Professor Emeritus, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University
In memoriam
Dr. John Baker is Professor Emeritus of Law, and previously the Dale E. Bennett Professor of Law, at Louisiana State University Law School. He is currently Visiting Professor at Peking University School of Transnational Law (via Zoom) and has been Visiting Professor at The Center for the Constitution, Georgetown Law School (2013-2020). He has also been a Visiting Fellow at Oriel College, the University of Oxford (2012-2014) and taught at Blackfriars Hall, Oxford in 2014. Dr. Baker has also been an adjunct Fellow at the Heritage Foundation (Spring, 2008) and a Distinguished Scholar at the Catholic University of America Law School (2011-12). He has taught at Tulane Law School, George Mason Law School, Pepperdine Law School, New York Law School, Hong Kong University, and the University of Dallas, School of Management and also taught and/or lectured in 17 foreign countries. Notable among his foreign visits are the
following: Visiting Professor at the University of Lyon III (France) (1999-2011); Visiting Professor at the Universidad de los Andes, Chile (2012), as a Fulbright Specialist (2006); and a Fulbright Scholar at various universities in the Philippines. Dr. Baker received his J.D., with honors, from the University of Michigan Law School and his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Dallas. He also earned a Ph.D. in Political Thought from the University of London. Baker has taught over a dozen different subjects, mostly courses in public law. His main areas of interest are Constitutional Law (particularly federalism and separation of powers), Criminal Law, Anti-Terrorism Law, International Law, Health Care Law, Mediation, and Comparative Law.
In addition to law review articles and book chapters, Dr. Baker’s academic publications include Hall's Criminal Law: Cases and Materials (with Benson, Force and George; 5th ed. Michie, 1993); An Introduction to the Law of the United States (ed. with Levasseur; University Press of America, 1992). He has also published on Forbes.com, FoxNews.com, in The Washington Times, and a number of times in The Wall Street Journal. He argues in federal court, including two oral arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court. For many years, he co-taught courses for the Federalist Society on separation of powers with the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. In September 2016, he co-taught a Supreme Court seminar in China with Justice Samuel Alito. Following law school, he served as a law clerk in federal district court and as an assistant district attorney in New Orleans before joining LSU in 1975. While a professor, he has been as a consultant to USAID, USIA (since rolled into the State Department), the Justice Department, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Powers, and the Office of Planning in the White House. He served on an ABA Task Force which issued the report, The Federalization of Crime (1998) and later as a consultant to the “Bi-Partisan Task Force on the Over- federalization of Crime” (2012-2014) created by the U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime. Dr. Baker was a co-founder of the first iteration (1995) of Stratfor Inc., a global intelligence agency. He co-authored its first book: The Intelligence Edge (with Friedman, Friedman and Chapman; Crown Books/Random House 1997). In 2022, he began a short, weekly video podcast available on YouTube and Rumble, The Baker Brief.
Partner, Latham & Watkins LLP
Alice Fisher is a partner in Latham & Watkins' Washington, D.C. office and is a member of the firm's Executive Committee. She focuses her practice on white collar criminal investigations, internal investigations and advises clients on a range of criminal matters.
From 2005-2008, Ms. Fisher served as Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Criminal Division of the US DOJ. As Assistant Attorney General, Ms. Fisher led more than 750 attorneys and staff responsible for federal criminal enforcement policy as well as handling criminal matters in federal courts across the country in all areas of federal criminal law enforcement. Under her leadership, the Criminal Division pursued a broad array of federal criminal investigations and prosecutions, with particular focus on corporate fraud matters, including securities fraud, procurement fraud, financial institution fraud, anti-money laundering, healthcare fraud, computer hacking and cyber security, national security, as well as US-domestic and international corruption.
Ms. Fisher also chaired the National Procurement Fraud Task Force, supervised the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, and served as a member of the President's Corporate Fraud Task Force. She handled various transnational and multi-national law enforcement operations and policies, including bilateral agreements and treaties involving information sharing and global criminal enforcement initiatives. Representing the DOJ in front of Congress, Ms. Fisher testified on criminal enforcement policies and served on the Federal Criminal Rules Committee.
As a litigation partner at Latham from 2003-2005 and prior to 2001, Ms. Fisher represented both individual and corporate clients in grand jury, agency and congressional inquiries involving allegations of securities and bank fraud, healthcare fraud, the FCPA, criminal antitrust matters, OFAC sanctions and procurement fraud. She has also represented clients in a number of complex civil and regulatory litigations. Ms. Fisher previously held other positions in government, including Deputy Special Counsel to a US Senate Special Committee.
Ms. Fisher has published articles and spoken on criminal law topics such as the criminalization of corporate conduct, the FCPA, healthcare and procurement fraud, the False Claims Act, the US criminal enforcement environment, public corruption and the honest services statute, financial crime in the financial services industry, securities fraud, identity theft, cybercrime and national security.
United States Attorney General
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland was sworn in as the 86th Attorney General of the United States on March 11, 2021. As the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, Attorney General Garland leads the Justice Department’s 115,000 employees, who work across the United States and in more than 50 countries worldwide. Under his leadership, the Department of Justice is dedicated to upholding the rule of law, keeping our country safe, and protecting the civil rights of all Americans.
Immediately preceding his confirmation as Attorney General, Attorney General Garland was a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to that position in 1997, served as Chief Judge of the Circuit from 2013-20, and served as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States from 2017-20. In 2016, President Obama nominated him for the position of Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.
Before becoming a federal judge, Attorney General Garland spent a substantial part of his professional life at the Department of Justice. He served in both career and non-career positions under five Attorneys General, including as Special Assistant to the Attorney General, Assistant United States Attorney, Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Criminal Division, and Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General. In those roles, his responsibilities spanned the work of the Department, including criminal, civil, and national security matters. They also included direct supervision of investigations and prosecutions of national importance, including the Oklahoma City bombing, Unabomber, and Montana Freemen cases.
Earlier in his career, Attorney General Garland was a partner in the law firm of Arnold & Porter, where his practice involved civil and criminal litigation, antitrust, and administrative law. He also taught antitrust at Harvard Law School and published law review articles on both antitrust and administrative law.
Attorney General Garland graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College and magna cum laude from Harvard Law School. Following law school, he clerked for Judge Henry J. Friendly of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and for Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., of the United States Supreme Court.
43rd President of the United States
George Walker Bush served as the 43rd President of the United States from 2001 to 2009, and the 46th Governor of Texas from 1995 to 2000.
William D. Warren Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law
Stephen Bainbridge is the William D. Warren Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA School of Law, where he currently teaches Business Associations, Advanced Corporation Law, and Mergers and Acquisitions. In past years, he has also taught Corporate Finance, Securities Regulation, Unincorporated Business Associations and Catholic Social Thought and the Law. Professor Bainbridge previously taught at the University of Illinois Law School (1988-1996). He has also taught at Harvard Law School as the Joseph Flom Visiting Professor of Law and Business (2000-2001), and as a visiting professor at La Trobe University in Melbourne (2005 and 2007) and at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo (1999).
In 2008, Bainbridge received the UCLA School of Law's Rutter Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 1990, the graduating class of the University of Illinois College of Law voted him "Professor of the Year."
Professor Bainbridge is a prolific scholar, whose work covers a variety of subjects, but with a strong emphasis on the law and economics of public corporations. He has written over 100 law review articles which have appeared in such leading journals as the Harvard Law Review, Virginia Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Cornell Law Review, Stanford Law Review, and Vanderbilt Law Review. Bainbridge has also written 19 books, including seven in multiple editions. His most recent books include: Outsourcing the Board: How Board Service Providers Can Improve Corporate Governance (Cambridge University Press, 2018) (with M. Todd Henderson); Business Associations: Cases and Materials on Agency, Partnerships, and Corporations (Foundation Press, 10th ed., 2018) (with Klein and Ramseyer); Mergers and Acquisitions: A Transactional Perspective (Foundation Press, 2017) (with Iman Anabtawi).
According to Gregory Sisk and Brian Leiter’s rankings of law professors by scholarly impact, Professor Bainbridge was the third most-frequently cited scholar in corporate and securities law for the period 2013-2017. According to Hein Online, Bainbridge is the 29th most frequently cited scholar in their database of legal publications over the last 10 years and the 23rd most cited for the period January 2018 through August 2019. In SSRN.com’s ranking of the top 3000 legal authors by all-time downloads, Bainbridge is ranked 10th. By that metric, he is the highest ranked member of the UCLA law school faculty. In SSRN.com’s ranking of the top 3000 legal authors by all-time citations to their work, Bainbridge is ranked 55th. By that metric, he is the second highest ranked member of the UCLA law school faculty.
Professor Bainbridge has been a Salvatori Fellow with the Heritage Foundation, a member of the American Bar Association’s Committee on Corporate Laws, a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Markets and Morality, and Chair of the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s Corporations, Securities & Antitrust Practice Group.
In May 2014, Professor Bainbridge was the Cameron Fellow at the University of Auckland Faculty of Law. He was the Francis G. Pileggi Distinguished Lecturer in Law at Widener University School of Law in September 2005, and a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the University of Maryland School of Law in November 2005.
In 2008, 2011, and 2012, Professor Bainbridge was named by the National Association of Corporate Directors' Directorship magazine to its list of the 100 most influential people in the field of corporate governance.
His blog, ProfessorBainbridge.com, was named by the ABA Journal as one of the Top 100 Law Blogs of 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Director of Policy and Special Counsel, AFL-CIO
Damon A. Silvers is the Director of Policy and Special Counsel for the AFL-CIO. He joined the AFL-CIO as Associate General Counsel in 1997.
Mr. Silvers serves on a pro bono basis as a Special Assistant Attorney General for the state of New York. Mr. Silvers is also a member of the Investor Advisory Committee of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Treasury Department’s Financial Research Advisory Committee, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s Standing Advisory Group and its Investor Advisory Group.
Mr. Silvers served as the Deputy Chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel for TARP from 2008 to 2011. Between 2006 and 2008, Mr. Silvers served as the Chair of the Competition Subcommittee of the United States Treasury Department Advisory Committee on the Auditing Profession and as a member of the United States Treasury Department Investor’s Practice Committee of the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets.
Prior to working for the AFL-CIO, Mr. Silvers worked for the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers, the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers, and as a law clerk at the Delaware Court of Chancery for Chancellor William T. Allen and Vice-Chancellor Bernard Balick.
Special Counsel, Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, PA and former C, Delaware Supreme Court
E. NORMAN VEASEY joined the Wilmington law firm of Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, P.A. in January 2014. He is the former Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court, having served a 12-year term through May 2004. After his retirement from the Supreme Court, he was a Senior Partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, until the end of 2013.
At GFM, he will concentrate on serving as an arbitrator, mediator, special master, and provide other neutral services in complex corporate, contract, and commercial litigation. Chief Justice Veasey is listed on the National Roster of Arbitrators and Mediators of the American Arbitration Association (AAA) and as a distinguished neutral of the Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution (CPR).
During his tenure as Chief Justice, and thereafter, the United States Chamber of Commerce ranked Delaware’s courts first in the nation for their fair, reasonable, and efficient litigation environment. Chief Justice Veasey has been credited with leading nationwide programs to restore professionalism to the practice of law and to adopt best practices in the running of America’s courts. In 2004, his final year of service in the Delaware Supreme Court, he was awarded the Order of the First State by the Governor of Delaware, the highest honor for meritorious service the State’s governor can grant.
As Senior Partner at Weil, he served as a strategic adviser to the firm’s roster of prominent global clients on a wide range of issues related to mergers & acquisitions, restructuring, and litigation. He also advised on corporate governance issues involving the responsibilities of corporate directors in complex financial transactions and crisis management.
He was President of the Conference of Chief Justices, Chair of the board of the National Center for State Courts, Chair of the Section of Business Law of the American Bar Association (ABA), Chair of the ABA Special Commission on Evaluation of the Rules of Professional Conduct (Ethics 2000), Chair of the Committee on Corporate Laws of the ABA Section of Business Law, and President of the Delaware State Bar Association.
During 1992-93, Chief Justice Veasey was the editor of Volume 48 of The Business Lawyer, the scholarly legal journal published by the Section of Business Law of the ABA. He is co-author, with Weil’s Christine Di Guglielmo, of a book, published by Oxford University Press, on the challenges of modern-day corporate general counsel. The book is entitled, E. Norman Veasey & Christine T. Di Guglielmo, Indispensable Counsel: The Chief Legal Officer in the New Reality (2012). The Wall Street Journal recently called it “a field manual to aid [chief legal officers] with their new tasks.” (March 9, 2012)
He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers; included in Best Lawyers in America; a director of the Institute for Law and Economics at the University of Pennsylvania; a member of the American Law Institute; a member of the International Advisory Board of the Centre for Corporate Law and Securities Regulation; a frequent panelist and lecturer on the corporation law, corporate governance, ethics, and professionalism; and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he teaches a course entitled, “The Real World of Ethical Corporate Lawyering.” He served in previous years as an Adjunct Professor teaching this course at New York University School of Law, the University of Virginia School of Law, and at Wake Forest University School of Law.
He is a graduate of Dartmouth College (A.B. 1954) and the University of Pennsylvania Law School (LLB 1957). He has been awarded honorary degrees of Doctor of Laws from the University of Delaware and Widener University.
Recent Honors include Josiah Marvel Cup presented by the Delaware Chamber of Commerce, January, 2014, presented annually to a citizen of Delaware who has given outstanding service to the state, community, and society; Common Cause of Delaware Good Government award, November 2014; named “Corporate Governance Lawyer of the Year” in 2009-2012; Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award; Daniel L. Herrmann Professional Conduct Award; Order of the First State-2004; Annual Ethics Award from ACCA-2002; Paul C. .Reardon Award from the National Center for State Courts-2002; St. Thomas More Society Award; Alumni of Merit Award from the University of Pennsylvania; Lewis F. Powell, Jr., Award for Professionalism and Ethics from the American Inns of Court Foundation-1996; Class of 1954 Award from Dartmouth College.
From 1957 until he took office as Chief Justice in 1992, he practiced law with the Wilmington, Delaware, law firm of Richards, Layton & Finger, where he concentrated on business law, corporate transactions, litigation, and counseling. He served at various times as managing partner and the chief executive officer of the firm. During 1961-63, he was Deputy Attorney General and Chief Deputy Attorney of the State of Delaware, and from 2011 to 2014 he served the State of Delaware as Independent Counsel and Special Deputy Attorney General to investigate campaign funding law violations.
Chief Justice Veasey and his wife, Suzanne, live in Wilmington, Delaware. They have four grown children and eleven grandchildren.
Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh was born in Washington, D.C., on February 12, 1965. He married Ashley Estes in 2004, and they have two daughters - Margaret and Liza. He received a B.A. from Yale College in 1987 and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1990. He served as a law clerk for Judge Walter Stapleton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit from 1990-1991, for Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit from 1991-1992, and for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the U.S. Supreme Court during the 1993 Term. In 1992-1993, he was an attorney in the Office of the Solicitor General of the United States. From 1994 to 1997 and for a period in 1998, he was Associate Counsel in the Office of Independent Counsel. He was a partner at a Washington, D.C., law firm from 1997 to 1998 and again from 1999 to 2001. From 2001 to 2003, he was Associate Counsel and then Senior Associate Counsel to President George W. Bush. From 2003 to 2006, he was Assistant to the President and Staff Secretary for President Bush. He was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2006. President Donald J. Trump nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat on October 6, 2018.
William D. Warren Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law
Stephen Bainbridge is the William D. Warren Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA School of Law, where he currently teaches Business Associations, Advanced Corporation Law, and Mergers and Acquisitions. In past years, he has also taught Corporate Finance, Securities Regulation, Unincorporated Business Associations and Catholic Social Thought and the Law. Professor Bainbridge previously taught at the University of Illinois Law School (1988-1996). He has also taught at Harvard Law School as the Joseph Flom Visiting Professor of Law and Business (2000-2001), and as a visiting professor at La Trobe University in Melbourne (2005 and 2007) and at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo (1999).
In 2008, Bainbridge received the UCLA School of Law's Rutter Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 1990, the graduating class of the University of Illinois College of Law voted him "Professor of the Year."
Professor Bainbridge is a prolific scholar, whose work covers a variety of subjects, but with a strong emphasis on the law and economics of public corporations. He has written over 100 law review articles which have appeared in such leading journals as the Harvard Law Review, Virginia Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Cornell Law Review, Stanford Law Review, and Vanderbilt Law Review. Bainbridge has also written 19 books, including seven in multiple editions. His most recent books include: Outsourcing the Board: How Board Service Providers Can Improve Corporate Governance (Cambridge University Press, 2018) (with M. Todd Henderson); Business Associations: Cases and Materials on Agency, Partnerships, and Corporations (Foundation Press, 10th ed., 2018) (with Klein and Ramseyer); Mergers and Acquisitions: A Transactional Perspective (Foundation Press, 2017) (with Iman Anabtawi).
According to Gregory Sisk and Brian Leiter’s rankings of law professors by scholarly impact, Professor Bainbridge was the third most-frequently cited scholar in corporate and securities law for the period 2013-2017. According to Hein Online, Bainbridge is the 29th most frequently cited scholar in their database of legal publications over the last 10 years and the 23rd most cited for the period January 2018 through August 2019. In SSRN.com’s ranking of the top 3000 legal authors by all-time downloads, Bainbridge is ranked 10th. By that metric, he is the highest ranked member of the UCLA law school faculty. In SSRN.com’s ranking of the top 3000 legal authors by all-time citations to their work, Bainbridge is ranked 55th. By that metric, he is the second highest ranked member of the UCLA law school faculty.
Professor Bainbridge has been a Salvatori Fellow with the Heritage Foundation, a member of the American Bar Association’s Committee on Corporate Laws, a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Markets and Morality, and Chair of the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s Corporations, Securities & Antitrust Practice Group.
In May 2014, Professor Bainbridge was the Cameron Fellow at the University of Auckland Faculty of Law. He was the Francis G. Pileggi Distinguished Lecturer in Law at Widener University School of Law in September 2005, and a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the University of Maryland School of Law in November 2005.
In 2008, 2011, and 2012, Professor Bainbridge was named by the National Association of Corporate Directors' Directorship magazine to its list of the 100 most influential people in the field of corporate governance.
His blog, ProfessorBainbridge.com, was named by the ABA Journal as one of the Top 100 Law Blogs of 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Director of Policy and Special Counsel, AFL-CIO
Damon A. Silvers is the Director of Policy and Special Counsel for the AFL-CIO. He joined the AFL-CIO as Associate General Counsel in 1997.
Mr. Silvers serves on a pro bono basis as a Special Assistant Attorney General for the state of New York. Mr. Silvers is also a member of the Investor Advisory Committee of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Treasury Department’s Financial Research Advisory Committee, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s Standing Advisory Group and its Investor Advisory Group.
Mr. Silvers served as the Deputy Chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel for TARP from 2008 to 2011. Between 2006 and 2008, Mr. Silvers served as the Chair of the Competition Subcommittee of the United States Treasury Department Advisory Committee on the Auditing Profession and as a member of the United States Treasury Department Investor’s Practice Committee of the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets.
Prior to working for the AFL-CIO, Mr. Silvers worked for the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers, the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers, and as a law clerk at the Delaware Court of Chancery for Chancellor William T. Allen and Vice-Chancellor Bernard Balick.
Special Counsel, Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, PA and former C, Delaware Supreme Court
E. NORMAN VEASEY joined the Wilmington law firm of Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, P.A. in January 2014. He is the former Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court, having served a 12-year term through May 2004. After his retirement from the Supreme Court, he was a Senior Partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, until the end of 2013.
At GFM, he will concentrate on serving as an arbitrator, mediator, special master, and provide other neutral services in complex corporate, contract, and commercial litigation. Chief Justice Veasey is listed on the National Roster of Arbitrators and Mediators of the American Arbitration Association (AAA) and as a distinguished neutral of the Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution (CPR).
During his tenure as Chief Justice, and thereafter, the United States Chamber of Commerce ranked Delaware’s courts first in the nation for their fair, reasonable, and efficient litigation environment. Chief Justice Veasey has been credited with leading nationwide programs to restore professionalism to the practice of law and to adopt best practices in the running of America’s courts. In 2004, his final year of service in the Delaware Supreme Court, he was awarded the Order of the First State by the Governor of Delaware, the highest honor for meritorious service the State’s governor can grant.
As Senior Partner at Weil, he served as a strategic adviser to the firm’s roster of prominent global clients on a wide range of issues related to mergers & acquisitions, restructuring, and litigation. He also advised on corporate governance issues involving the responsibilities of corporate directors in complex financial transactions and crisis management.
He was President of the Conference of Chief Justices, Chair of the board of the National Center for State Courts, Chair of the Section of Business Law of the American Bar Association (ABA), Chair of the ABA Special Commission on Evaluation of the Rules of Professional Conduct (Ethics 2000), Chair of the Committee on Corporate Laws of the ABA Section of Business Law, and President of the Delaware State Bar Association.
During 1992-93, Chief Justice Veasey was the editor of Volume 48 of The Business Lawyer, the scholarly legal journal published by the Section of Business Law of the ABA. He is co-author, with Weil’s Christine Di Guglielmo, of a book, published by Oxford University Press, on the challenges of modern-day corporate general counsel. The book is entitled, E. Norman Veasey & Christine T. Di Guglielmo, Indispensable Counsel: The Chief Legal Officer in the New Reality (2012). The Wall Street Journal recently called it “a field manual to aid [chief legal officers] with their new tasks.” (March 9, 2012)
He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers; included in Best Lawyers in America; a director of the Institute for Law and Economics at the University of Pennsylvania; a member of the American Law Institute; a member of the International Advisory Board of the Centre for Corporate Law and Securities Regulation; a frequent panelist and lecturer on the corporation law, corporate governance, ethics, and professionalism; and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he teaches a course entitled, “The Real World of Ethical Corporate Lawyering.” He served in previous years as an Adjunct Professor teaching this course at New York University School of Law, the University of Virginia School of Law, and at Wake Forest University School of Law.
He is a graduate of Dartmouth College (A.B. 1954) and the University of Pennsylvania Law School (LLB 1957). He has been awarded honorary degrees of Doctor of Laws from the University of Delaware and Widener University.
Recent Honors include Josiah Marvel Cup presented by the Delaware Chamber of Commerce, January, 2014, presented annually to a citizen of Delaware who has given outstanding service to the state, community, and society; Common Cause of Delaware Good Government award, November 2014; named “Corporate Governance Lawyer of the Year” in 2009-2012; Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award; Daniel L. Herrmann Professional Conduct Award; Order of the First State-2004; Annual Ethics Award from ACCA-2002; Paul C. .Reardon Award from the National Center for State Courts-2002; St. Thomas More Society Award; Alumni of Merit Award from the University of Pennsylvania; Lewis F. Powell, Jr., Award for Professionalism and Ethics from the American Inns of Court Foundation-1996; Class of 1954 Award from Dartmouth College.
From 1957 until he took office as Chief Justice in 1992, he practiced law with the Wilmington, Delaware, law firm of Richards, Layton & Finger, where he concentrated on business law, corporate transactions, litigation, and counseling. He served at various times as managing partner and the chief executive officer of the firm. During 1961-63, he was Deputy Attorney General and Chief Deputy Attorney of the State of Delaware, and from 2011 to 2014 he served the State of Delaware as Independent Counsel and Special Deputy Attorney General to investigate campaign funding law violations.
Chief Justice Veasey and his wife, Suzanne, live in Wilmington, Delaware. They have four grown children and eleven grandchildren.
Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh was born in Washington, D.C., on February 12, 1965. He married Ashley Estes in 2004, and they have two daughters - Margaret and Liza. He received a B.A. from Yale College in 1987 and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1990. He served as a law clerk for Judge Walter Stapleton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit from 1990-1991, for Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit from 1991-1992, and for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the U.S. Supreme Court during the 1993 Term. In 1992-1993, he was an attorney in the Office of the Solicitor General of the United States. From 1994 to 1997 and for a period in 1998, he was Associate Counsel in the Office of Independent Counsel. He was a partner at a Washington, D.C., law firm from 1997 to 1998 and again from 1999 to 2001. From 2001 to 2003, he was Associate Counsel and then Senior Associate Counsel to President George W. Bush. From 2003 to 2006, he was Assistant to the President and Staff Secretary for President Bush. He was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2006. President Donald J. Trump nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat on October 6, 2018.
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.
Professor Emeritus, Paul M. Hebert Law Center, Louisiana State University
In memoriam
Dr. John Baker is Professor Emeritus of Law, and previously the Dale E. Bennett Professor of Law, at Louisiana State University Law School. He is currently Visiting Professor at Peking University School of Transnational Law (via Zoom) and has been Visiting Professor at The Center for the Constitution, Georgetown Law School (2013-2020). He has also been a Visiting Fellow at Oriel College, the University of Oxford (2012-2014) and taught at Blackfriars Hall, Oxford in 2014. Dr. Baker has also been an adjunct Fellow at the Heritage Foundation (Spring, 2008) and a Distinguished Scholar at the Catholic University of America Law School (2011-12). He has taught at Tulane Law School, George Mason Law School, Pepperdine Law School, New York Law School, Hong Kong University, and the University of Dallas, School of Management and also taught and/or lectured in 17 foreign countries. Notable among his foreign visits are the
following: Visiting Professor at the University of Lyon III (France) (1999-2011); Visiting Professor at the Universidad de los Andes, Chile (2012), as a Fulbright Specialist (2006); and a Fulbright Scholar at various universities in the Philippines. Dr. Baker received his J.D., with honors, from the University of Michigan Law School and his B.A., magna cum laude, from the University of Dallas. He also earned a Ph.D. in Political Thought from the University of London. Baker has taught over a dozen different subjects, mostly courses in public law. His main areas of interest are Constitutional Law (particularly federalism and separation of powers), Criminal Law, Anti-Terrorism Law, International Law, Health Care Law, Mediation, and Comparative Law.
In addition to law review articles and book chapters, Dr. Baker’s academic publications include Hall's Criminal Law: Cases and Materials (with Benson, Force and George; 5th ed. Michie, 1993); An Introduction to the Law of the United States (ed. with Levasseur; University Press of America, 1992). He has also published on Forbes.com, FoxNews.com, in The Washington Times, and a number of times in The Wall Street Journal. He argues in federal court, including two oral arguments in the U.S. Supreme Court. For many years, he co-taught courses for the Federalist Society on separation of powers with the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia. In September 2016, he co-taught a Supreme Court seminar in China with Justice Samuel Alito. Following law school, he served as a law clerk in federal district court and as an assistant district attorney in New Orleans before joining LSU in 1975. While a professor, he has been as a consultant to USAID, USIA (since rolled into the State Department), the Justice Department, the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Powers, and the Office of Planning in the White House. He served on an ABA Task Force which issued the report, The Federalization of Crime (1998) and later as a consultant to the “Bi-Partisan Task Force on the Over- federalization of Crime” (2012-2014) created by the U.S. House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime. Dr. Baker was a co-founder of the first iteration (1995) of Stratfor Inc., a global intelligence agency. He co-authored its first book: The Intelligence Edge (with Friedman, Friedman and Chapman; Crown Books/Random House 1997). In 2022, he began a short, weekly video podcast available on YouTube and Rumble, The Baker Brief.
Partner, Latham & Watkins LLP
Alice Fisher is a partner in Latham & Watkins' Washington, D.C. office and is a member of the firm's Executive Committee. She focuses her practice on white collar criminal investigations, internal investigations and advises clients on a range of criminal matters.
From 2005-2008, Ms. Fisher served as Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Criminal Division of the US DOJ. As Assistant Attorney General, Ms. Fisher led more than 750 attorneys and staff responsible for federal criminal enforcement policy as well as handling criminal matters in federal courts across the country in all areas of federal criminal law enforcement. Under her leadership, the Criminal Division pursued a broad array of federal criminal investigations and prosecutions, with particular focus on corporate fraud matters, including securities fraud, procurement fraud, financial institution fraud, anti-money laundering, healthcare fraud, computer hacking and cyber security, national security, as well as US-domestic and international corruption.
Ms. Fisher also chaired the National Procurement Fraud Task Force, supervised the Medicare Fraud Strike Force, and served as a member of the President's Corporate Fraud Task Force. She handled various transnational and multi-national law enforcement operations and policies, including bilateral agreements and treaties involving information sharing and global criminal enforcement initiatives. Representing the DOJ in front of Congress, Ms. Fisher testified on criminal enforcement policies and served on the Federal Criminal Rules Committee.
As a litigation partner at Latham from 2003-2005 and prior to 2001, Ms. Fisher represented both individual and corporate clients in grand jury, agency and congressional inquiries involving allegations of securities and bank fraud, healthcare fraud, the FCPA, criminal antitrust matters, OFAC sanctions and procurement fraud. She has also represented clients in a number of complex civil and regulatory litigations. Ms. Fisher previously held other positions in government, including Deputy Special Counsel to a US Senate Special Committee.
Ms. Fisher has published articles and spoken on criminal law topics such as the criminalization of corporate conduct, the FCPA, healthcare and procurement fraud, the False Claims Act, the US criminal enforcement environment, public corruption and the honest services statute, financial crime in the financial services industry, securities fraud, identity theft, cybercrime and national security.
United States Attorney General
Attorney General Merrick B. Garland was sworn in as the 86th Attorney General of the United States on March 11, 2021. As the nation’s chief law enforcement officer, Attorney General Garland leads the Justice Department’s 115,000 employees, who work across the United States and in more than 50 countries worldwide. Under his leadership, the Department of Justice is dedicated to upholding the rule of law, keeping our country safe, and protecting the civil rights of all Americans.
Immediately preceding his confirmation as Attorney General, Attorney General Garland was a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to that position in 1997, served as Chief Judge of the Circuit from 2013-20, and served as Chair of the Executive Committee of the Judicial Conference of the United States from 2017-20. In 2016, President Obama nominated him for the position of Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court.
Before becoming a federal judge, Attorney General Garland spent a substantial part of his professional life at the Department of Justice. He served in both career and non-career positions under five Attorneys General, including as Special Assistant to the Attorney General, Assistant United States Attorney, Deputy Assistant Attorney General in the Criminal Division, and Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General. In those roles, his responsibilities spanned the work of the Department, including criminal, civil, and national security matters. They also included direct supervision of investigations and prosecutions of national importance, including the Oklahoma City bombing, Unabomber, and Montana Freemen cases.
Earlier in his career, Attorney General Garland was a partner in the law firm of Arnold & Porter, where his practice involved civil and criminal litigation, antitrust, and administrative law. He also taught antitrust at Harvard Law School and published law review articles on both antitrust and administrative law.
Attorney General Garland graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College and magna cum laude from Harvard Law School. Following law school, he clerked for Judge Henry J. Friendly of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and for Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., of the United States Supreme Court.
William D. Warren Professor of Law, UCLA School of Law
Stephen Bainbridge is the William D. Warren Distinguished Professor of Law at UCLA School of Law, where he currently teaches Business Associations, Advanced Corporation Law, and Mergers and Acquisitions. In past years, he has also taught Corporate Finance, Securities Regulation, Unincorporated Business Associations and Catholic Social Thought and the Law. Professor Bainbridge previously taught at the University of Illinois Law School (1988-1996). He has also taught at Harvard Law School as the Joseph Flom Visiting Professor of Law and Business (2000-2001), and as a visiting professor at La Trobe University in Melbourne (2005 and 2007) and at Aoyama Gakuin University in Tokyo (1999).
In 2008, Bainbridge received the UCLA School of Law's Rutter Award for Excellence in Teaching. In 1990, the graduating class of the University of Illinois College of Law voted him "Professor of the Year."
Professor Bainbridge is a prolific scholar, whose work covers a variety of subjects, but with a strong emphasis on the law and economics of public corporations. He has written over 100 law review articles which have appeared in such leading journals as the Harvard Law Review, Virginia Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review, Cornell Law Review, Stanford Law Review, and Vanderbilt Law Review. Bainbridge has also written 19 books, including seven in multiple editions. His most recent books include: Outsourcing the Board: How Board Service Providers Can Improve Corporate Governance (Cambridge University Press, 2018) (with M. Todd Henderson); Business Associations: Cases and Materials on Agency, Partnerships, and Corporations (Foundation Press, 10th ed., 2018) (with Klein and Ramseyer); Mergers and Acquisitions: A Transactional Perspective (Foundation Press, 2017) (with Iman Anabtawi).
According to Gregory Sisk and Brian Leiter’s rankings of law professors by scholarly impact, Professor Bainbridge was the third most-frequently cited scholar in corporate and securities law for the period 2013-2017. According to Hein Online, Bainbridge is the 29th most frequently cited scholar in their database of legal publications over the last 10 years and the 23rd most cited for the period January 2018 through August 2019. In SSRN.com’s ranking of the top 3000 legal authors by all-time downloads, Bainbridge is ranked 10th. By that metric, he is the highest ranked member of the UCLA law school faculty. In SSRN.com’s ranking of the top 3000 legal authors by all-time citations to their work, Bainbridge is ranked 55th. By that metric, he is the second highest ranked member of the UCLA law school faculty.
Professor Bainbridge has been a Salvatori Fellow with the Heritage Foundation, a member of the American Bar Association’s Committee on Corporate Laws, a member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the Journal of Markets and Morality, and Chair of the Executive Committee of the Federalist Society’s Corporations, Securities & Antitrust Practice Group.
In May 2014, Professor Bainbridge was the Cameron Fellow at the University of Auckland Faculty of Law. He was the Francis G. Pileggi Distinguished Lecturer in Law at Widener University School of Law in September 2005, and a Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the University of Maryland School of Law in November 2005.
In 2008, 2011, and 2012, Professor Bainbridge was named by the National Association of Corporate Directors' Directorship magazine to its list of the 100 most influential people in the field of corporate governance.
His blog, ProfessorBainbridge.com, was named by the ABA Journal as one of the Top 100 Law Blogs of 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, and 2012.
Associate Justice, Supreme Court of the United States
Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh was born in Washington, D.C., on February 12, 1965. He married Ashley Estes in 2004, and they have two daughters - Margaret and Liza. He received a B.A. from Yale College in 1987 and a J.D. from Yale Law School in 1990. He served as a law clerk for Judge Walter Stapleton of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit from 1990-1991, for Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit from 1991-1992, and for Justice Anthony M. Kennedy of the U.S. Supreme Court during the 1993 Term. In 1992-1993, he was an attorney in the Office of the Solicitor General of the United States. From 1994 to 1997 and for a period in 1998, he was Associate Counsel in the Office of Independent Counsel. He was a partner at a Washington, D.C., law firm from 1997 to 1998 and again from 1999 to 2001. From 2001 to 2003, he was Associate Counsel and then Senior Associate Counsel to President George W. Bush. From 2003 to 2006, he was Assistant to the President and Staff Secretary for President Bush. He was appointed a Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in 2006. President Donald J. Trump nominated him as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court, and he took his seat on October 6, 2018.
Director of Policy and Special Counsel, AFL-CIO
Damon A. Silvers is the Director of Policy and Special Counsel for the AFL-CIO. He joined the AFL-CIO as Associate General Counsel in 1997.
Mr. Silvers serves on a pro bono basis as a Special Assistant Attorney General for the state of New York. Mr. Silvers is also a member of the Investor Advisory Committee of the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Treasury Department’s Financial Research Advisory Committee, the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board’s Standing Advisory Group and its Investor Advisory Group.
Mr. Silvers served as the Deputy Chair of the Congressional Oversight Panel for TARP from 2008 to 2011. Between 2006 and 2008, Mr. Silvers served as the Chair of the Competition Subcommittee of the United States Treasury Department Advisory Committee on the Auditing Profession and as a member of the United States Treasury Department Investor’s Practice Committee of the President’s Working Group on Financial Markets.
Prior to working for the AFL-CIO, Mr. Silvers worked for the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers, the Amalgamated Clothing and Textile Workers, and as a law clerk at the Delaware Court of Chancery for Chancellor William T. Allen and Vice-Chancellor Bernard Balick.
Special Counsel, Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, PA and former C, Delaware Supreme Court
E. NORMAN VEASEY joined the Wilmington law firm of Gordon, Fournaris & Mammarella, P.A. in January 2014. He is the former Chief Justice of the Delaware Supreme Court, having served a 12-year term through May 2004. After his retirement from the Supreme Court, he was a Senior Partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP, until the end of 2013.
At GFM, he will concentrate on serving as an arbitrator, mediator, special master, and provide other neutral services in complex corporate, contract, and commercial litigation. Chief Justice Veasey is listed on the National Roster of Arbitrators and Mediators of the American Arbitration Association (AAA) and as a distinguished neutral of the Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution (CPR).
During his tenure as Chief Justice, and thereafter, the United States Chamber of Commerce ranked Delaware’s courts first in the nation for their fair, reasonable, and efficient litigation environment. Chief Justice Veasey has been credited with leading nationwide programs to restore professionalism to the practice of law and to adopt best practices in the running of America’s courts. In 2004, his final year of service in the Delaware Supreme Court, he was awarded the Order of the First State by the Governor of Delaware, the highest honor for meritorious service the State’s governor can grant.
As Senior Partner at Weil, he served as a strategic adviser to the firm’s roster of prominent global clients on a wide range of issues related to mergers & acquisitions, restructuring, and litigation. He also advised on corporate governance issues involving the responsibilities of corporate directors in complex financial transactions and crisis management.
He was President of the Conference of Chief Justices, Chair of the board of the National Center for State Courts, Chair of the Section of Business Law of the American Bar Association (ABA), Chair of the ABA Special Commission on Evaluation of the Rules of Professional Conduct (Ethics 2000), Chair of the Committee on Corporate Laws of the ABA Section of Business Law, and President of the Delaware State Bar Association.
During 1992-93, Chief Justice Veasey was the editor of Volume 48 of The Business Lawyer, the scholarly legal journal published by the Section of Business Law of the ABA. He is co-author, with Weil’s Christine Di Guglielmo, of a book, published by Oxford University Press, on the challenges of modern-day corporate general counsel. The book is entitled, E. Norman Veasey & Christine T. Di Guglielmo, Indispensable Counsel: The Chief Legal Officer in the New Reality (2012). The Wall Street Journal recently called it “a field manual to aid [chief legal officers] with their new tasks.” (March 9, 2012)
He is a Fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers; included in Best Lawyers in America; a director of the Institute for Law and Economics at the University of Pennsylvania; a member of the American Law Institute; a member of the International Advisory Board of the Centre for Corporate Law and Securities Regulation; a frequent panelist and lecturer on the corporation law, corporate governance, ethics, and professionalism; and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where he teaches a course entitled, “The Real World of Ethical Corporate Lawyering.” He served in previous years as an Adjunct Professor teaching this course at New York University School of Law, the University of Virginia School of Law, and at Wake Forest University School of Law.
He is a graduate of Dartmouth College (A.B. 1954) and the University of Pennsylvania Law School (LLB 1957). He has been awarded honorary degrees of Doctor of Laws from the University of Delaware and Widener University.
Recent Honors include Josiah Marvel Cup presented by the Delaware Chamber of Commerce, January, 2014, presented annually to a citizen of Delaware who has given outstanding service to the state, community, and society; Common Cause of Delaware Good Government award, November 2014; named “Corporate Governance Lawyer of the Year” in 2009-2012; Michael Franck Professional Responsibility Award; Daniel L. Herrmann Professional Conduct Award; Order of the First State-2004; Annual Ethics Award from ACCA-2002; Paul C. .Reardon Award from the National Center for State Courts-2002; St. Thomas More Society Award; Alumni of Merit Award from the University of Pennsylvania; Lewis F. Powell, Jr., Award for Professionalism and Ethics from the American Inns of Court Foundation-1996; Class of 1954 Award from Dartmouth College.
From 1957 until he took office as Chief Justice in 1992, he practiced law with the Wilmington, Delaware, law firm of Richards, Layton & Finger, where he concentrated on business law, corporate transactions, litigation, and counseling. He served at various times as managing partner and the chief executive officer of the firm. During 1961-63, he was Deputy Attorney General and Chief Deputy Attorney of the State of Delaware, and from 2011 to 2014 he served the State of Delaware as Independent Counsel and Special Deputy Attorney General to investigate campaign funding law violations.
Chief Justice Veasey and his wife, Suzanne, live in Wilmington, Delaware. They have four grown children and eleven grandchildren.
Criminal Law: The Prosecution of Public Corruption
John S. Baker, Alice Fisher, Merrick B. Garland, Daniel E. Reidy, Robert Trout
The United States Department of Justice has traditionally ranked the investigation and prosecution of public...
Criminal Law: The Prosecution of Public Corruption
2008 National Lawyers Convention
Washington, DCDistrict of Columbia v. Heller
Austin, TexasThe Dirty Dozen
Remarks by the President on Judicial Accomplishments and Philosophy
George W. Bush
Hilton Cincinnati Netherland PlazaCincinnati, Ohio 3:02 P.M. EDT THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. (Applause.) ...
Stockholders at the Wheel: Shareholder Access Rule
Stephen Bainbridge, John Olson, Damon A. Silvers, E. Norman Veasey, Brett M. Kavanaugh
On November 28, 2007, the Securities and Exchange Commission voted to adopt an amendment to...
Stockholders at the Wheel: Shareholder Access Rule
Stephen Bainbridge, John Olson, Damon A. Silvers, E. Norman Veasey, Brett M. Kavanaugh
On November 28, 2007, the Securities and Exchange Commission voted to adopt an amendment to...
Stockholders at the Wheel: Shareholder Access Rule
Corporations, Securities, and Antitrust Practice Group
Washington, DCThe ABA Rates Supreme Court Nominees Roberts, Alito "Well-Qualified"
The ABA’s Standing Committee on the Federal Judiciary rated both of President George W. Bush’s...
California: In re Marriage Cases
John Shu
Gay marriage litigation continues throughout the several states. On May 15, 2008, the California Supreme...