Stephen Wermiel

Last updated
Stephen J. Wermiel
NationalityAmerican
OccupationProfessor
SpouseRhonda Schwartz
Academic background
Education

Stephen J. Wermiel is an American legal scholar, historian, and professor of law at American University Washington College of Law specializing in First Amendment law and the history of the United States Supreme Court. [1] [2] Wermiel has written several biographical books about Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. [1] Alongside Jamie Raskin, Wermiel co-founded the Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project.

Contents

Early life and education

Wermiel was born at the American Hospital of Paris in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France. [3] His family moved to Brooklyn when he was two years old. [3] Wermiel attended Brooklyn Friends School, where he wrote about the Supreme Court for the student newspaper, The Life. [3] He graduated in 1968. [3]

Wermiel attended Tufts University, receiving his Bachelor of Arts in 1972. [3] While at Tufts, Wermiel worked as the editor of the student newspaper. [3] In 1982, Wermiel received his Juris Doctor from American University Washington College of Law. [4] [3]

Career

Journalism

Wermiel began as a college intern and later became a correspondent for the Boston Globe for the Washington, D.C. area. [3] [5] From 1979 to 1991, Wermiel covered the U.S. Supreme Court for the Wall Street Journal, remaining there even after his law school graduation. [3] [6] [7] In the 1990s, Wermiel also served on the board of directors and legal committee of the ACLU of Georgia. [5]

In 1986, Justice Brennan secretly agreed to work with Wermiel on a biography after Judge Abner Mikva recommended Wermiel. [1] [8] Justice Brennan gave Wermiel more than sixty hours of recorded interviews in chambers and allowed him access to tens of thousands of pages of records. [1] [8] [9] The records included case files, correspondence, and case histories that Justice Brennan's clerks had prepared each term. [8] Wermiel was the only person allowed to see the case histories. [10] Wermiel began working on the book, which he intended to publish after Justice Brennan's retirement. [1] Justice Brennan retired in 1990, but after his death in 1997, Wermiel stopped working. [8] At the time, he was approximately twenty-five percent done with the book. [10] In 2004, Jeffrey Toobin and Justice Brennan's son, William J. Brennan III, criticized Wermiel for his failure to use his unparalleled access to Justice Brennan's documents that was unavailable to other researchers. [1] [8] [10] Wermiel responded by saying that he was overwhelmed by the project. [1] In 2006, Wermiel asked Seth Stern to work on the book with him. [1] [8] [11] Stern who reorganized the material and drafted most of the book chapters. [8] In 2010, Stern and Wermiel published the book as Justice Brennan: Liberal Champion. [8] [12]

Wermiel is a contributor to SCOTUSblog , where he writes the SCOTUS for Law Students column. [13] Wermiel has made numerous appearances on cable news networks, including ABC News and MSNBC. [14] [15] Wermiel has also made appearances on C-SPAN as a correspondent and legal expert. [16]

American University Washington College of Law

Wermiel was a teaching fellow at William and Mary Law School and then taught at Georgia State University College of Law. [3] Eventually, Wermiel accepted a professorship at American University Washington College of Law, his alma mater. [3]

Wermiel and Representative Jamie Raskin, who was also a professor at the Washington College of Law at the time, co-founded the Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project in 1999. [17] [18] [19] The project places law students in underserved high schools, where the law students teach constitutional law and civic engagement to high school students. [17] Wermiel previously served as the Associate Director of the Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project. [20] He currently serves as a faculty adviser for the project.

Wermiel is a Fellow in the Program on Law & Government at the university. [3]

Wermiel is a faculty adviser for the Moot Court Honor Society, American University Law Review, Administrative Law Review, and the Journal of Gender, Social Policy & the Law.

Publications

Books

Awards

In January 2018, Wermiel received the Robert F. Drinan Award from the American Bar Association Section of Civil Rights and Social Justice for dedication and service to the section.

Personal life

Wermiel is married to Rhonda Schwartz, the senior producer for Brian Ross at ABC News. [3] [21] Together, they have one daughter, Anne. [3] They have a home in Sharon, Connecticut. [21]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thurgood Marshall</span> US Supreme Court justice from 1967 to 1991

Thurgood Marshall was an American civil rights lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. He was the Supreme Court's first African-American justice. Prior to his judicial service, he was an attorney who fought for civil rights, leading the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund. Marshall was a prominent figure in the movement to end racial segregation in American public schools. He won 29 of the 32 civil rights cases he argued before the Supreme Court, culminating in the Court's landmark 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education, which rejected the separate but equal doctrine and held segregation in public education to be unconstitutional. President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed Marshall to the Supreme Court in 1967. A staunch liberal, he frequently dissented as the Court became increasingly conservative.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Warren E. Burger</span> Chief Justice of the United States from 1969 to 1986

Warren Earl Burger was an American attorney and jurist who served as the 15th chief justice of the United States from 1969 to 1986. Born in Saint Paul, Minnesota, Burger graduated from the St. Paul College of Law in 1931. He helped secure the Minnesota delegation's support for Dwight D. Eisenhower at the 1952 Republican National Convention. After Eisenhower won the 1952 presidential election, he appointed Burger to the position of Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Civil Division. In 1956, Eisenhower appointed Burger to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Burger served on this court until 1969 and became known as a critic of the Warren Court.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William J. Brennan Jr.</span> U.S. Supreme Court justice from 1956 to 1990

William Joseph Brennan Jr. was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1956 to 1990. He was the seventh-longest serving justice in Supreme Court history, and was known for being a leader of the Court's liberal wing.

<i>Harvard Law Review</i> Academic journal

The Harvard Law Review is a law review published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School. According to the Journal Citation Reports, the Harvard Law Review's 2015 impact factor of 4.979 placed the journal first out of 143 journals in the category "Law". It is published monthly from November through June, with the November issue dedicated to covering the previous year's term of the Supreme Court of the United States. The journal also publishes the online-only Harvard Law Review Forum, a rolling journal of scholarly responses to the main journal's content. The law review is one of three honors societies at the law school, along with the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau and the Board of Student Advisors. Students who are selected for more than one of these three organizations may only join one.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">American University Washington College of Law</span> Law school of American University

The American University Washington College of Law is the law school of American University, a private research university in Washington, D.C. It is located on the western side of Tenley Circle in the Tenleytown section of northwest Washington, D.C. The school is accredited by the American Bar Association and a member of the AALS.

<i>Plyler v. Doe</i> 1982 United States Supreme Court case

Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202 (1982), was a landmark decision in which the Supreme Court of the United States struck down both a state statute denying funding for education of undocumented immigrant children in the United States and an independent school district's attempt to charge an annual $1,000 tuition fee for each student to compensate for lost state funding. The Court found that any state restriction imposed on the rights afforded to children based on their immigration status must be examined under a rational basis standard to determine whether it furthers a substantial government interest.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jamie Raskin</span> American politician (born 1962)

Jamin Ben Raskin is an American attorney, law professor, and politician serving as the U.S. representative for Maryland's 8th congressional district since 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he served in the Maryland State Senate from 2007 to 2016. The district previously included portions of Montgomery County, a suburban county northwest of Washington, D.C., and extended through rural Frederick County to the Pennsylvania border. Since redistricting in 2022, Raskin's district now encompasses only part of Montgomery County.

Stephen J. Friedman is the former commissioner of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission, and seventh president of Pace University from 2007 to 2017. Prior to that, Friedman has served as dean of the Pace Law School, and senior partner and co-chairman of Debevoise & Plimpton. On February 1, 2017, Friedman urged New York to increase student financial aid to both public and private universities.

<i>The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court</i> 1979 book by Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong

The Brethren: Inside the Supreme Court is a 1979 book by Bob Woodward and Scott Armstrong. It gives a "behind-the-scenes" account of the United States Supreme Court during Warren Burger's early years as Chief Justice of the United States. The book covers the years from the 1969 term through the 1975 term. Using Woodward's trademark writing technique involving "off-the-record" sources, the book provides an account of the deliberations leading to some of the court's more controversial decisions from the 1970s. Among the cases with substantial treatment in the book was the decision in United States v. Nixon (1974), where the Supreme Court unanimously ruled that President Richard Nixon was legally obligated to turn over the Watergate tapes. In 1985, upon the death of Associate Justice Potter Stewart, Woodward disclosed that Stewart had been the primary source for The Brethren.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul M. Smith</span> American lawyer

Paul March Smith is an American attorney who has argued many important cases, most notably Lawrence v. Texas and has argued 21 cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. In January 2017, he joined the faculty at Georgetown University Law Center, and also the Campaign Legal Center in Washington, D.C., as Vice President of Litigation and Strategy. Until 2017, he was a partner at Jenner & Block's Washington, D.C., office where he served as co-chair of the firm's Election Law and Redistricting practice.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">William J. Brennan Award</span>

William J. Brennan, Jr., who authored the opinion in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, has several awards named in his honor, which are presented to individuals for dedication to public interest and free expression. Awards named after William J. Brennan, Jr. are presented by the following organizations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Burger Court</span> Period of the US Supreme Court from 1969 to 1986

The Burger Court was the period in the history of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1969 to 1986, when Warren Burger served as Chief Justice of the United States. Burger succeeded Earl Warren as Chief Justice after the latter's retirement, and Burger served as Chief Justice until his retirement, at which point William Rehnquist was nominated and confirmed as Burger's replacement. The Burger Court is generally considered to be the last liberal court to date. It has been described as a "transitional" court, due to its transition from having the liberal rulings of the Warren Court to the conservative rulings of the Rehnquist Court.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anthony Kennedy</span> US Supreme Court justice from 1988 to 2018

Anthony McLeod Kennedy is an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1988 until his retirement in 2018. He was nominated to the court in 1987 by President Ronald Reagan, and sworn in on February 18, 1988. After the retirement of Sandra Day O'Connor in 2006, he was considered the swing vote on many of the Roberts Court's 5–4 decisions.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Donald B. Verrilli Jr.</span> United States Solicitor General

Donald Beaton Verrilli Jr. is an American lawyer who served as the solicitor general of the United States from 2011 to 2016. President Barack Obama nominated Verrilli to the post on January 26, 2011. On June 6, the United States Senate confirmed Verrilli in a 72–16 vote, and he was sworn in on June 9. Verrilli previously served in the Obama administration as the associate deputy attorney general and as Deputy Counsel to the President. He is currently a partner in the Washington, D.C. office of Munger, Tolles & Olson and a lecturer at Columbia University Law School, his alma mater.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nomination and confirmation to the Supreme Court of the United States</span> Political process

The nomination and confirmation of justices to the Supreme Court of the United States involves several steps, the framework for which is set forth in the United States Constitution. Specifically, Article II, Section 2, Clause 2, provides that the president of the United States nominates a justice and that the United States Senate provides advice and consent before the person is formally appointed to the Court. It also empowers a president to temporarily, under certain circumstances, fill a Supreme Court vacancy by means of a recess appointment. The Constitution does not set any qualifications for service as a justice, thus the president may nominate any individual to serve on the Court.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Clarence Thomas</span> US Supreme Court justice since 1991 (born 1948)

Clarence Thomas is an American lawyer and jurist who serves as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to succeed Thurgood Marshall and has served since 1991. After Marshall, Thomas is the second African American to serve on the Court and is its longest-serving member since Anthony Kennedy's retirement in 2018. Since Stephen Breyer's retirement in 2022, he is also the Court's oldest member.

The Marshall-Brennan Constitutional Literacy Project is civic education program in which law students work with local high schools to enhance understanding of constitutional law and oral advocacy. The project was founded in 1999 at American University's Washington College of Law in Washington, D.C., by Professor Jamie Raskin. There are now nearly 20 chapters in the United States, and there are 2 international chapters. The program began as a way of addressing civic disengagement and a lack of political participation. Through analyzing Supreme Court decisions and participating in moot court arguments, participating high school students learn about their rights as citizens, the strategic benefits of voting, how lawmaking occurs, and other fundamental constitutional processes. They also have the opportunity to compete in a national moot court competition.

Georgianna Alexandra Franklin Brennan is a former journalist. Brennan is the daughter-in-law of the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice William Joseph Brennan, Jr. and the wife of the late New Jersey assistant general William Joseph Brennan III. She worked as a features writer for the Newark Star Ledger in Newark, New Jersey and served as the newspaper's society editor.

Fisher v. University of Texas, 579 U.S. 365 (2016) is a United States Supreme Court case which held that the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit correctly found that the University of Texas at Austin's undergraduate admissions policy survived strict scrutiny, in accordance with Fisher v. University of Texas (2013), which ruled that strict scrutiny should be applied to determine the constitutionality of the University's race-conscious admissions policy.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Liptak, Adam (October 4, 2010). "Brennan Book, Many Years in Making". New York Times. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  2. ↑ Willis, Adam (March 24, 2021). "North Dakota's bill to allow Ten Commandments in schools likely unconstitutional, could draw lawsuits, experts say". Grand Forks Herald. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 "Alumni Profile: Stephen Wermiel '68". Brooklyn Friends School. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  4. ↑ Craft, Philip (January 25, 2011). "Stephen Wermiel, official biographer of Justice Brennan, speaks at Elon Law". Today at Elon. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  5. 1 2 "Supreme Court Experts Available to Comment on Sotomayor Nomination". Newswise. May 26, 2009. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  6. ↑ O'Donnell, Michael (November 17, 2010). "Without Artifice: On William Brennan". The Nation. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  7. ↑ Stern, Seth (January 1, 2011). "William Brennan '31 and his complicated relationship with Harvard Law School". Harvard Law Today. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  8. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 Lithwick, Dahlia (October 8, 2010). "Getting to Five". New York Times. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
  9. ↑ Mears, Bill (September 29, 2010). "Author stresses Justice Brennan's continued relevance". CNN. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  10. 1 2 3 Toobin, Jeffrey (December 28, 2003). "A Not So Brief Recess". The New Yorker. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  11. ↑ Lat, David (January 26, 2007). "And You Thought You Had a Procrastination Problem". Above the Law. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  12. ↑ Kragie, Andrew (April 7, 2021). "Biden Gets 2nd Opening On 9th Circ. Thanks To Judge Berzon". Lexis360. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  13. ↑ "Stephen Wermiel". SCOTUSBlog. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
  14. ↑ "Major decisions ahead for Supreme Court". MSNBC. January 3, 2014. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  15. ↑ "Aaron Keller Brian Ross Andrew Bringuel & Stephen Wermiel Talk Kavanaugh Hearing". YouTube. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  16. ↑ "Stephen J. Wermiel". C-SPAN. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  17. 1 2 Strauss, Daniel (September 17, 2008). "Program Brings Constitutional Basics to High School Students". Roll Call. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  18. ↑ Winter, Erica. "From Law School To High School—Washington College Of Law's Marshall-Brennan Program Teaches The Constitution One Classroom At A Time". Law Crossing. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  19. ↑ Swoyer, Alex (February 8, 2021). "'No one better': Dems bank on 'relentless' Raskin to sway Republicans on impeachment". Washington Times. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  20. ↑ "Pre-Gaming the Upcoming Supreme Court Term". Wall Street Journal. September 27, 2006. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
  21. 1 2 ""Inside the Supreme Court: What's Next? Who's Next?" with Steve Wermiel". Hotchkiss Library of Sharon. Retrieved 28 April 2021.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.