Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law and Director, Julis-Rabinowitz Program on Jewish and Israeli Law, Harvard Law School
Noah Feldman specializes in constitutional studies, with a particular emphasis on the relationship between law and religion, free speech, constitutional design, and the history of legal theory. Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, he is also a Senior Fellow of the Society of Fellows at Harvard. In 2003 he served as senior constitutional advisor to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq, and subsequently advised members of the Iraqi Governing Council on the drafting of the Transitional Administrative Law or interim constitution. He received his A.B. summa cum laude in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from Harvard University in 1992. Selected as a Rhodes Scholar, he earned a D.Phil. in Oriental Studies from Oxford University in 1994. From 1999 to 2002, he was a Junior Fellow of the Society of Fellows at Harvard. Before that he served as a law clerk to Justice David H. Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court (1998 to 1999) and to Chief Judge Harry T. Edwards of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (1997 to 1998). He received his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1997, serving as Book Reviews Editor of the Yale Law Journal. He’s the author of eight books: The Three Lives of James Madison: Genius, Partisan, President (Random House, 2017); Cool War: The Future of Global Competition (Random House, 2013); Scorpions: The Battles and Triumphs of FDR’s Great Supreme Court Justices (Twelve Publishing, 2010); The Fall and Rise of the Islamic State (Princeton University Press, 2008); Divided By God: America's Church-State Problem and What We Should Do About It (Farrar, Straus & Giroux 2005); What We Owe Iraq: War and the Ethics of Nation building (Princeton University Press 2004); and After Jihad: America and the Struggle for Islamic Democracy (Farrar, Straus & Giroux 2003. He also co-authored two textbooks with Kathleen Sullivan: Constitutional Law, Twentieth Edition (Foundation Press, Fall 2019) and First Amendment (Foundation Press, 2016).
Senior Counsel, First Liberty Institute
Jordan Lorence is Senior Counsel in FLI’s Washington, D.C. office, where he represents First Liberty in strategic efforts promoting religious liberty, and works on important First Amendment projects and litigation, including those at the U.S. Supreme Court.
Lorence has a long career of litigating religious liberty cases since 1984. He has worked for many public interest law firms, including Alliance Defending Freedom, Home School Legal Defense Association, the North Star Legal Center and Concerned Women for America.
He has worked on important religious liberty cases. Lorence worked on school choice cases at the Supreme Court, such as Witters v. Washington Department of Services for the Blind (1986), and Trinity Lutheran (2016), which laid the foundation for First Liberty’s crucial win in Carson v. Makin (2022), requiring Maine to include religious schools in its school choice program.
Lorence argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in Regents of the University of Wisconsin v. Southworth (2000). He represented prolife Christian law students from the University of Wisconsin Law School who objected to the University’s requirement that they pay a mandatory student fee that funded the advocacy of student pro-abortion groups. Other Supreme Court cases Lorence has worked on include NIFLA v. Becerra (2018), protecting prolife pregnancy centers from a California statute requiring them to post signs explaining how pregnant women could obtain state-funded abortions; Masterpiece Cakeshop (2017), involving a Christian cake artist sued by the State of Colorado for declining to design a case celebrating the wedding of a same-sex couple and other cases such as Christian Legal Society v. Martinez (2012), Rosenberger v. University of Virginia (1995), Hurley v. GLIB (1995) and Lamb’s Chapel v. Center Moriches Center Moriches School District (1993).
Churches and other religious groups in New York City obtained the right to rent vacant public schools on weekends to conduct worship services after Lorence’s tenacious 20 years of litigation in Bronx Household of Faith. Lorence won protection for churches facing eviction from discriminatory zoning ordinances in Minnesota in Cornerstone Bible Church v. City of Hastings, Minnesota (1991). He also argued at the New Mexico Supreme Court one of the first cases in the nation defending a Christian wedding photographer charged by the State of New Mexico with discrimination for declining to create photos celebrating the commitment ceremony of a lesbian couple in Elane Photography v. Willock (2013).
Lorence defended home schooling families from intrusive school officials during his time working at Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) in the 1980s and 1990s. HSLDA also tasked Lorence with establishing a sister organization in Canada to protect home schooling families there. He traveled extensively in Canada from British Columbia to Prince Edward Island speaking to families how they could protect their right to home school under relevant Canadian law.
Lorence earned his undergraduate degree in journalism from Stanford University and his law degree from the University of Minnesota, his home state. Lorence was born and raised in Minnesota, where he worked one summer building Mighty Dump trucks at Tonka Toys in Mound, Minnesota. For two years immediately after he graduated from law school, Lorence served as the head administrator for a Minnesota Senate committee.
He speaks extensively on First Amendment and other legal issues. Lorence has spoken at least 75 law schools and many legal conferences. Prominent publications such as the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post and others have printed his opinion pieces on key legal issues involving religious liberty and freedom of speech. He has appeared on such media outlets as Fox News, CNN, National Public Radio, NBC’s Today Show, BBC radio and many others.
Lorence and his wife Marilyn have been married 40 years. They live in the Washington, D.C. area where they raised their seven children.
Senior Research Fellow, Mercatus Center, George Mason University; Former General Counsel at the Federal Trade Commission (FTC)
Alden Abbott is a Senior Research Fellow at the Mercatus Center. Prior to joining Mercatus, he served as the General Counsel of the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). As the Commission’s chief legal officer and adviser, he represented the agency in court and provides legal counsel to the Commission and its bureaus and offices.
Prior to rejoining the FTC in April 2018, Mr. Abbott served in executive positions at the Heritage Foundation (2014-2018) and BlackBerry (2012-2014). He also held a variety of senior positions in the U.S. federal government (in the FTC, the Commerce Department, and the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel and the Antitrust Division).
He speaks French, Spanish, and Italian.
Patrick Hotung Professor of Constitutional Law, Georgetown University Law Center; Faculty Director, Georgetown Center for the Constitution
Randy E. Barnett is the Patrick Hotung Professor of Constitutional Law at the Georgetown University Law Center and is the Faculty Director of the Georgetown Center for the Constitution. After graduating from Northwestern University and Harvard Law School, he tried many felony cases as a prosecutor in the Cook County States’ Attorney’s Office in Chicago. A recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship in Constitutional Studies and the Bradley Prize, Professor Barnett has been a visiting professor at Penn, Northwestern and Harvard Law School.
Professor Barnett’s publications includes thirteen books, more than one hundred articles and reviews, as well as numerous op-eds. His most recent book is Felony Review: Tales of True Crime and Corruption in Chicago (2026). His other books on the Constitution include: A Life for Liberty: The Making of an American Originalist (2024); The Original Meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment: Its Letter and Spirit (2021) (with Evan Bernick); An Introduction to Constitutional Law: 100 Supreme Court Cases Everyone Should Know (2019) (with Josh Blackman); Restoring the Lost Constitution: The Presumption of Liberty (2nd ed. 2013); Our Republican Constitution: Securing the Liberty and Sovereignty of We the People (2016); and Constitutional Law: Cases in Context (5th ed. forthcoming 2027) (with Josh Blackman). His books on contracts are The Oxford Introductions to U.S. Law: Contracts (2010) and Contracts: Cases and Doctrine (7th ed. 2021) (with Nate Oman). And he is the author of The Structure of Liberty: Justice and the Rule of Law (2nd ed. 2014).
In 2004, he argued the medical marijuana case of Gonzalez v. Raich before the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2012, he was one of the lawyers representing the National Federation of Independent Business in its constitutional challenge to the Affordable Care Act in NFIB v. Sebelius. He’s appeared in numerous documentaries and portrayed a prosecutor in the 2010 science-fiction feature film, InAlienable: The Movie. On X he is @RandyEBarnett
Ralph S. Tyler, Jr. Professor of Constitutional Law, Harvard Law School
Mizuho Financial Group Professor of Finance, Harvard Business Sc, Harvard Law School
Mihir A. Desai is the Mizuho Financial Group Professor of Finance at Harvard Business School and a Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He received his Ph.D. in political economy from Harvard University; his MBA as a Baker Scholar from Harvard Business School; and a bachelor's degree in history and economics from Brown University. In 1994, he was a Fulbright Scholar to India.
Professor Desai's areas of expertise include tax policy, international finance, and corporate finance. His academic publications have appeared in leading economics, finance, and law journals. His work has emphasized the appropriate design of tax policy in a globalized setting, the links between corporate governance and taxation, and the internal capital markets of multinational firms. His research has been cited in The Economist, BusinessWeek, The New York Times, and several other publications. He is a Research Associate in the National Bureau of Economic Research's Public Economics and Corporate Finance Programs, and served as the co-director of the NBER's India program.
His general interest publications include opinion pieces on varied topics, including tax policy and the effects of globalization on domestic welfare, in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Tax Notes and The New York Times. He has also written for practitioners in the Harvard Business Review on the role of the Global CFO, on how to reform the U.S. tax system, and how changing incentive systems have contributed to the degradation of American competitiveness. He has testified several times to Congressional bodies, including most recently to the Senate Finance Committee on corporate tax reform and inversions.
Professor Desai has taught extensively as an award-winning teacher at HBS and at Harvard University. As a second-year professor teaching finance in the required curriculum, he received the Student Association Award for teaching excellence from the HBS Class of 2001. He subsequently built a second-year elective on International Financial Management, and his many cases on international finance are collected in a casebook published by John Wiley and are taught around the world. Since 1999, he has co-taught Public Economics (EC 1410) at Harvard College. He has also taught seminars and classes on tax policy at Harvard Law School, NYU Law School, and Columbia Law School. Most recently, Professor Desai has been active in delivering various executive education programs at HBS, including the General Managers Program (GMP), on campus and around the world. In 2011, Professor Desai launched, with Professor Joe Lassiter, the first offering at HBS for Harvard undergraduates, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, that is also included as part of the General Education curriculum at Harvard College. In the fall of 2014, Professor Desai began teaching Taxation at Harvard Law School.
From 2008 to 2011, Professor Desai led HBS's doctoral programs, which include the DBA and joint programs with the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. In that role, he led the restructuring of various programs and initiated a terminal master's program. From 2010 to 2014, Professor Desai was the Senior Associate Dean for Planning and University Affairs, where he was part of the senior management team of the Business School focused on integration with the rest of the University. Specifically, he has launched a program for Harvard undergraduates to collaborate on research with HBS professors (PRIMO), led the course for undergraduates described above, helped launch the Harvard Innovation Lab, worked on campus planning efforts including the design of Tata Hall and served on the newly created Harvard Libraries Board.
His professional experiences include working at CS First Boston (1989-1991), McKinsey & Co. (1992), and advising a number of firms and governmental organizations. He is also on the Advisory Board of the International Tax Policy Forum and the Centre for Business Taxation at Oxford University.
Senior Lecturer on Law, Harvard Law School
Stephen E. Shay is a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Law School.
Before joining the Harvard Law School faculty as a Professor of Practice in 2011, Mr. Shay was Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Tax Affairs in the United States Department of the Treasury. Prior to re-joining the Treasury Department in 2009, Mr. Shay was a tax partner for 22 years with Ropes & Gray, LLP. Mr. Shay served in the Office of International Tax Counsel at the Department of the Treasury, including as International Tax Counsel, from 1982 to 1987, during which Mr. Shay actively participated in the development and enactment of international provisions in the Tax Reform Act of 1986.
Mr. Shay has published scholarly and practice articles relating to international taxation, and testified for law reform before Congressional tax-writing committees. He has had extensive practice experience in the international tax area and while in active practice was recognized as a leading practitioner in Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers, Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers, The Best Lawyers in America, Euromoney's Guide to The World's Leading Tax Advisers and Euromoney's, Guide to The Best of the Best. Mr. Shay discloses certain related interests and activities not connected with his position at Harvard Law School on the Harvard Law School website.
Mr. Shay is President of the American Tax Policy Institute Board of Trustees and is the IBFD Professor in Residence for 2015. Mr. Shay serves on the Executive Committee of the New York State Bar Association Tax Section and has been active in the American Bar Association Tax Section as a Council Director and Chair of the Committee on Foreign Activities of U.S. Taxpayers, in the American Law Institute as an Associate Reporter and in the Taxes Committee of the International Bar Association. Mr. Shay is a 1972 graduate of Wesleyan University, and he earned his J.D. and his M.B.A. from Columbia University in 1976.
Mizuho Financial Group Professor of Finance, Harvard Business Sc, Harvard Law School
Mihir A. Desai is the Mizuho Financial Group Professor of Finance at Harvard Business School and a Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He received his Ph.D. in political economy from Harvard University; his MBA as a Baker Scholar from Harvard Business School; and a bachelor's degree in history and economics from Brown University. In 1994, he was a Fulbright Scholar to India.
Professor Desai's areas of expertise include tax policy, international finance, and corporate finance. His academic publications have appeared in leading economics, finance, and law journals. His work has emphasized the appropriate design of tax policy in a globalized setting, the links between corporate governance and taxation, and the internal capital markets of multinational firms. His research has been cited in The Economist, BusinessWeek, The New York Times, and several other publications. He is a Research Associate in the National Bureau of Economic Research's Public Economics and Corporate Finance Programs, and served as the co-director of the NBER's India program.
His general interest publications include opinion pieces on varied topics, including tax policy and the effects of globalization on domestic welfare, in The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Tax Notes and The New York Times. He has also written for practitioners in the Harvard Business Review on the role of the Global CFO, on how to reform the U.S. tax system, and how changing incentive systems have contributed to the degradation of American competitiveness. He has testified several times to Congressional bodies, including most recently to the Senate Finance Committee on corporate tax reform and inversions.
Professor Desai has taught extensively as an award-winning teacher at HBS and at Harvard University. As a second-year professor teaching finance in the required curriculum, he received the Student Association Award for teaching excellence from the HBS Class of 2001. He subsequently built a second-year elective on International Financial Management, and his many cases on international finance are collected in a casebook published by John Wiley and are taught around the world. Since 1999, he has co-taught Public Economics (EC 1410) at Harvard College. He has also taught seminars and classes on tax policy at Harvard Law School, NYU Law School, and Columbia Law School. Most recently, Professor Desai has been active in delivering various executive education programs at HBS, including the General Managers Program (GMP), on campus and around the world. In 2011, Professor Desai launched, with Professor Joe Lassiter, the first offering at HBS for Harvard undergraduates, Innovation and Entrepreneurship, that is also included as part of the General Education curriculum at Harvard College. In the fall of 2014, Professor Desai began teaching Taxation at Harvard Law School.
From 2008 to 2011, Professor Desai led HBS's doctoral programs, which include the DBA and joint programs with the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. In that role, he led the restructuring of various programs and initiated a terminal master's program. From 2010 to 2014, Professor Desai was the Senior Associate Dean for Planning and University Affairs, where he was part of the senior management team of the Business School focused on integration with the rest of the University. Specifically, he has launched a program for Harvard undergraduates to collaborate on research with HBS professors (PRIMO), led the course for undergraduates described above, helped launch the Harvard Innovation Lab, worked on campus planning efforts including the design of Tata Hall and served on the newly created Harvard Libraries Board.
His professional experiences include working at CS First Boston (1989-1991), McKinsey & Co. (1992), and advising a number of firms and governmental organizations. He is also on the Advisory Board of the International Tax Policy Forum and the Centre for Business Taxation at Oxford University.
Senior Lecturer on Law, Harvard Law School
Stephen E. Shay is a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Law School.
Before joining the Harvard Law School faculty as a Professor of Practice in 2011, Mr. Shay was Deputy Assistant Secretary for International Tax Affairs in the United States Department of the Treasury. Prior to re-joining the Treasury Department in 2009, Mr. Shay was a tax partner for 22 years with Ropes & Gray, LLP. Mr. Shay served in the Office of International Tax Counsel at the Department of the Treasury, including as International Tax Counsel, from 1982 to 1987, during which Mr. Shay actively participated in the development and enactment of international provisions in the Tax Reform Act of 1986.
Mr. Shay has published scholarly and practice articles relating to international taxation, and testified for law reform before Congressional tax-writing committees. He has had extensive practice experience in the international tax area and while in active practice was recognized as a leading practitioner in Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers, Chambers USA: America's Leading Lawyers, The Best Lawyers in America, Euromoney's Guide to The World's Leading Tax Advisers and Euromoney's, Guide to The Best of the Best. Mr. Shay discloses certain related interests and activities not connected with his position at Harvard Law School on the Harvard Law School website.
Mr. Shay is President of the American Tax Policy Institute Board of Trustees and is the IBFD Professor in Residence for 2015. Mr. Shay serves on the Executive Committee of the New York State Bar Association Tax Section and has been active in the American Bar Association Tax Section as a Council Director and Chair of the Committee on Foreign Activities of U.S. Taxpayers, in the American Law Institute as an Associate Reporter and in the Taxes Committee of the International Bar Association. Mr. Shay is a 1972 graduate of Wesleyan University, and he earned his J.D. and his M.B.A. from Columbia University in 1976.
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