Tabor," 64 Mercer Law Review 405 (2013). Professor Gedicks is currently working with Professors Robert Tuttle, Micah Schwartzman, and Nelson Tebbe on a freedom of religion casebook for West Publishing.
Professor Gedicks has lectured in Italian at universities throughout Italy, including the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart (at both its Milan and Piacenza campuses), the Graduate Institute of Sant'Anna in Pisa, and the Universities of Alessandria, Como, Florence, Genoa, Milan, Salerno, Siena, and Turin. He was a Visiting Research Fellow for the ReligioWest project at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy during November and December 2012.
Professor Gedicks grew up in New Jersey and southern California. Following graduation from law school and a clerkship on the Ninth Circuit, he practiced corporation and securities law in Phoenix, Arizona, until he entered law teaching. Professor Gedicks joined the BYU law faculty in 1990 after four years at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia, and a year at the University of Denver. He has been a visiting professor at the law schools of the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), the University of Notre Dame, and the University of Utah.
Pepperdine University School of Law
Guy Anderson Chair and Professor of Law, Brigham Young University Law School
Professor Gedicks holds the Guy Anderson Chair, one of three endowed chairs at the Law School. He is widely published on law and religion, constitutional law, and constitutional interpretation, including two books,The Rhetoric of Church and State: A Critical Analysis of Religion Clause Jurisprudence (Duke University Press, 1995), and Choosing the Dream: The Future of Religion in American Public Life (Greenwood Press, 1991) (with Roger Hendrix).
Professor Gedicks is an active defender of the contraception mandate of the Affordable Care Act and opposes efforts by owners of for-profit businesses to obtain religious exemptions from the mandate. See "One Cheer for Hobby Lobby: Improbably Alternatives, Trutly Strict Scrutiny, and Third-Party Employee Burdens," 38 Harvard Journal of Law & Gender 153 (2015); "RFRA Exemptions from the Contraception Mandate: An Unconstitutional Accommodation of Religion," 49 Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review (Spring 2014); (with Rebecca Van Tassell); "Invisible Women" Why an Exemption for Hobby Lobby Would Violate the Establishment Clause," 67 Vanderbilt Law Review En Banc 51 (2014) (with Andrew Koppelman); and "With Religious LIberty for All: A Defense of the Affordable Care Act's Contraception Coverage Mandate," 6 Advance 135 (Fall 2012). He was principal author and counsel of record on a U.S. Supreme Court amicus brief filed for himself and twenty other church-state scholars in the Hobby Lobbyand Conestoga Wood cases, arguing that for-profit employer exemptions would violate the Establishment Clause, and also published a widely read op-ed in the Washington Post making the same argument, "Paying for the Boss's Religion" (January 20, 2014).
Other recent publications include "Cross, Crucifix, Culture: An Approach to the Constitutional Meaning of Confessional Symbols," 13 First Amendment Law Review (forthcoming 2015) (with Pasquale Annicchino); "Incorporation of the Establishment Clause Against the States: A Logical, Textual, and HIstorical Account," 88Indiana Law Journal 699 (2013); and "Narrative Pluralism and Doctrinal Incoherence in Hosanna-Tabor," 64 Mercer Law Review 405 (2013). Professor Gedicks is currently working with Professors Robert Tuttle, Micah Schwartzman, and Nelson Tebbe on a freedom of religion casebook for West Publishing.
Professor Gedicks has lectured in Italian at universities throughout Italy, including the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart (at both its Milan and Piacenza campuses), the Graduate Institute of Sant'Anna in Pisa, and the Universities of Alessandria, Como, Florence, Genoa, Milan, Salerno, Siena, and Turin. He was a Visiting Research Fellow for the ReligioWest project at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy during November and December 2012.
Professor Gedicks grew up in New Jersey and southern California. Following graduation from law school and a clerkship on the Ninth Circuit, he practiced corporation and securities law in Phoenix, Arizona, until he entered law teaching. Professor Gedicks joined the BYU law faculty in 1990 after four years at Mercer University in Macon, Georgia, and a year at the University of Denver. He has been a visiting professor at the law schools of the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill), the University of Notre Dame, and the University of Utah.
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