Douglas H. Ginsburg

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Douglas Howard Ginsburg
Douglas H. Ginsburg
Incumbent
Assumed office 
1986
Nominated by Ronald Reagan
Preceded by J. Skelly Wright
Born May 25, 1946 (1946-05-25) (age 62)
Chicago, IL
Spouse Deecy Gray

Douglas Howard Ginsburg (born May 25, 1946) is a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to this court in October 1986 by President Ronald Reagan. He served as its Chief Judge from July 16, 2001 until February 10, 2008. He is not related to Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

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[edit] Education

Ginsburg graduated from The Latin School of Chicago in 1963. Ginsburg went on to attend Cornell University in 1964-1965 and then from 1968 to 1970, when he received his B.S. degree. He was graduated from the University of Chicago Law School in 1973, where he served on the law review with Frank Easterbrook, and became a law clerk for US Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall.

[edit] Teaching and other public service experience

From 1975 to 1983 Ginsburg was a professor at Harvard Law School. From 1983 to 1986 he served in the Reagan administration, as Administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affaris, in the Office of Management and Budget, and as Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Assistant Attorney General in the Antitrust Division of the Department of Justice. Since 1988 he has been an Adjunct Professor at the George Mason University School of Law in Arlington, Virginia, where he teaches a seminar called "Readings in Legal Thought." He is also a Visiting Lecturer and Charles J. Merriam Scholar at the University of Chicago Law School in Chicago, Illinois. Ginsburg has been a visiting professor at Columbia University Law School (1987-88) and a visiting scholar at New York Law School (2006-08). He serves on the advisory boards of the Jevons Institute for Competition Law and Economics, University College London, Faculty of Laws; Law and Economics Center, George Mason University School of Law; Competition Policy International; Journal of Competition Law and Economics; Journal of Law, Economics & Policy; Supreme Court Economic Review; University of Chicago Law Review; and the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy.

He is a member of the Judicial Conference of the United States, 2001-08, and previously served on its Budget Committee, 1997-2001, and Committee on Judicial Resources, 1987-96; American Bar Association, Antitrust Section, Council, 1985-86 (ex officio), 2000-03 (judicial liaison); Boston University Law School, Visiting Committee, 1994-97; and University of Chicago Law School, Visiting Committee, 1985-88.

[edit] U.S. Supreme Court nomination

In 1987, President Ronald Reagan announced his intention to nominate Ginsburg to the United States Supreme Court to fill the vacancy created by the retirement of Lewis F. Powell. Ginsburg was chosen after a Democratically-controlled Senate had rejected the nomination of Judge Robert Bork after a bruising, partisan confirmation battle.

Ginsburg almost immediately came under some fire for an entirely different reason when NPR's Nina Totenberg[1] revealed that Ginsburg had used marijuana "on a few occasions" during his student days in the 1960s and while an Assistant Professor at Harvard in the 1970s. In 1991, a similar admission by then nominee Clarence Thomas that he had used the drug during his law school days had no effect on his nomination. This was the crucial distinction in the minds of many Senators and members of the public.[2][3]

Due to these allegations, Ginsburg withdrew his name from consideration and remained on the federal appellate bench, where he is still a Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Anthony Kennedy was then nominated and confirmed as the 107th Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.

[edit] Judicial philosophy

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Ginsburg is perhaps best known in legal circles[citation needed] for his views on Constitutional interpretation, known by the shorthand "Constitution in Exile", taken from a phrase used in a book review Ginsburg penned in the journal Regulation. Roughly, Ginsburg's approach advocates reversing the expansions of federal power, particularly under the Interstate Commerce Clause, starting in the 1930s. Some argue[citation needed] that the use of the term "Constitution in Exile" is inappropriate as a generalization for Ginsburg's views, or its broader application to conservative, originalist, or textualist legal theorists.

Critics of Ginsburg's approach argue[citation needed] that such a philosophy would require overturning several decades of Supreme Court precedent, significantly undermining the doctrine of stare decisis. Defenders of the view argue[citation needed] that such a move would merely reverse decades of accumulated judicial activism. Other proponents also point out[citation needed] that implementing Ginsburg's vision could be done gradually, rather than suddenly.

Ginsburg has published most extensively in the area of antitrust. Recent articles include "Antitrust Decisions of the Supreme Court, 1967-2007," Vol. 3,No. 2 Comp. Pol. Int’l (2007) (with L. Brannon); "Synthetic Competition," 16 Media Law & Pol’y 1 (2006); "Comparing Antitrust Enforcement in the United States and Europe," 1 J. Comp. Law & Econ.427 (2005); and "Determinants of Private Antitrust Enforcement in the United States," Vol.1, No. 2 Comp. Pol. Int’l 29 (2005)(with L.Brannon).

[edit] See also

[edit] References

  1. ^ 'Nina Totenberg, NPR Biography' http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=2101289
  2. ^ The Washington Post: "Media Frenzies in Our Time" Special to the washingtonpost.com [1]
  3. ^ Ginsburg was also accused of a financial conflict of interest during his work in the Reagan Administration, but a Department of Justice investigation under the Ethics in Government Act found that allegation baseless in a February 1988 report. Hall, Kermit, ed., The Oxford Companion to the Supreme Court of the United States, page 339, Oxford Press, 1992

[edit] External links