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Chris Schroeder

April 22, 2010
Nominations Proceed Amid Backlog

President Obama announced more judicial nominees this week, while the Senate overcame obstruction to confirm some long-delayed executive and judicial nominations.

Among the nominees confirmed is Duke law professor Chris Schroeder, who President Obama selected to lead the Justice Department's Office of Legal Policy. Schroeder is a co-author of Keeping Faith with the Constitution, a book published by ACS. His nomination languished in the Senate for 11 months before being confirmed by a 72-24 vote.

Other confirmations include Judge Thomas I. Vanaskie to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, and Judge Denny Chin to the Second Circuit. Vanaskie's nomination, announced in August 2009, received Senate approval by a vote of 77-20. Chin was nominated last October and confirmed unanimously this week.

While Chin's nomination was delayed in the Senate, the Second Circuit became the site of "the worst judicial emergency in the nation, as defined by the Judicial Conference of the United States," The Blog of the Legal Times reports. "There are 920 'adjusted filings per panel,' compared with a threshold for emergencies of 700 adjusted filings per panel."
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Judicial Nominations, Chris Schroeder, District of Delaware, Fourth Circuit, Judge Albert Diaz, Judge Denny Chin, Judge James Wynn, Judge Thomas Vanaskie, Judicial Emergency, Judicial Nominees, President Obama, Ray Lohier, Second Circuit
February 4, 2010
Judiciary Committee Delays Reconsideration of OLC Nomination
Dawn Johnsen's nomination to lead the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) was delayed again by the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning. Johnsen, a former member of the ACS Board of Directors, was first announced as President Obama's OLC nomination in January 2009. After prior support of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Johnsen's nomination spent the better part of 2009 -- a year of unprecedented obstruction -- languishing on the Senate floor without a vote.

The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal published editorials today staking out opposing views on Johnsen's nomination. This battle of the editorial boards follows last week's Los Angeles Times editorial stating that "the obstruction of this nomination is and always has been unjustified."

The Journal's editorial criticized Johnsen for her views on the OLC's role under the Bush administration, when that office produced the infamous "torture memos," noting:

During the Bush years she [Johnsen] has said that OLC gave "horrific legal advice" and "advice premised on an extreme and unfounded view of presidential power to justify desired counter terrorism policies." On issues such as the use of domestic electronic surveillance or interrogation policies, she has called the Bush Administration's practices controversial and "sometimes flatly illegal."

Considering these same facts, The Times editorial called Johnsen "a highly qualified choice" whose nomination has drawn "baseless objections" causing "unreasonable delay."

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Executive power, Other courts, Separation of powers, Separation of Powers and Federalism, Chris Schroeder, Dawn Johnsen, DOJ, filibuster, Keeping Faith with the Constitution, OLC, Senate Judiciary Committee, Torture Memos
September 1, 2009
Kinkopf to OLP
The Justice Department announced this week that Georgia State University College of Law professor Neil Kinkopf is joining the Justice Department's Office of Legal Policy (OLP) as OLP's counselor to the assistant attorney general. Kinkopf, the faculty advisor to the ACS chapter at Georgia State, has been a regular ACS participant.

At the Justice Department, Kinkopf joins David Barron, former member of the board of advisors at the Harvard Law and Policy Review (the official journal of ACS,) and Martin Lederman, a regular ACS participant. Barron remains the de facto head of the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) pending Senate confirmation of former ACS board member Dawn Johnsen to lead the office.

Also at the Justice Department, are former ACS board member Spencer Overton and Chris Schroeder, co-author of ACS's Keeping Faith with the Constitution -- both of whom are at the OLP. And, of course, former ACS board member Eric Holder is serving as Attorney General.

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Executive power, Separation of Powers and Federalism, Chris Schroeder, David Barron, Dawn Johnsen, DOJ, Marty Lederman, Neil Kinkopf, OLC, OLP, Spencer Overton
May 22, 2009
"Keeping Faith" Co-Author Nominated to Key DOJ Position
The White House has officially announced its intent to nominate Prof. Christopher Schroeder (right) of Duke University School of Law to the head the Justice Department's Office of Legal Policy.

"In his new role, Schroeder would be a leading voice on legislation related to law enforcement and the federal court system, and on nominations for the federal judiciary," according to The Blog of the Legal Times. "If confirmed by the Senate, he would be the chief policy advisor to Attorney General Eric Holder Jr. and Deputy Attorney General David Ogden."
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Fidelity to the Constitution, Constitutional Interpretation and Change, Criminal Justice, Chris Schroeder, Goodwin Liu, Keeping Faith with the Constitution, OLP, Pam Karlan
April 30, 2009
ACS Releases "Keeping Faith with the Constitution"
UPDATE: Fri. May 1, 2009, 10:23 a.m. (EST)

You can now download Keeping Faith with the Constitution at www.ACSLaw.org/KeepingFaith.

Keeping Faith with the Constitution presents a common-sense approach to interpreting the U.S. Constitution and explains why it is the world's most enduring written Constitution. Authored by legal scholars Goodwin Liu, Pamela S. Karlan and Christopher H. Schroeder, the book shows how the Framers inscribed the fundamental values of liberty, equality and democracy into the Constitution and offers an approach to interpreting the Constitution that, as its Framers envisioned, applies the Constitution's text and broad principles to the changing needs and conditions of our society.

The authors call their approach "constitutional fidelity," and argue that being faithful to the Constitution requires judges to ask not how the Constitution's general principles would have been applied in 1789 or 1868, but rather how those principles should be applied today. As the authors explain, this approach is true to the vision of the Framers, who deliberately left the words and broad principles in the document open to future interpretation and adaptation.

The book notes the shortcomings of originalism and so-called "strict construction." The authors argue, for example, that if originalism means resolving constitutional disputes according to how those who wrote the text would have resolve them at the time, it would not be faithful to the Framers' own vision. The Framers, they explain, were not so parochial as to bind future generations to their own specific understandings of broad principles. The genius of their accomplishment is that they correctly anticipated that a constitution written in general terms, open to interpretation and adaptation by succeeding generations, would endure and retain its legitimacy even as the nation experienced profound social, economic and political transformations.

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Fidelity to the Constitution,