Chairman and President, The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty
Kevin J. "Seamus" Hasson is Founder and President of The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a bipartisan, public-interest law firm that protects the free expression of all religious traditions. Since 1994, Hasson and the Becket Fund have successfully represented clients from nearly every faith tradition including Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, Hindus, Native Americans, Unitarians and Zoroastrians. Along the way, The Becket Fund has won kudos from thinkers from Pope John Paul II to Elie Wiesel.
Hasson enjoys broad credibility in the national media. He has been widely quoted, appearing for example, in Newsweek, US News and World Report, The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Christian Science Monitor and USA Today, as well as in regional media from The L.A. Times to The Chicago Tribune to The Philadelphia Enquirer. He has appeared on broadcast news programs including The Today Show, Dateline NBC, McLaughlin One on One, NPR's Talk of the Nation, and CNN Talkback Live. He's also appeared twice on Al-Jazeera, debating Saudi clerics.
Hasson lectures and debates frequently, in venues ranging from Oxford to the Vatican, from Harvard to BYU. He is the author of The Right to be Wrong: Ending the Culture War over Religion in America.
Before founding the Becket Fund in 1994, Hasson was an attorney at Williams & Connolly in Washington D.C., where he focused on religious liberty litigation. From 1986 to 1987, he served in the Office of Legal Counsel at the Justice Department where he advised the White House and cabinet departments on church-state relations. He is a 1985 magna cum laude graduate of Notre Dame Law School and also holds a Master's degree in theology from Notre Dame.
Professor of Law, George Mason University School of Law
With his work in regulatory takings and other aspects of property law, professor of law Steven Eagle plays an important role in the ongoing dialogue among American legal scholars, lawyers, and judges on the proper interpretation of property rights in the Constitution. He is the author of a leading property treatise and scholarly and popular articles and teaches in programs for judges and the practicing bar.
Professor Eagle came to George Mason in 1987 and also has taught at the law schools of Vanderbilt University, the University of Toledo, and Pace University. He earned his B.B.A. from the City College of New York (1965) and his J.D. from Yale Law School (1970). Professor Eagle teaches the first-year course, Property, Land Use Planning, and an advanced constitutional law seminar on property rights.
Attorney and Legal Commentator
John Shu is an attorney and legal commentator. His focus areas include constitutional law, securities & corporate law, antitrust law, administrative law, politics, and international affairs. Mr. Shu has lectured and published on a wide variety of issues.
Mr. Shu served President George H.W. Bush and President George W. Bush. He also served Judge Stanley Sporkin, U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, who was Director of Enforcement at the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission and General Counsel at the Central Intelligence Agency, and Judge Paul Roney, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit, who was Presiding Judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review.
Mr. Shu is a member of the National Committee on U.S. - China Relations, the Pacific Council on International Policy, and the Foreign Policy Association.
Counsel to the Firm, Cascadia Cross-Border Law
Margaret Stock focuses her practice on immigration and citizenship law. She is a nationally known expert on immigration and national security laws, and has testified regularly before Congressional committees on immigration, homeland security, and military matters. As a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the Military Police, U.S. Army Reserve, Margaret has extensive experience with U.S. military issues. She has also worked as a professor at the United States Military Academy at West Point, and she has served as an adjunct instructor at the University of Alaska. Margaret served as a member of the American Bar Association Commission on Immigration from 2008-2012. She regularly authors articles on military-related immigration issues, and is well-versed on “parole in place” for military family members and the Military Accessions Vital to the National Interest (“MAVNI”) Program. Margaret authored the book Immigration Law & the Military, which was published by the American Immigration Lawyers Association in 2012.
Judge, U.S. Court of International Trade
M. Miller Baker was appointed as a Judge of the United States Court of International Trade on December 18, 2019, by President Donald J. Trump. Judge Baker entered on duty on December 20, 2019.
A native of Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, Judge Baker grew up in Louisiana and Wyoming and attended Louisiana State University. Judge Baker thereafter earned his J.D. from Tulane University Law School and was admitted to the Louisiana bar in 1984 at age 22. After graduating from Tulane, he served as a law clerk to Judge John Malcolm Duhé, Jr., of the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana and then for Judge Thomas Gibbs Gee of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Following his judicial clerkships, from 1986 until the end of the Reagan Administration on January 20, 1989, Judge Baker served in the Justice Department under Attorneys General Edwin Meese III and Richard Thornburgh, first as an attorney-advisor in the Office of Legal Policy, and later as a special assistant to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. Judge Baker then entered private practice in Washington, D.C., until 1991. From 1991 to 1993 he served as counsel to Senator Orrin G. Hatch on the staff of the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Following his service on the Judiciary Committee staff, Judge Baker returned to private practice in Washington, D.C., focusing on complex civil litigation involving a wide range of subjects at the law firms of Carr Goodson Warner (1993–2000) and McDermott Will & Emery LLP (2000–2019). At McDermott, Judge Baker co-chaired the firm’s appellate practice group.
When he was in private practice, Judge Baker argued before the Supreme Court, nine of the thirteen federal courts of appeals, and appellate courts in three states and the District of Columbia. In 2009, The American Lawyer named Judge Baker as “Litigator of the Week” for one of his Supreme Court wins. In addition to his appellate practice, Judge Baker litigated in state and federal trial courts in seventeen states and the District of Columbia.
From 1986 to 1995, Judge Baker served as a naval reserve intelligence officer and received an honorable discharge. His duties included serving with an anti-terrorist unit, on the battle staff of an admiral commanding a carrier battle group operating in the North Atlantic during a large NATO exercise in the Cold War, and as a watch officer in the Navy Command Center in the Pentagon during the Persian Gulf War.
In the aftermath of 9/11, Judge Baker testified before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees on constitutional and policy issues associated with continuity of government. He also testified before the Continuity of Government Commission, a bipartisan study commission established by the American Enterprise Institute and the Brookings Institution.
Judge Baker and his wife Margaret have five children, two of whom are active duty military officers.
How High A Wall? Originalism and the Separation of Church and State.
Kevin J. Hasson, James Nickels
MR. HASSON: Thank you for having me. I’m going to tell you some stories and...
The Supreme Court’s Property Rights Cases
Steven J. Eagle
The U.S. Supreme Court handed down three major decisions affecting private property rights during its...
Recent Gay Marriage Rulings
John Shu
Gay marriage litigation continues to occur in various forms among the several states. In the...
Bar Watch Bulletin August 9, 2004
ABA WATCH will be reporting daily from the American Bar Association's Annual meeting in Atlanta...
Bar Watch Bulletin August 8, 2004
ABA WATCH will be reporting daily from the ABA Meetings in Atlanta through August 10....
Bar Watch Bulletin February 10, 2004
GAY MARRIAGERecommendation 103D puts the American Bar Association on record as opposing "any federal enactment...
United States Immigration Law in a World of Terror
Margaret D. Stock
By Margaret D. Stock*I. Introduction The terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 have spurred a...
Racial Profiling of Borrowers: An Idea Fraught With Peril
James M. Rockett
In the early 1970s, during my first days as a banking lawyer, I was anxious...
A New Use for the Gavel: Auction Bidding as a Tool for Selecting Class Action Counsel
Federal judges have a new tool for selecting plaintiffs' lead counsel in class actions. "Auction...
Fools, Drunkards, & Presidential Succession
M. Miller Baker
by M. Miller Baker* The terrorist attack on America on September 11, 2001, represents an...