Visiting Fellow in Governance Studies, Brookings Institution
Bill Baer is a visiting fellow in Governance Studies. He is one of the world’s best known and respected antitrust/competition enforcers. Baer is the only person to have led antitrust enforcement at both U.S. antitrust agencies, serving as assistant attorney general in charge of the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice from 2013 to 2016, and as director of the Bureau of Competition at the Federal Trade Commission from 1995 to 1999. During his tenure as assistant attorney general, the Antitrust Division achieved unprecedented success in civil and criminal enforcement, bringing and winning more cases than at any point in its history. He also developed close working relationships with his competition enforcement colleagues around the world. In 2016 and early 2017, Baer also served as acting associate attorney general, the third highest official in the Department of Justice. He oversaw the work of the Antitrust, Civil, Civil Rights, Tax, and Environment and Natural Resources Divisions and successfully led the effort to hold financial institutions accountable in the residential mortgage-backed securities crisis, securing record penalties and consumer redress. Baer worked at the Federal Trade Commission on two different occasions: from 1995 to 1999, as director of the Bureau of Competition; and from 1975 to 1980 as attorney advisor to the chairman and assistant general counsel for Legislation and Congressional Relations. While not in public service, he headed the highly regarded antitrust practice at Arnold & Porter, representing a broad range of companies in U.S. and international cartel investigations, antitrust litigation, and merger and acquisition reviews by antitrust enforcers, including the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, state attorneys general, and the European Commission.
Baer was twice named by Global Competition Review as the best competition lawyer in the world; honored, in 2010 and 2012, by Best Lawyers as the best antitrust lawyer in Washington; and named by The National Law Journal as one of “The Decade’s Most Influential Lawyers.” In 2015 the Federal Trade Commission honored him with the Miles W. Kirkpatrick Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2017, the American Antitrust Institute presented him with the Alfred E. Kahn Award for Antitrust Achievement. In 2024 the American Economic Liberties Project honored him with its first Achievements in Antitrust Award. Most recently, Baer was awarded the John Sherman Award for his substantive contributions to the development of antitrust law. It is the highest honor granted by the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.
Baer received his J.D. in 1975 from Stanford Law School, where he served as senior article editor of The Stanford Law Review, and his B.A. in 1972 from Lawrence University. Outside of Brookings, he is a trustee and board officer of his alma mater, Lawrence University. He previously served on the Biden transition team for the Federal Trade Commission. In addition, he occasionally serves as a consulting expert on antitrust matters.
Partner, Supreme Court Attorney, Cabinet Briard LLP
François-Henri Briard is a Knight of the Legion of Honor, an Officer of the National Order of Merit and a Knight of the Palmes Académiques.
He was a member of the Governing Board of the Bar of the French Supreme Courts (2003-2005).
François-Henri Briard was a trustee of Sarah Lawrence College in New York for eight years. He is President of the Institut Vergennes, a member of the U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society and an honorary member of the Society of the Cincinnati and of the Sons of the American Revolution. He is also an expert with the Federalist Society, a U.S. think tank that focuses on constitutional and judicial issues.
He is a member of the Institute of Consulting Tax Attorneys (IACF) and an associate member of the Academy of Moral Sciences, Letters and Arts of Versailles and Ile de France.
He is a member of the French Navy civilian reserve with the rank of frigate captain and has been awarded a medal by the voluntary military services. On behalf of the Firm, he received the Military Reserve Prize (2011).
Adjunct Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania
Makan Delrahim is currently an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania.
Previously he served as Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division, Deputy Assistant to the President, and Deputy White House Counsel. Mr. Delrahim’s rich antitrust background covers the full range of industries, issues, and institutions touched upon by the work of the Antitrust Division. He is a former partner in the Los Angeles office of a national law firm. He served in the Antitrust Division from 2003 to 2005 as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General, overseeing the Appellate, Foreign Commerce, and Legal Policy sections. During that time, he played an integral role in building the Antitrust Division’s engagement with its international counterparts and was involved in civil and criminal matters. He has served on the Attorney General’s Task Force on Intellectual Property and as Chairman of the Merger Working Group of the International Competition Network. Mr. Delrahim was also a Commissioner on the Antitrust Modernization Commission from 2004 to 2007. Earlier in his career, Mr. Delrahim served as antitrust counsel, and later as the Staff Director and Chief Counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.
Senior Judge, United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
Circuit Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in 1986. After receiving his B.S. from Cornell University in 1970, and his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1973, he clerked on the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Thurgood Marshall on the United States Supreme Court. Thereafter, Judge Ginsburg was a professor at the Harvard Law School, the Deputy Assistant and then Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice, as well as the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Office of Management and Budget. Concurrent with his service as a federal judge, Judge Ginsburg has taught at the University of Chicago Law School and the New York University School of Law. Judge Ginsburg is currently a Professor of Law at the George Mason University and a visiting professor at University College London, Faculty of Laws.
Judge Ginsburg is the Chairman of the International Advisory Board of the Global Antitrust Institute at the Law and Economics Center of the George Mason University School of Law. He also serves on the Advisory Boards of: Competition Policy International; the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy; the Journal of Competition Law and Economics; the Journal of Law, Economics & Policy; the Supreme Court Economic Review; the University of Chicago Law Review; the New York University Journal of Law and Liberty; and, at University College London, both the Centre for Law, Economics and Society and the Jevons Institute for Competition Law and Economics.
In 2020, Judge Ginsburg was the 11th recipient of the John Sherman Award, presented by the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice in recognition of the awardee’s Lifetime Contributions to Antitrust Law and Policy.
In 2014, Judge Ginsburg received the Lifetime Achievement Award given annually by the Global Competition Review.
He is the author or co-author of several books and more than 100 articles on competition and regulation, including, most recently, Growing Convergence: The Limited Role of Antitrust in Standard Essential Patent Disputes, in CPI Antitrust Chronicle, Summer 2021, Vol. 1, No. 2.
Vice President and Director of Competition Policy, Progressive Policy Institute
Diana Moss joined the Progressive Policy Institute in 2023. She was previously President of the American Antitrust Institute from 2015-2023. An economist, Dr. Moss has developed and expanded competition enforcement and policy advocacy channels and strategies, and strengthened communications with enforcers, Congress, other advocacy groups, and the media. Her work spans both antitrust and regulation, with industry expertise in digital technology, electricity, petroleum, food and agriculture, airlines, telecommunications, and healthcare. Dr. Moss was previously at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, where she coordinated the agency’s competition analysis for electricity mergers. In the early 1990s, she consulted in private practice in the areas of regulation and antitrust. Dr. Moss has spoken widely on various topics involving competition policy and enforcement, testified before Congress, appeared before state and federal regulatory commissions, and made numerous radio and television appearances. She has published articles in a number of economic and legal academic journals, including: American Economic Review, Journal of Industrial Organization, the Energy Law Journal, and the Antitrust Bulletin. She is editor of Network Access, Regulation and Antitrust (2005). Dr. Moss is Adjunct Faculty in the Department of Economics at the University of Colorado at Boulder. She holds a M.A. degree from the University of Denver and a Ph.D. from the Colorado School of Mines.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
Judge Readler earned his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Michigan. After graduating, he served as a law clerk to Judge Alan Norris of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Judge Readler then began practicing law in the Columbus office of the international law firm Jones Day, eventually spending ten years as a partner in the firm’s Issues and Appeals Practice Group. While at Jones Day, Judge Readler appeared in state and federal trial and appellate courts around the country, most frequently the Supreme Court of Ohio and the Sixth Circuit. Judge Readler also successfully argued before the United States Supreme Court in McQuiggin v. Perkins on behalf of an inmate claiming actual innocence. His other pro bono representations include representing capital defendants before the Tenth Circuit and the Supreme Court of Ohio, as well as representing defendants sentenced to life in prison before the Sixth Circuit. While at Jones Day, Judge Readler traveled to Nairobi with Lawyers Without Borders to train Kenyan lawyers in prosecuting domestic violence cases, and he was also a recipient of the American Marshall Memorial Fellowship awarded by the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Following his career in private practice, Judge Readler served as Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division of the United States Department of Justice from 2017 to 2019. In that role, Judge Readler led and supervised over 1,000 lawyers in the Department’s largest litigating division, briefing and arguing several cases on behalf of the United States in federal courts across the country, including high-profile cases significant to the Administration and the Department. In March 2019, Judge Readler was confirmed to serve as a Circuit Judge on the Sixth Circuit. He resides in Columbus.
Visiting Fellow in Governance Studies, Brookings Institution
Bill Baer is a visiting fellow in Governance Studies. He is one of the world’s best known and respected antitrust/competition enforcers. Baer is the only person to have led antitrust enforcement at both U.S. antitrust agencies, serving as assistant attorney general in charge of the Antitrust Division of the U.S. Department of Justice from 2013 to 2016, and as director of the Bureau of Competition at the Federal Trade Commission from 1995 to 1999. During his tenure as assistant attorney general, the Antitrust Division achieved unprecedented success in civil and criminal enforcement, bringing and winning more cases than at any point in its history. He also developed close working relationships with his competition enforcement colleagues around the world. In 2016 and early 2017, Baer also served as acting associate attorney general, the third highest official in the Department of Justice. He oversaw the work of the Antitrust, Civil, Civil Rights, Tax, and Environment and Natural Resources Divisions and successfully led the effort to hold financial institutions accountable in the residential mortgage-backed securities crisis, securing record penalties and consumer redress. Baer worked at the Federal Trade Commission on two different occasions: from 1995 to 1999, as director of the Bureau of Competition; and from 1975 to 1980 as attorney advisor to the chairman and assistant general counsel for Legislation and Congressional Relations. While not in public service, he headed the highly regarded antitrust practice at Arnold & Porter, representing a broad range of companies in U.S. and international cartel investigations, antitrust litigation, and merger and acquisition reviews by antitrust enforcers, including the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission, state attorneys general, and the European Commission.
Baer was twice named by Global Competition Review as the best competition lawyer in the world; honored, in 2010 and 2012, by Best Lawyers as the best antitrust lawyer in Washington; and named by The National Law Journal as one of “The Decade’s Most Influential Lawyers.” In 2015 the Federal Trade Commission honored him with the Miles W. Kirkpatrick Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2017, the American Antitrust Institute presented him with the Alfred E. Kahn Award for Antitrust Achievement. In 2024 the American Economic Liberties Project honored him with its first Achievements in Antitrust Award. Most recently, Baer was awarded the John Sherman Award for his substantive contributions to the development of antitrust law. It is the highest honor granted by the Justice Department’s Antitrust Division.
Baer received his J.D. in 1975 from Stanford Law School, where he served as senior article editor of The Stanford Law Review, and his B.A. in 1972 from Lawrence University. Outside of Brookings, he is a trustee and board officer of his alma mater, Lawrence University. He previously served on the Biden transition team for the Federal Trade Commission. In addition, he occasionally serves as a consulting expert on antitrust matters.
Partner, Supreme Court Attorney, Cabinet Briard LLP
François-Henri Briard is a Knight of the Legion of Honor, an Officer of the National Order of Merit and a Knight of the Palmes Académiques.
He was a member of the Governing Board of the Bar of the French Supreme Courts (2003-2005).
François-Henri Briard was a trustee of Sarah Lawrence College in New York for eight years. He is President of the Institut Vergennes, a member of the U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society and an honorary member of the Society of the Cincinnati and of the Sons of the American Revolution. He is also an expert with the Federalist Society, a U.S. think tank that focuses on constitutional and judicial issues.
He is a member of the Institute of Consulting Tax Attorneys (IACF) and an associate member of the Academy of Moral Sciences, Letters and Arts of Versailles and Ile de France.
He is a member of the French Navy civilian reserve with the rank of frigate captain and has been awarded a medal by the voluntary military services. On behalf of the Firm, he received the Military Reserve Prize (2011).
Adjunct Professor of Law, University of Pennsylvania
Makan Delrahim is currently an Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Pennsylvania.
Previously he served as Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division, Deputy Assistant to the President, and Deputy White House Counsel. Mr. Delrahim’s rich antitrust background covers the full range of industries, issues, and institutions touched upon by the work of the Antitrust Division. He is a former partner in the Los Angeles office of a national law firm. He served in the Antitrust Division from 2003 to 2005 as a Deputy Assistant Attorney General, overseeing the Appellate, Foreign Commerce, and Legal Policy sections. During that time, he played an integral role in building the Antitrust Division’s engagement with its international counterparts and was involved in civil and criminal matters. He has served on the Attorney General’s Task Force on Intellectual Property and as Chairman of the Merger Working Group of the International Competition Network. Mr. Delrahim was also a Commissioner on the Antitrust Modernization Commission from 2004 to 2007. Earlier in his career, Mr. Delrahim served as antitrust counsel, and later as the Staff Director and Chief Counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee.
Senior Judge, United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit
Circuit Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg was appointed to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in 1986. After receiving his B.S. from Cornell University in 1970, and his J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1973, he clerked on the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Thurgood Marshall on the United States Supreme Court. Thereafter, Judge Ginsburg was a professor at the Harvard Law School, the Deputy Assistant and then Assistant Attorney General for the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice, as well as the Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs in the Office of Management and Budget. Concurrent with his service as a federal judge, Judge Ginsburg has taught at the University of Chicago Law School and the New York University School of Law. Judge Ginsburg is currently a Professor of Law at the George Mason University and a visiting professor at University College London, Faculty of Laws.
Judge Ginsburg is the Chairman of the International Advisory Board of the Global Antitrust Institute at the Law and Economics Center of the George Mason University School of Law. He also serves on the Advisory Boards of: Competition Policy International; the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy; the Journal of Competition Law and Economics; the Journal of Law, Economics & Policy; the Supreme Court Economic Review; the University of Chicago Law Review; the New York University Journal of Law and Liberty; and, at University College London, both the Centre for Law, Economics and Society and the Jevons Institute for Competition Law and Economics.
In 2020, Judge Ginsburg was the 11th recipient of the John Sherman Award, presented by the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice in recognition of the awardee’s Lifetime Contributions to Antitrust Law and Policy.
In 2014, Judge Ginsburg received the Lifetime Achievement Award given annually by the Global Competition Review.
He is the author or co-author of several books and more than 100 articles on competition and regulation, including, most recently, Growing Convergence: The Limited Role of Antitrust in Standard Essential Patent Disputes, in CPI Antitrust Chronicle, Summer 2021, Vol. 1, No. 2.
Vice President and Director of Competition Policy, Progressive Policy Institute
Diana Moss joined the Progressive Policy Institute in 2023. She was previously President of the American Antitrust Institute from 2015-2023. An economist, Dr. Moss has developed and expanded competition enforcement and policy advocacy channels and strategies, and strengthened communications with enforcers, Congress, other advocacy groups, and the media. Her work spans both antitrust and regulation, with industry expertise in digital technology, electricity, petroleum, food and agriculture, airlines, telecommunications, and healthcare. Dr. Moss was previously at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, where she coordinated the agency’s competition analysis for electricity mergers. In the early 1990s, she consulted in private practice in the areas of regulation and antitrust. Dr. Moss has spoken widely on various topics involving competition policy and enforcement, testified before Congress, appeared before state and federal regulatory commissions, and made numerous radio and television appearances. She has published articles in a number of economic and legal academic journals, including: American Economic Review, Journal of Industrial Organization, the Energy Law Journal, and the Antitrust Bulletin. She is editor of Network Access, Regulation and Antitrust (2005). Dr. Moss is Adjunct Faculty in the Department of Economics at the University of Colorado at Boulder. She holds a M.A. degree from the University of Denver and a Ph.D. from the Colorado School of Mines.
Judge, United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit
Judge Readler earned his undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Michigan. After graduating, he served as a law clerk to Judge Alan Norris of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Judge Readler then began practicing law in the Columbus office of the international law firm Jones Day, eventually spending ten years as a partner in the firm’s Issues and Appeals Practice Group. While at Jones Day, Judge Readler appeared in state and federal trial and appellate courts around the country, most frequently the Supreme Court of Ohio and the Sixth Circuit. Judge Readler also successfully argued before the United States Supreme Court in McQuiggin v. Perkins on behalf of an inmate claiming actual innocence. His other pro bono representations include representing capital defendants before the Tenth Circuit and the Supreme Court of Ohio, as well as representing defendants sentenced to life in prison before the Sixth Circuit. While at Jones Day, Judge Readler traveled to Nairobi with Lawyers Without Borders to train Kenyan lawyers in prosecuting domestic violence cases, and he was also a recipient of the American Marshall Memorial Fellowship awarded by the German Marshall Fund of the United States. Following his career in private practice, Judge Readler served as Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division of the United States Department of Justice from 2017 to 2019. In that role, Judge Readler led and supervised over 1,000 lawyers in the Department’s largest litigating division, briefing and arguing several cases on behalf of the United States in federal courts across the country, including high-profile cases significant to the Administration and the Department. In March 2019, Judge Readler was confirmed to serve as a Circuit Judge on the Sixth Circuit. He resides in Columbus.
Clinical Professor and Senior Scholar and Senior Fellow for Copyright Research and Policy of C-IP2, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Sandra Aistars is Senior Fellow for Copyright Research and Policy and a Senior Scholar at the Center for Intellectual Property x Innovation Policy (C-IP2). She also leads the law school’s Arts & Entertainment Advocacy Program. Professor Aistars has over twenty years of advocacy experience on behalf of copyright and other intellectual property owners. She has served on trade missions and been an industry advisor to the Department of Commerce on intellectual property implications for international trade negotiations; worked on legislative and regulatory matters worldwide; frequently testified before Congress and federal agencies regarding intellectual property matters; chaired cross-industry coalitions and technology standards efforts; and is regularly tapped by government agencies to lecture in U.S. government-sponsored study tours for visiting legislators, judges, prosecutors, and regulators.
Immediately prior to joining Scalia Law, Professor Aistars was the Chief Executive Officer of the Copyright Alliance – a nonprofit, public interest organization that represents the interests of artists and creators across the creative spectrum. While at Scalia Law, she continues to collaborate with the Copyright Alliance as a member of its Academic Advisory Board. Professor Aistars currently serves on the boards of the Washington Area Lawyers for the Arts (WALA) and the Howard Intellectual Property Program (HIPP), and she has previously served as trustee of the Copyright Society of the USA (CSUSA). Professor Aistars has also previously served as Vice President and Associate General Counsel at Time Warner Inc. She began her legal career in private practice at Weil, Gotshal and Manges LLP.
U.S. Court of Federal Claims and Jurist-In-Residence Professor of Law, The University of Akron School of Law
Judge Ryan T. Holte was sworn in as a judge on the United States Court of Federal Claims in July 2019. Prior to confirmation he served as the David L. Brennan Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Intellectual Property Law and Technology at The University of Akron School of Law (2017-2019) and an assistant professor of law at Southern Illinois University School of Law (2013-2017). Judge Holte has written and presented widely on patent law subjects and empirical legal studies of Federal Circuit and district court patent law cases. His most recent articles were published in the Iowa Law Review (2019), George Mason Law Review (2018), and Washington Law Review (2017).
In practice, Judge Holte served for six years as general counsel and partner of an electrical engineering technology company and is co-inventor of multiple patents related to Systems and Methods for Countering Satellite-Navigated Munitions. Prior to entering academia, Judge Holte practiced as a litigation attorney at the Federal Trade Commission and an associate in the Intellectual Property Practice Group at Jones Day. Prior to practice, he served as a law clerk to Judge Stanley F. Birch, Jr. on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and as a law clerk to Judge Loren A. Smith on the United States Court of Federal Claims.
Judge Holte received his JD from the University of California Davis School of Law and his BS, magna cum laude, in engineering from the California Maritime Academy where he was a First Class graduate of the Corps of Cadets Third Engineering Division and sailed as a U.S. Merchant Marine oiler.
Professor of Law, University of San Diego School of Law
Lisa Ramsey is a Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law, where she is a founding member of the Center for Intellectual Property Law and Markets. She teaches and writes in the intellectual property and international intellectual property law area and is an expert on trademark law. Professor Ramsey is an active member of the American Intellectual Property Law Association and has given presentations on trademark law to attorneys, professors, and students throughout the United States and around the world. Before joining the USD law faculty, she was an intellectual property litigator at Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich and served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Rebecca Beach Smith in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. Professor Ramsey’s scholarship focuses on potential conflicts between trademark laws and free speech rights, and explains how trademark protection of inherently valuable words, symbols, and product features can harm fair competition and freedom of expression.
Examples of Professor Ramsey’s publications include Protectable Trademark Subject Matter in Common Law Countries and the Problem with Flexibility in The Cambridge Handbook of International and Comparative Trademark Law (Irene Calboli & Jane Ginsburg eds., Cambridge University Press 2020); Using Failure to Function Doctrine to Protect Free Speech and Competition in Trademark Law in the Iowa Law Review Online (2020); Non-Traditional Trademarks and Inherently Valuable Expression in The Protection of Non-Traditional Trademarks (Irene Calboli & Martin Senftleben eds., Oxford University Press 2018); Free Speech Challenges to Trademark Law After Matal v. Tam in the Houston Law Review (2018); A Free Speech Right to Trademark Protection? in the Trademark Reporter (2016); and Free Speech and International Obligations to Protect Trademarks in the Yale Journal of International Law (2010). Her article Descriptive Trademarks and the First Amendment in the Tennessee Law Review (2003) was judged by the editor of the Intellectual Property Law Review to be one of the best intellectual property law articles of 2003.
Associate Dean for Faculty Development & Chapman Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Tulsa College of Law
Robert Spoo is Chapman Distinguished Professor at The University of Tulsa College of Law, where he teaches copyright law, property, contracts, law and literature, and other subjects. He received his Ph.D. in English from Princeton University and his J.D. from the Yale Law School. After serving as a judicial clerk for the Honorable Sonia Sotomayor when she was a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Spoo was an attorney with law firms in New York, San Francisco, and Tulsa.
Formerly, Spoo was, for more than a decade, editor of the James Joyce Quarterly and a tenured member of the English Department at the University of Tulsa. He has published extensively on modern authors, law and literature, copyrights, and the public domain. His recent articles have appeared in the Stanford Law Review, UCLA Law Review, Law & Literature, Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal, and Journal of Modern Literature. His book Without Copyrights: Piracy, Publishing, and the Public Domain (Oxford University Press, 2013)—an exploration of the problems faced by foreign authors during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when they lacked copyright protection in the United States—was enthusiastically reviewed in The Nation, London Times Literary Supplement, Paris Review Daily, American Historical Review, Critical Inquiry, and other venues. Spoo’s earlier books and editions, published with Oxford and Duke University Presses, focused on James Joyce, Ezra Pound, and H.D. (Hilda Doolittle).
Spoo is coeditor, with Simon Stern, of a Law & Literature series with Oxford University Press.
In 2016, Spoo was awarded a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in the Humanities—one of four legal scholars in the United States and Canada to receive a Guggenheim that year. His book Modernism and the Law, prepared during his Guggenheim year, was published in 2018 by Bloomsbury Academic.
In 2020-2021, Spoo was on leave with a Law and Public Affairs (LAPA) Fellowship from Princeton University, where his project for the LAPA year was “Lawful Piracy and Trade Courtesy in the American Copyright Vacuum.”
Senior Executive Vice President and Global General Counsel, Motion Picture Association
Karyn A. Temple is Senior Executive Vice President and Global General Counsel for the Motion Picture Association. One of the world’s leading authorities on copyright, Ms. Temple oversees all of the Association’s legal affairs and content protection efforts around the world.
Prior to joining the Motion Picture Association, Ms. Temple served more than eight years in the U.S. Copyright Office, most recently as the Register of Copyrights, where she led the 400-person agency and its eight divisions. Prior to leading the U.S. Copyright Office, Ms. Temple headed its Office of Policy and International Affairs, as well as served in policy and litigation roles at the U.S. Department of Justice; she most recently served in the Obama Administration as Senior Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General of the United States.
Ms. Temple received her J.D. from Columbia University School of Law and her B.A. in English from the University of Michigan.
Clinical Professor and Senior Scholar and Senior Fellow for Copyright Research and Policy of C-IP2, Antonin Scalia Law School, George Mason University
Sandra Aistars is Senior Fellow for Copyright Research and Policy and a Senior Scholar at the Center for Intellectual Property x Innovation Policy (C-IP2). She also leads the law school’s Arts & Entertainment Advocacy Program. Professor Aistars has over twenty years of advocacy experience on behalf of copyright and other intellectual property owners. She has served on trade missions and been an industry advisor to the Department of Commerce on intellectual property implications for international trade negotiations; worked on legislative and regulatory matters worldwide; frequently testified before Congress and federal agencies regarding intellectual property matters; chaired cross-industry coalitions and technology standards efforts; and is regularly tapped by government agencies to lecture in U.S. government-sponsored study tours for visiting legislators, judges, prosecutors, and regulators.
Immediately prior to joining Scalia Law, Professor Aistars was the Chief Executive Officer of the Copyright Alliance – a nonprofit, public interest organization that represents the interests of artists and creators across the creative spectrum. While at Scalia Law, she continues to collaborate with the Copyright Alliance as a member of its Academic Advisory Board. Professor Aistars currently serves on the boards of the Washington Area Lawyers for the Arts (WALA) and the Howard Intellectual Property Program (HIPP), and she has previously served as trustee of the Copyright Society of the USA (CSUSA). Professor Aistars has also previously served as Vice President and Associate General Counsel at Time Warner Inc. She began her legal career in private practice at Weil, Gotshal and Manges LLP.
U.S. Court of Federal Claims and Jurist-In-Residence Professor of Law, The University of Akron School of Law
Judge Ryan T. Holte was sworn in as a judge on the United States Court of Federal Claims in July 2019. Prior to confirmation he served as the David L. Brennan Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Intellectual Property Law and Technology at The University of Akron School of Law (2017-2019) and an assistant professor of law at Southern Illinois University School of Law (2013-2017). Judge Holte has written and presented widely on patent law subjects and empirical legal studies of Federal Circuit and district court patent law cases. His most recent articles were published in the Iowa Law Review (2019), George Mason Law Review (2018), and Washington Law Review (2017).
In practice, Judge Holte served for six years as general counsel and partner of an electrical engineering technology company and is co-inventor of multiple patents related to Systems and Methods for Countering Satellite-Navigated Munitions. Prior to entering academia, Judge Holte practiced as a litigation attorney at the Federal Trade Commission and an associate in the Intellectual Property Practice Group at Jones Day. Prior to practice, he served as a law clerk to Judge Stanley F. Birch, Jr. on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and as a law clerk to Judge Loren A. Smith on the United States Court of Federal Claims.
Judge Holte received his JD from the University of California Davis School of Law and his BS, magna cum laude, in engineering from the California Maritime Academy where he was a First Class graduate of the Corps of Cadets Third Engineering Division and sailed as a U.S. Merchant Marine oiler.
Professor of Law, University of San Diego School of Law
Lisa Ramsey is a Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law, where she is a founding member of the Center for Intellectual Property Law and Markets. She teaches and writes in the intellectual property and international intellectual property law area and is an expert on trademark law. Professor Ramsey is an active member of the American Intellectual Property Law Association and has given presentations on trademark law to attorneys, professors, and students throughout the United States and around the world. Before joining the USD law faculty, she was an intellectual property litigator at Gray Cary Ware & Freidenrich and served as a judicial law clerk for the Honorable Rebecca Beach Smith in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. Professor Ramsey’s scholarship focuses on potential conflicts between trademark laws and free speech rights, and explains how trademark protection of inherently valuable words, symbols, and product features can harm fair competition and freedom of expression.
Examples of Professor Ramsey’s publications include Protectable Trademark Subject Matter in Common Law Countries and the Problem with Flexibility in The Cambridge Handbook of International and Comparative Trademark Law (Irene Calboli & Jane Ginsburg eds., Cambridge University Press 2020); Using Failure to Function Doctrine to Protect Free Speech and Competition in Trademark Law in the Iowa Law Review Online (2020); Non-Traditional Trademarks and Inherently Valuable Expression in The Protection of Non-Traditional Trademarks (Irene Calboli & Martin Senftleben eds., Oxford University Press 2018); Free Speech Challenges to Trademark Law After Matal v. Tam in the Houston Law Review (2018); A Free Speech Right to Trademark Protection? in the Trademark Reporter (2016); and Free Speech and International Obligations to Protect Trademarks in the Yale Journal of International Law (2010). Her article Descriptive Trademarks and the First Amendment in the Tennessee Law Review (2003) was judged by the editor of the Intellectual Property Law Review to be one of the best intellectual property law articles of 2003.
Associate Dean for Faculty Development & Chapman Distinguished Professor of Law, University of Tulsa College of Law
Robert Spoo is Chapman Distinguished Professor at The University of Tulsa College of Law, where he teaches copyright law, property, contracts, law and literature, and other subjects. He received his Ph.D. in English from Princeton University and his J.D. from the Yale Law School. After serving as a judicial clerk for the Honorable Sonia Sotomayor when she was a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, Spoo was an attorney with law firms in New York, San Francisco, and Tulsa.
Formerly, Spoo was, for more than a decade, editor of the James Joyce Quarterly and a tenured member of the English Department at the University of Tulsa. He has published extensively on modern authors, law and literature, copyrights, and the public domain. His recent articles have appeared in the Stanford Law Review, UCLA Law Review, Law & Literature, Cardozo Arts & Entertainment Law Journal, and Journal of Modern Literature. His book Without Copyrights: Piracy, Publishing, and the Public Domain (Oxford University Press, 2013)—an exploration of the problems faced by foreign authors during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries when they lacked copyright protection in the United States—was enthusiastically reviewed in The Nation, London Times Literary Supplement, Paris Review Daily, American Historical Review, Critical Inquiry, and other venues. Spoo’s earlier books and editions, published with Oxford and Duke University Presses, focused on James Joyce, Ezra Pound, and H.D. (Hilda Doolittle).
Spoo is coeditor, with Simon Stern, of a Law & Literature series with Oxford University Press.
In 2016, Spoo was awarded a Guggenheim Foundation Fellowship in the Humanities—one of four legal scholars in the United States and Canada to receive a Guggenheim that year. His book Modernism and the Law, prepared during his Guggenheim year, was published in 2018 by Bloomsbury Academic.
In 2020-2021, Spoo was on leave with a Law and Public Affairs (LAPA) Fellowship from Princeton University, where his project for the LAPA year was “Lawful Piracy and Trade Courtesy in the American Copyright Vacuum.”
Senior Executive Vice President and Global General Counsel, Motion Picture Association
Karyn A. Temple is Senior Executive Vice President and Global General Counsel for the Motion Picture Association. One of the world’s leading authorities on copyright, Ms. Temple oversees all of the Association’s legal affairs and content protection efforts around the world.
Prior to joining the Motion Picture Association, Ms. Temple served more than eight years in the U.S. Copyright Office, most recently as the Register of Copyrights, where she led the 400-person agency and its eight divisions. Prior to leading the U.S. Copyright Office, Ms. Temple headed its Office of Policy and International Affairs, as well as served in policy and litigation roles at the U.S. Department of Justice; she most recently served in the Obama Administration as Senior Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General of the United States.
Ms. Temple received her J.D. from Columbia University School of Law and her B.A. in English from the University of Michigan.
UC Foundation Assistant Professor, U.T. Chattanooga
Senior Attorney, Institute for Justice
Michael Bindas is a senior attorney with the Institute for Justice (IJ) and leads IJ’s educational choice team. In this role, he oversees a talented group of IJ attorneys who help policymakers design constitutionally defensible educational choice programs and who defend educational choice programs in courtrooms nationwide. He joined IJ in 2005.
Michael was part of IJ’s litigation team in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, in which the U.S. Supreme Court held the exclusion of religious options from Montana’s educational choice program unconstitutional, and he led IJ’s defense of the Choice Scholarship Program for elementary and secondary students in Douglas County, Colorado. He also successfully challenged Washington’s denial of special education services to children in religious schools, as well as the state’s exclusion of sectarian options from its state work study program. Currently, he leads IJ’s team in Carson v. Makin, challenging Maine’s exclusion of religious options from its educational choice program.
Prior to leading IJ’s educational choice team, Michael litigated extensively to secure economic liberty, property rights, and freedom of speech throughout the nation. He was counsel of record at the U.S. Supreme Court for Kimbrough Fine Wine & Spirits in Tennessee Wine and Spirits Retailers Association v. Thomas, a successful challenge to Tennessee’s durational residency requirements for retail liquor licenses. He also led successful challenges to the municipal sign codes of St. Louis, Mo. and Norfolk, Va., after those cities attempted to silence protests of their abusive eminent domain practices.
Prior to joining IJ, Michael spent three years as an attorney with Perkins Coie LLP. He is a former law clerk to Judge Rhesa Hawkins Barksdale of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and served as an engineer officer in the United States Army and Pennsylvania Army National Guard before beginning his legal career.
Michael received his law degree cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 2001, where he served as Articles Editor for the Journal of Constitutional Law and was elected to the Order of the Coif. He received his undergraduate degree from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1995.
Director, ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief
Daniel Mach is the director of the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief. He leads a wide range of religious-liberty litigation, advocacy, and public education efforts nationwide, and often writes, teaches, and speaks publicly on religious freedom issues. Mach currently serves as an adjunct professor of law at the George Washington University Law School, focusing on constitutional law and religious liberty. Prior to his work at the ACLU, Mach was a partner in the Washington office of Jenner & Block, where he specialized in First Amendment law.
Senior Attorney, Institute for Justice
Michael Bindas is a senior attorney with the Institute for Justice (IJ) and leads IJ’s educational choice team. In this role, he oversees a talented group of IJ attorneys who help policymakers design constitutionally defensible educational choice programs and who defend educational choice programs in courtrooms nationwide. He joined IJ in 2005.
Michael was part of IJ’s litigation team in Espinoza v. Montana Department of Revenue, in which the U.S. Supreme Court held the exclusion of religious options from Montana’s educational choice program unconstitutional, and he led IJ’s defense of the Choice Scholarship Program for elementary and secondary students in Douglas County, Colorado. He also successfully challenged Washington’s denial of special education services to children in religious schools, as well as the state’s exclusion of sectarian options from its state work study program. Currently, he leads IJ’s team in Carson v. Makin, challenging Maine’s exclusion of religious options from its educational choice program.
Prior to leading IJ’s educational choice team, Michael litigated extensively to secure economic liberty, property rights, and freedom of speech throughout the nation. He was counsel of record at the U.S. Supreme Court for Kimbrough Fine Wine & Spirits in Tennessee Wine and Spirits Retailers Association v. Thomas, a successful challenge to Tennessee’s durational residency requirements for retail liquor licenses. He also led successful challenges to the municipal sign codes of St. Louis, Mo. and Norfolk, Va., after those cities attempted to silence protests of their abusive eminent domain practices.
Prior to joining IJ, Michael spent three years as an attorney with Perkins Coie LLP. He is a former law clerk to Judge Rhesa Hawkins Barksdale of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and served as an engineer officer in the United States Army and Pennsylvania Army National Guard before beginning his legal career.
Michael received his law degree cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 2001, where he served as Articles Editor for the Journal of Constitutional Law and was elected to the Order of the Coif. He received his undergraduate degree from the United States Military Academy at West Point in 1995.
Director, ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief
Daniel Mach is the director of the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief. He leads a wide range of religious-liberty litigation, advocacy, and public education efforts nationwide, and often writes, teaches, and speaks publicly on religious freedom issues. Mach currently serves as an adjunct professor of law at the George Washington University Law School, focusing on constitutional law and religious liberty. Prior to his work at the ACLU, Mach was a partner in the Washington office of Jenner & Block, where he specialized in First Amendment law.
Paul J. Schierl Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame Law School
Professor Richard W. Garnett teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional law, criminal law, the First Amendment, and law and religion. He is a leading authority on questions and debates regarding religious freedom and church-state relations, and is the founding director of Notre Dame Law School’s Program on Church, State, and Society.
Garnett clerked for the late Chief Justice of the United States, William H. Rehnquist, and also for the late Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, Richard S. Arnold. He earned his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1995 and his B.A., summa cum laude, from Duke University in 1990. He joined the faculty in 1999 after practicing law in Washington, D.C. with Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin.
Co-Chairman, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Leonard is Co-Chairman and former Executive Vice President of the Federalist Society, joining the organization over 25 years ago. Since that time he has been instrumental in helping the organization top 70,000, focusing on the growth of lawyers membership, operations and activities advancing limited, constitutional government. In addition to his work at the Society, Leonard has advised President Trump on judicial selection, assisted with the Gorsuch and Kavanaugh Supreme Court selection and confirmation process, and served as a member of the transition team. He also organized the outside coalition efforts in support of the Roberts and Alito U.S. Supreme Court confirmations. Leonard was appointed by President George W. Bush to three terms to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom as chairman. He was also a U.S. Delegate to the UN Council and UN Commission on Human Rights during the Bush Administration. Leonard was the recipient of the 2009 Bradley Prize, along with the other founders and directors of the Federalist Society, for his work in advancing freedom and the rule of law. He is the coeditor of Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and the Worst in the White House, as well as the author of opinion editorials in the New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. Leonard holds degrees from Cornell University and Cornell Law School. He presently resides in Northern Virginia, where he and his wife Sally have raised their seven children.
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.
Paul J. Schierl Professor of Law, University of Notre Dame Law School
Professor Richard W. Garnett teaches and writes in the areas of constitutional law, criminal law, the First Amendment, and law and religion. He is a leading authority on questions and debates regarding religious freedom and church-state relations, and is the founding director of Notre Dame Law School’s Program on Church, State, and Society.
Garnett clerked for the late Chief Justice of the United States, William H. Rehnquist, and also for the late Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, Richard S. Arnold. He earned his J.D. from Yale Law School in 1995 and his B.A., summa cum laude, from Duke University in 1990. He joined the faculty in 1999 after practicing law in Washington, D.C. with Miller, Cassidy, Larroca & Lewin.
Co-Chairman, The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies
Leonard is Co-Chairman and former Executive Vice President of the Federalist Society, joining the organization over 25 years ago. Since that time he has been instrumental in helping the organization top 70,000, focusing on the growth of lawyers membership, operations and activities advancing limited, constitutional government. In addition to his work at the Society, Leonard has advised President Trump on judicial selection, assisted with the Gorsuch and Kavanaugh Supreme Court selection and confirmation process, and served as a member of the transition team. He also organized the outside coalition efforts in support of the Roberts and Alito U.S. Supreme Court confirmations. Leonard was appointed by President George W. Bush to three terms to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom as chairman. He was also a U.S. Delegate to the UN Council and UN Commission on Human Rights during the Bush Administration. Leonard was the recipient of the 2009 Bradley Prize, along with the other founders and directors of the Federalist Society, for his work in advancing freedom and the rule of law. He is the coeditor of Presidential Leadership: Rating the Best and the Worst in the White House, as well as the author of opinion editorials in the New York Times,The Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post. Leonard holds degrees from Cornell University and Cornell Law School. He presently resides in Northern Virginia, where he and his wife Sally have raised their seven children.
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.
Associate, Covington & Burling LLP
Eli Nachmany is an associate at Covington & Burling LLP in the Washington, DC, office. He clerked for Judge Steven J. Menashi of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Eli graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was Editor-in-Chief of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy. Prior to law school, Eli served as the speechwriter to the U.S. Secretary of the Interior and as a domestic policy aide in the White House Office of American Innovation. He graduated summa cum laude from New York University with a B.S. in Sports Management. Eli’s scholarship on administrative law and executive power has appeared in the BYU Law Review, George Mason Law Review, Wake Forest Law Review, and Yale Law Journal Forum.
Senior Litigation Counsel, New Civil Liberties Alliance
Throughout his 40-year career in private law practice in Washington, D.C., Richard Samp has specialized in appellate litigation with a focus on constitutional law. He served as Chief Counsel of the Washington Legal Foundation for more than 30 years. He has participated directly in more than 200 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. Mr. Samp is a graduate of Harvard College and the University of Michigan Law School and clerked for a federal judge in Detroit.
The Antitrust Revolution?
Bill Baer, François-Henri Briard, Makan Delrahim, Douglas H. Ginsburg, Diana L. Moss, Chad A. Readler
The 2021 National Lawyers Convention took place November 11-13, 2021 at the Mayflower Hotel in...
The Antitrust Revolution?
Bill Baer, François-Henri Briard, Makan Delrahim, Douglas H. Ginsburg, Diana L. Moss, Chad A. Readler
The 2021 National Lawyers Convention took place November 11-13, 2021 at the Mayflower Hotel in...
IP Law and Culture
Sandra Aistars, Ryan T. Holte, Lisa P. Ramsey, Robert Spoo, Karyn A. Temple
The 2021 National Lawyers Convention took place November 11-13, 2021 at the Mayflower Hotel in...
IP Law and Culture
Sandra Aistars, Ryan T. Holte, Lisa P. Ramsey, Robert Spoo, Karyn A. Temple
The 2021 National Lawyers Convention took place November 11-13, 2021 at the Mayflower Hotel in...
What Happened to Natural Law in American Jurisprudence?
Kody Cooper
A Review of The Decline of Natural Law: How American Lawyers Once Used Natural Law and...
Courthouse Steps Oral Argument Webinar: Carson v. Makin
Michael Bindas, Daniel Mach
On December 8, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Carson v....
Courthouse Steps Oral Argument Webinar: Carson v. Makin
Michael Bindas, Daniel Mach
On December 8, 2021, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Carson v....
Courthouse Steps Oral Argument Litigation Update: American Hospital Association v. Becerra
TeleforumPanel Two: School Choice in the Courts [Archive Collection]
Richard W. Garnett, Leonard A. Leo, Steve Shapiro, Jeffrey S. Sutton
On March 26, 1999, the Federalist Society co-sponsored the Stranahan National Issues Forum with the...
Panel Two: School Choice in the Courts [Archive Collection]
Richard W. Garnett, Leonard A. Leo, Steve Shapiro, Jeffrey S. Sutton
On March 26, 1999, the Federalist Society co-sponsored the Stranahan National Issues Forum with the...