Robert Heron Bork was an American legal scholar who served as solicitor general of the United States from 1973 until 1977. A professor by training, he was acting United States Attorney General and a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit from 1982 to 1988. In 1987, President Ronald Reagan nominated Bork to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the Senate rejected his nomination after a contentious and highly publicized confirmation hearing.
Antonin Gregory Scalia was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. He was described as the intellectual anchor for the originalist and textualist position in the U.S. Supreme Court's conservative wing. For catalyzing an originalist and textualist movement in American law, he has been described as one of the most influential jurists of the twentieth century, and one of the most important justices in the history of the Supreme Court. Scalia was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2018, and the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University was named in his honor.
Originalism is a legal theory that bases constitutional, judicial, and statutory interpretation of text on the original understanding at the time of its adoption. Proponents of the theory object to judicial activism and other interpretations related to a living constitution framework. Instead, originalists argue for democratic modifications of laws through the legislature or through constitutional amendment.
The University of Chicago Law School is the law school of the University of Chicago, a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. It employs more than 180 full-time and part-time faculty and hosts more than 600 students in its Juris Doctor program, while also offering the Master of Laws, Master of Studies in Law and Doctor of Juridical Science degrees in law.
Frank Hoover Easterbrook is an American lawyer and jurist who has served as a United States circuit judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit since 1985. He was the Seventh Circuit's chief judge from 2006 to 2013.
Constitution in Exile is a controversial term that refers to the situation resulting from provisions of the United States Constitution allegedly not having been enforced according to their "original intent" or "original meaning". Some originalists might argue, for example, that the Commerce Clause and Necessary and Proper Clause do not authorize economic legislation dating back to the New Deal.
The Antonin Scalia Law School is the law school of George Mason University, Virginia's largest public research university. It is located in Arlington, Virginia, roughly 4 miles (6.4 km) west of Washington, D.C., and 15 miles (24 km) east-northeast of George Mason University's main campus in Fairfax, Virginia. The law school is accredited by the American Bar Association (ABA). The school is known for its conservative ideological leaning in law and economics. It is named after former Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.
David Bryan Sentelle is a Senior United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He previously was a U.S. district judge on the United States District Court for the Western District of North Carolina from 1985 to 1987.
Ralph Karl Winter Jr. was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
John Fitzgerald Duffy is Professor of Law at University of Virginia School of Law in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is a Legal Commentator and Author who has written numerous articles and co-authored a scholarly book on patent law. He previously served as law clerk to Antonin Scalia, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, and Stephen F. Williams, Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Between these two assignments, he served as an attorney at the Office of Legal Counsel in the United States Department of Justice. In addition to clerking for Justice Scalia, John Duffy has been very influential in regard to constitutional law and the appointment of federal judges.
The University of Chicago Law Review is the flagship law journal published by the University of Chicago Law School. Up until 2020, it utilized a different citation system than most law journals—the Maroonbook rather than the Bluebook. The Law Review has announced, however, that it will be switching to the more commonly used Bluebook. It is published quarterly in print and also has an online companion, The University of Chicago Law Review Online.
On July 1, 1987, President Ronald Reagan nominated Judge Robert Bork for Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, to succeed Lewis F. Powell Jr., who had earlier announced his retirement. At the time of his nomination, Bork was a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, a position to which he had been appointed by President Reagan in 1982.
John Francis Manning is an American legal scholar who serves as the provost of Harvard University. He is the Dane Professor of Law at Harvard Law School (HLS), where he is a scholar of administrative and constitutional law. From 2017 to 2024, he was the 13th Dean of Harvard Law School.
Bernard Herbert Siegan was a longtime law professor at the University of San Diego School of Law, libertarian legal theorist and a former federal judicial nominee to the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. The New York Times called Siegan's nomination "one of the most bitterly disputed judicial nominations of the Reagan Era."
Speculation abounded over potential nominations to the Supreme Court of the United States by Ronald Reagan even before his presidency officially began, due to the advanced ages of several justices, and Reagan's own highlighting of Supreme Court nominations as a campaign issue. Reagan had promised "to appoint only those opposed to abortion and the 'judicial activism' of the Warren and Burger Courts". Conversely, some opposed to Reagan argued that he could "appoint as many as five Justices" and would "use the opportunity to stack the Court against women, minorities and social justice".
Joseph Dinneen Kearney is Dean and Professor of Law at Marquette University Law School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He is a scholar of civil litigation practice and procedure.
Richard Allen Posner is an American legal scholar and retired federal judge who served on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit from 1981 to 2017. A senior lecturer at the University of Chicago Law School, Posner was identified by The Journal of Legal Studies as the most-cited legal scholar of the 20th century. As of 2021, he is also the most-cited legal scholar of all time. He is widely considered to be one of the most influential legal scholars in the United States.
Patrick Joseph Schiltz is an American lawyer who serves as the chief United States district judge of the United States District Court for the District of Minnesota.
Paul Michael Bator was a Hungarian-born American legal scholar, Supreme Court advocate, and academic expert on United States federal courts. He taught for almost 30 years at Harvard Law School and the University of Chicago Law School. He also served as the United States Deputy Solicitor General during the Reagan administration, in which capacity he argued and won the landmark administrative law case Chevron U.S.A. v. Natural Resources Defense Council. From 1984 to 2024, the Chevron doctrine governed the judicial interpretation of Congressional statutes that authorized federal regulators to make law.
C. Scott Hemphill is a legal academic whose scholarship focuses on intellectual property law and antitrust law. He is currently a Professor of Law at New York University Law School, where he has taught since 2015. Previously, Hemphill was a Professor of Law at Columbia Law School.
