Douglas NeJaime and Stephen Bright Elected to the American Law Institute
Douglas NeJaime, the Anne Urowsky Professor of Law, and Stephen B. Bright, the Harvey L. Karp Visiting Lecturer in Law, have been elected to the American Law Institute (ALI). The new class includes 32 members who bring a range of perspectives and areas of expertise to ALI’s work of serving the legal field through scholarship.
“The American Law Institute’s mission to clarify and modernize the law continues to occupy an important space in today’s legal landscape,” said ALI President David F. Levi in an announcement. “The work that the Institute produces — to assist the judiciary, to aid legislative reform, and to assist the legal profession and the public — depends on the diverse knowledge and viewpoints of our members as well as their dedication, expertise, and wisdom.”
NeJaime specializes in family law, legal ethics, law and sexuality, and constitutional law. He has previously held teaching positions at Harvard Law School, UC Irvine School of Law, Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, and UCLA School of Law. At UCLA, he served as Faculty Director of the Williams Institute, a research institute on sexual orientation and gender identity law and public policy.
The co-author of three books and author or co-author of 25 articles, NeJaime is a three-time recipient of the Dukeminier Award, which recognizes the best legal scholarship on sexual orientation published in the previous year. NeJaime served as principal drafter of the Connecticut Parentage Act, which received near-unanimous support in both chambers of Connecticut’s legislature and was signed into state law in 2021.
Bright is a leading advocate for defendants facing capital charges. His areas of expertise include capital punishment, legal representation for poor people accused of crimes, conditions and practices in jails and prisons, racial discrimination in criminal courts, and judicial independence. For more than four decades, he has litigated in state and federal courts.
Bright has argued four capital cases before the United States Supreme Court, which ruled in his favor each time. He joined the Southern Center for Human Rights, first as Director, in 1982. Bright served as the organization’s President and Senior Counsel from 2006 to 2016. A recipient of the American Bar Association’s 1998 Thurgood Marshall Award, Bright is the subject of two books and a documentary film.
The ALI’s newest class also includes Yale Law School alumni Stephen E. Henderson ’99, Peter Lee ’05, Susan M. Lin ’04, Bertrall L. Ross ’06, Kevin S. Schwartz ’06, and Nicholas O. Stephanopolous ’06.
