Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Senior Research Fellow, School of Civic Leadership, Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Nonresident Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law. He is also Distinguished Visiting Scholar, School of Civic Leadership and Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War, Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare, and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University in South Korea, the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel, Keio University in Japan, Trento University in Italy, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and been the Edwin Meese III Originalism Lecturer at the Heritage Foundation.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Richard and Frances Mallery Professor of Law and Faculty Director, Constitutional Law Center, Stanford Law School
Michael W. McConnell is the Richard and Frances Mallery Professor and Faculty Director of the Constitutional Law Center at Stanford Law School, and a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. From 2002 to 2009, he served as a Circuit Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. He was nominated by President George W. Bush, a Republican, and confirmed by a Democratic Senate by unanimous consent. McConnell has previously held chaired professorships at the University of Chicago and the University of Utah, and visiting professorships at Harvard and NYU. He teaches courses on constitutional law, constitutional history, First Amendment, and interpretive theory. He has published widely in the fields of constitutional law and theory, especially church and state, equal protection, and separation of powers. His book, “The President Who Would Not Be King: Executive Power Under the Constitution,” was published by Princeton University Press in 2020, based on the Tanner Lectures in Human Values, which he delivered at Princeton in 2019. His latest book, co-authored with Nathan Chapman, “Agreeing to Disagree: How the Establishment Clause Protects Religious Diversity and Freedom of Conscience,” was published by Oxford University Press in mid-2023. McConnell has argued sixteen cases in the United States Supreme Court, most recently Carney v. Adams (2020). defending a provision of the Delaware Constitution requiring political balance on that state’s courts. More recently, he was co-counsel in Gonzalez v. Google. He earned his B.A. from Michigan State University and his J.D. from the University of Chicago, and has received honorary degrees from Notre Dame University and Michigan State. He served as law clerk to Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. and D.C. Circuit Chief Judge J. Skelly Wright. He has been Assistant General Counsel of the Office of Management & Budget, Assistant to the Solicitor General of the Department of Justice, and a member of the President’s Intelligence Oversight Board. He is Senior of Counsel to the law firm Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich & Rosati, and is co-chair of Meta’s Oversight Review Board.
Appellate Counsel, Theodore Cooperstein PLLC
Theodore Cooperstein currently is an appellate attorney in the boutique law firm of Theodore Cooperstein PLLC, available for criminal and civil appeals in both state and federal courts. A former career prosecutor with twenty five years of service in the US Department of Justice, he was an Assistant United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida and the Southern District of Mississippi, and has served as a Military Intelligence Officer in the Army Reserves from 1989 to 2011, retiring with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. During the Trump Administration, he was appointed and served as the General Counsel of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Prior to joining the Southern District of Florida, Mr. Cooperstein served as a Special Assistant U.S. Attorney in the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Maryland. He previously had served as Counsel to the Deputy Attorney General at the Department of Justice, and as Assistant General Counsel in the FBI Office of the General Counsel.
A.B., Dartmouth College; J.D., Stanford University; LL.M., Comparative and International Law, Georgetown University Law Center; Masters of Strategic Studies, U.S. Army War College
Chief Justice, Florida Supreme Court
Justice Charles Canady was born in Lakeland, Florida, in 1954. He is married to Jennifer Houghton, and they have two children. He received his B.A. from Haverford College in 1976 and his J.D. from the Yale Law School in 1979.
Justice Canady practiced law with the firm of Holland and Knight in Lakeland from 1979 through 1982. He practiced with the firm of Lane, Trohn, et al., from 1983 through 1992.
From November 1984 to November 1990, Justice Canady served three terms in the Florida House of Representatives, and from January 1993 to January 2001, he served four terms in the United States House of Representatives. Throughout his service in Congress, Justice Canady was a member of the House Judiciary Committee. For three terms, from January 1995 to January 2001, Justice Canady was the Chairman of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution.
Upon leaving Congress, Justice Canady became General Counsel to Governor Jeb Bush. He was appointed by Governor Bush to the Second District Court of Appeal for a term beginning November 20, 2002.
On August 28, 2008, Justice Canady was appointed to the Florida Supreme Court by Governor Charlie Crist and took office on September 8, 2008. He served as Chief Justice from July 2010 through June 2012. In March 2018, he was elected by his colleagues to serve as Chief Justice for a second time, with his two-year term starting July 1, 2018, and a third time starting July 1, 2020.
Partner, Marzulla Law
Roger J. Marzulla is one of the nation’s leading environmental, water, and property lawyers. As Assistant Attorney General in charge of the U.S. Justice Department’s Environment and Natural Resources Division, Roger learned first hand the operations and litigation styles of his client agencies: EPA, Interior Department, Bureau of Reclamation, Fish and Wildlife Service, National Marine Fisheries Service, Department of Transportation, Department of Commerce. In 1997, he co-founded Marzulla Law, where he brings to bear more than 35 years of expertise representing companies and individuals in industries as diverse as land and project development, aerospace, chemicals, oil and gas, mining, timber, manufacturing, computers, agriculture and water service.
Roger began his legal career as a trial lawyer in San Jose, California, after graduating magna cum laude from the University of Santa Clara School of Law. As a partner in Matthews & Marzulla he represented developers, title and construction companies, shopping centers, apartment owners and lenders in litigation throughout California. In 1981 he moved to Denver to become President of Mountain States Legal Foundation, litigating environmental and natural resource cases across the West.
In 1983 Roger joined the Justice Department as Special Litigation Counsel. He was subsequently promoted to Deputy Assistant Attorney General and, in 1987, was confirmed by the Senate as Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Environment and Natural Resources Division. At the Justice Department, Roger helped create litigation strategies for government programs as diverse as Superfund, the Clean Air Act, off-shore oil leasing, environmental crimes, federal facility clean-up, wetlands, endangered species and hazardous waste enforcement, as well as Presidential Order EO 12,630 (Government Interference with Private Property Rights).
In 1989 Roger returned to private law practice, successively heading the environmental law practices of the Powell, Goldstein and Akin, Gump law firms.
Since 1997, as a partner in Marzulla Law, Roger has continued to represent corporate and business clients in a wide array of environmental and property issues in courts across the country, frequently in litigation against the United States. He also assists clients in attaining compliance with environmental, health and safety regulation, and in avoiding risks in transactions.
Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law, University of California at Berkeley; Senior Research Fellow, School of Civic Leadership, Civitas Institute, University of Texas at Austin; Nonresident Senior Fellow, American Enterprise Institute
John Yoo is the Emanuel Heller Professor of Law. He is also Distinguished Visiting Scholar, School of Civic Leadership and Senior Research Fellow, Civitas Institute, at the University of Texas at Austin. He is also a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.
His most recent book, The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Supreme Court, co-authored with Robert Delahunty, was published in 2023. Professor Yoo’s other books include Defender-in-Chief: Trump’s Fight for Presidential Power; Striking Power: How Cyber, Robots, and Space Weapons Change the Rules for War, Point of Attack: Preventive War, International Law, and Global Welfare, and Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George Bush.
Professor Yoo has published more than 100 articles in academic journals on subjects including national security, constitutional law, international law, and the Supreme Court. He also regularly contributes to the editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and National Review, among others.
Professor Yoo has served in all three branches of government. He was an official in the U.S. Department of Justice, where he worked on national security and terrorism issues after the 9/11 attacks. He served as general counsel of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee. He has been a law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and federal appeals Judge Laurence Silberman. He has been a visiting professor at Seoul National University in South Korea, the Interdisciplinary Center in Israel, Keio University in Japan, Trento University in Italy, the University of Chicago, and the Free University of Amsterdam.
Professor Yoo supervises the Public Law and Policy Program and the California Constitution Center. He also serves on the boards of the Pacific Legal Foundation, the Federalist Society’s Separation of Powers and Federalism Division, the Universidad Cientifica del Sur Law School, and the Asia-Pacific Law Institute at Seoul National University. He is a winner of the Federalist Society’s Paul Bator award and been the Edwin Meese III Originalism Lecturer at the Heritage Foundation.
Professor Yoo graduated from Yale Law School and summa cum laude from Harvard College.
Retired
Tom Gede retired in 2023 as a principal in Morgan Lewis Consulting LLC and of counsel to the firm. He currently consults on a variety of legal and policy matters for both public and private clients. Tom has a national reputation and distinguished background in federal Indian law. Prior to retirement, he represented clients in complex governmental matters in litigation, administrative and regulatory proceedings, including high-profile matters involving state governments. A former senior deputy in the California Attorney General’s office, Tom was amicus coordinator and Supreme Court counsel, and argued cases in the US Supreme Court, the California Supreme Court, and numerous state and federal appellate courts.
Tom also served as executive director of the Conference of Western Attorneys General (CWAG), coordinating activities on key legal and policy issues, such as federal Indian law, energy, environmental, public lands, financial services, and telecommunications, for the attorneys general of 18 western states and territories. In 2016, Tom was elected as a Member of the American Law Institute (ALI), and served as an Adviser on the Restatement of the Law Third - The Law of American Indians. Tom also taught federal Indian law as an adjunct law professor at the University of the Pacific - McGeorge School of Law. He served as an assistant editor for and the author of the Indian gaming chapter in CWAG’s American Indian Law Deskbook (2d & 3d eds.). He has been engaged in Indian gaming and Indian law matters for more than three decades, having focused on the gaming compacts with Indian tribes, as well as complex civil and criminal jurisdiction, land, natural resources, water and law enforcement issues in Indian country. He has testified before Congress on American Indian and Native Alaskan issues. In 2012 he was appointed by Speaker John Boehner to serve on the United States Indian Law and Order Commission, where he examined criminal justice issues in Indian country and Alaska, resulting in the issuance of an important report to the President and Congress.
Former United States Senator, Utah
Over nearly four decades of public service, Senator Orrin Hatch established himself as a leading conservative voice in the United States Senate. As the upper chamber’s most senior Republican, he served as President Pro Tempore and as Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. In this capacity, he fought to create jobs and strengthen the economy by repealing and replacing Obamacare, reforming the tax code, and opening up overseas markets to American exports.
As a long-time member and former Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Hatch also fought to check judicial activism and protect our liberties. He was instrumental in confirming conservative judges to the federal bench and played an indispensable role in confirming Supreme Court Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, and Samuel Alito as well as scores of district and circuit court judges.
One of Senator Hatch’s particularly noteworthy achievements on the Judiciary Committee is the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 1993—a bill he co-authored with the late Senator Ted Kennedy. This landmark legislation prohibits substantial government burdens on the free exercise of religion, allowing all Americans to live, work, and worship in accordance with their beliefs.
In addition to protecting our individual liberties, Senator Hatch was on the front lines of legislative battles to protect our free-market economy and system of limited government under the Constitution. His reputation as a statesman and his record of fiscal responsibility earned him the nickname “Mr. Balanced Budget” from President Reagan.
By virtually all measures, Senator Hatch was among the most effective and consequential legislators in history. Since he first came to Congress in 1977, no legislator alive today has authored more bills that have become law than Senator Hatch.
Of all Senator Hatch’s achievements, he is proudest of his family, and he credits the love of his wife and children as the key to his success. He and Elaine have been married for more than fifty years. Together, they are the parents of six children, twenty-three grandchildren, and sixteen great-grandchildren.
General Counsel, Department of the Army
Mr. Benedict S. Cohen was appointed by President Bush to serve as the General Counsel for the Department of the Army effective on August 4, 2006. Mr. Cohen has twenty years of experience in high-level positions across the federal government, with a principal focus on national security and foreign policy. Prior to his current position, he served as the Managing Executive for Policy and Counselor to Chairman Cox at the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, where he focused on legal and policy issues facing the agency and enhancing the Commission’s crisis-management and homeland-security capabilities. Prior to taking this position, he served as staff director of the Committee on Homeland Security of the U.S. House of Representatives, where he managed the transition from select committee to full standing committee status and the passage of authorization legislation for the Department of Homeland Security and of legislation reforming DHS’ homeland security grant program.
Mr. Cohen has also served as Deputy General Counsel (Environment & Installations) for the Defense Department, in which capacity he spearheaded DoD’s Readiness and Range Preservation Initiative, a multifaceted legislative, regulatory, and resource-management program to ensure sustainability of the military’s test and training capabilities and foster better environmental stewardship. He also provided legal support for DoD’s installation initiatives, and served as a principal spokesman for the Department on environmental and installations issues. He has also served in senior positions in the White House Counsel’s Office, the congressional leadership staff, and the Department of Justice, as well as serving in two law firms.
Mr. Cohen graduated from Yale magna cum laude in 1980 with a B.A. in history, and from the University of Chicago Law School in 1983, having served as an Associate Editor of the Law Review. He clerked for Judge Laurence H. Silberman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. He lives in American University Park in Washington, D.C. His wife is an attorney in private practice. He has two children, aged eight and ten.
John Adams is a pseudonym. The author is a veteran attorney in the government arms control community. His opinions are purely his own, and do not reflect any official position or policy of the United States, the Conference on Disarmament, or the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons.
The Chemical Weapons Treaty is Unconstitutional
John C. Yoo
Suppose that the U.S. were to ratify a treaty to attack the problem of international...
The RFRA Decision: A Blow for Judicial Supremacy and Against Religious Freedom
Michael W. McConnell
It does not often happen that a "conservative" Supreme Court manages, in a single decision,...
The Emerging Interplay Between Law Enforcement and Intelligence Gathering
Theodore Cooperstein
The Intelligence Authorization Act of 1996 amended the National Security Act of 1947 to permit...
The Civil Rights Act of 1997
Charles T. Canady
On June 17, 1997, I introduced the Civil Rights Act of 1997 (H.R. 1909) in...
The Biodiversity Treaty Challenges Intellectual Property Rights
Laura Reifschneider, Roger J. Marzulla
Efforts to limit access to natural resources and markets, to diminish existing intellectual property rights...
The Chemical Weapons Treaty is Unconstitutional
John C. Yoo
I would like to thank the Chairman for the opportunity to testify on the constitutionality...
Major Habeas Reform Package Becomes Law
Thomas F. Gede
New deference standard requires federal courts to respect state court legal and constitutional rulings; Act...
Legislative Initiatives
Orrin Hatch
Despite the constitutional requirement for the protection of property rights, the America of the late...
Separation of Powers and Federalism in the 104th Congress
Benedict S. Cohen
In the fields of separation of powers and federalism the 104th Congress revisited old issues...
The Chemical Weapons Convention: Legal and Juridical Observations
John Adams
Introduction It is the inherent contradiction of the Twentieth Century that the same era that...