Academic

Nora Demleitner & Joanne Epps Supreme Court Possibles?

By Dan Filler

The Obama administration has been tantalizing us with suggestions that there are as-yet unidentified candidates for the David Souter Supreme Court seat.  We've heard of a ton of usual and not-so-usual suspects but perhaps, perhaps, there remains a shooting star: a lawyer who will emerge suddenly to take his or her rightful, albeit unexpected, place on the bench.  Shortly after last week's hint that there were potential nominees waiting to be discovered, reporters confirmed that California Supreme Court Justice Carlos Moreno "had been mentioned" as a potential nominee.

This weekend, however, a dean of of the Supreme Court reporting pool - NPR's Nina Totenberg - offered up her list of undiscovered candidates for the Supreme Court.  For those of us who follow legal academia closely, Totenberg's list included two particularly intriguing people: Hofstra Law Dean Nora Demleitner and Temple Law Dean Joanne Epps.  Both are relatively new deans and neither has been mentioned anywhere else I know of.  Though they are new to the Supreme Court radar screen as well, I suspect that both would be highly valuable additions to the Court.  This points up a broader reality: there are actually hundreds, if not thousands,  of lawyers who would be excellent appointments.   We expect the nominee to come from a pre-existing shortlist, but might there be other highly qualified, unexpected candidates?  In the spirit of Nina Totenberg, let me add four more:

1. Madhavi Sunder, law professor at UC Davis.  She's brilliant, lives far outside the beltway, and wouldn't be off the Court til I'm pushing up the daisies. 

2. Artur Davis, U.S. Representative from Alabama.  Another outsider who is both smart and savvy.  He'd see the political implications of the Court's rulings.

3. Joia Johnson, executive vice president and general counsel of Hanesbrands.  She's a Penn JD and MBA and lives in North Carolina - a nice state for Obama to tap.  And she'd bring a real-life perspective from the corporate point of view.

3. Lisa Rau, judge on the Pennsylvania state trial court.  She's a Stanford Law graduate and former civil rights lawyer who would offer a critical perspective on how Court decisions might play out in real life in real courts.

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on May 18, 2009 (boomark / email).