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James Wilson Fellowship
Washington, D.C., July 29-August 3, 2018
Professor Hadley Arkes, joined by other distinguished scholars, will offer a seminar over six days in Washington, DC, on Natural Law and its bearing on our current law. The course will focus on discussing the central points of a jurisprudence of Natural Law, such as the classic connection between the “logic of morals” and the “logic of law,” the properties of moral truths and the principles of judgment, and how we would see certain landmark cases differently if they were viewed through the lens of Natural Law. Our main objective is to restore a moral coherence to our jurisprudence.
Topics discussed in past seminars have included, “The Natural Law, the Positive Law, and the American Regime”; “The Natural Law and Ordinary Language: Recovering the Philosophic ground for the Restriction of Assaulting Speech Acts”; “Abortion, Privacy, and the Law: Who is the Bearer of Natural Rights?’”; and “Religion and the Law.” To read the biographies of our 2018 faculty, please visit here.
We are pleased to present the James Wilson Fellows Class of 2018:
Megan Ball
Megan Ball is a 2019 J.D. Candidate at the University of Notre Dame Law School. After graduating, she will serve as a law clerk to the Honorable L. Steven Grasz of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. Ms. Ball is a Blackstone Legal Fellow from the Class of 2017 and serves as a Managing Senior Editor on the Notre Dame Law Review. This summer, Ms. Ball is working as a summer associate for Jones Day in Cleveland. Prior to law school, Ms. Ball earned a B.A. magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa in History Honors and Theology from the University of Notre Dame in 2016.
Annika Boone
Annika Boone is a 3L at Harvard Law School, where she serves as President of the Federalist Society and as an Executive Editor of the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. She will clerk for Justice Thomas R. Lee of the Utah Supreme Court for the 2020 term. Previously, Ms. Boone worked as a legal intern at Becket and as the lead legislative intern for the Utah Attorney General's Office. She graduated summa cum laude from George Washington University with a B.A. in Political Communication.
Billy Braff
Billy Braff is a JD student at The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law, where he serves as Executive Articles Editor for The Ohio State Law Journal and research assistant to Professor Dakota S. Rudesill. During his second year at Moritz, he externed for Judge Michael H. Watson in the Southern District of Ohio. Prior to law school, Mr. Braff experienced both the public and private sectors in Washington, D.C., interning for Congressman Tim Ryan and working as a staff assistant for McDonald Hopkins Government Strategies, a nonpartisan lobbying firm. Earlier this summer, he returned to Taft, Stettinius & Hollister in Cincinnati, Ohio as a summer associate and participated in the Department of Justice's Summer Law Internship Program with the Commercial Litigation Branch. Mr. Braff received his B.A. in Political Science and English from Kenyon College in 2013, where he focused his studies on political philosophy and the intersection of politics and literature.
Joshua C. Fiveson
Joshua C. Fiveson is a Lieutenant in the United States Navy Judge Advocate General’s Corps. Prior to active duty, Mr. Fiveson served as an attorney advisor to Judge Kevin Ohlson at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces, as a judicial law clerk for Chief Justice Nathan Hecht of the Supreme Court of Texas, and as a law clerk at the U.S. Department of Justice--both with the Counter-Terrorism Section of the National Security Division and the Criminal Division's Office of International Affairs. Mr. Fiveson has also served as a fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Center for Public Leadership, the University of Virginia Law School's National Security Law Institute, the Claremont Institute's Center for Constitutional Jursiprudence, the Institute of World Politics, and the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Mr. Fiveson holds a B.S. in Criminology, Law, and Society from George Mason University and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.
Caesar Kalinowski
Caesar Kalinowski is currently clerking for the Honorable Richard Tallman at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. While attending the University of Washington School of Law, he acted as Appellate Chair for the Moot Court Honor Board and President of the Military Law Association. Caesar previously served over nine years in the U.S. Marine Corps and was deployed to combat, peacekeeping, and training missions in Southwest Asia, Southeast Asia, and the Middle East. Following his clerkship, he intends to practice Media and Intellectual Property Litigation at the firm of Davis Wright Tremaine LLP. In his spare time, he enjoys traveling, riding motorcycles, reading, weight lifting, playing rugby, and spending time with his wife and baby son.
James Kilcup
James Kilcup is clerking for Judge Alice M. Batchelder of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. He previously worked in Portland, Oregon as a litigation associate at Perkins Coie LLP, to which he will be returning post-clerkship. He graduated from The University of Chicago Law School, where he won the annual Edward W. Hinton Moot Court Competition and served as Articles Editor of the Chicago Journal of International Law and as President of the St. Thomas More Society. Mr. Kilcup also holds a M.A. in Philosophy from Loyola Marymount University and a B.A. in Philosophy and English from Seattle University.
John Liolos
John Liolos is presently pursuing doctoral studies on a fellowship at Columbia University. He has practiced law at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP in New York City. Prior to that, he served as a judicial law clerk to the Honorable Robert E. Bacharach on the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and the Honorable Matthew W. Brann on the United States District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania. He holds a J.D., magna cum laude, Order of the Coif, from Boston College Law School, and B.A.s, cum laude, in History and Philosophy from Boston College.
Shiva H. Logarajah
Shiva H. Logarajah is a law clerk for Judge Bobby E. Shepherd of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit. He will next clerk for Judge Michael J. Garcia of the New York Court of Appeals. Mr. Logarajah graduated from the Columbia Law School, where he was a Senior Editor on the Law Review and Co-President of the Federalist Society chapter. He is also a graduate of the University of Toronto and the London School of Economics.
Thomas Molloy
Thomas Molloy is a J.D. Student at The University of Chicago Law School where he serves as the Online Projects Editor of the Law Review and as a research assistant for Professor Richard A. Epstein. After law school, he will clerk for The Honorable Edith Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He worked as a summer associate at Gibson Dunn, O'Melveny & Myers, and Boyden Gray & Associates. Thomas is a licensed minister and prior to law school served as a pastor, professor of philosophy and religion, and Director of Ministry Formation for a religious college. He received his B.A. in Biblical Studies from Life Pacific College and an M.A. in Philosophy of Religion and Ethics from Talbot Theological Seminary.
Joel Nolette
Joel Nolette is currently a litigation associate at Mintz Levin in Boston, MA, where he represents clients in a range of complex commercial litigation matters. Joel received his J.D. cum laude from the Georgetown University Law Center in 2017. During law school, Joel served as a law clerk to Senator Mike Lee on the Senate Judiciary Committee, which experience instilled in him a passion for administrative law, federal courts, and separation of powers. He was also the Editor-in-Chief of Volume 15 of the Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy. In August 2019, Joel will begin clerking for Judge Raymond W. Gruender of the Eighth Circuit. After that, Joel will then be clerking for Judge Timothy J. Kelly of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Before law school, Joel worked as a letter carrier for the United States Postal Service in Western Massachusetts. He graduated from Gordon College summa cum laude in 2011 with his Bachelor of Arts in Biblical Studies. When he is not practicing law or otherwise writing about it, Joel enjoys playing guitar and keyboard.
Joshua Prince
Joshua Prince is an incoming law clerk at the Clark County District Attorney’s Office in Las Vegas, NV. During law school, he clerked at both the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Utah and the Utah Attorney General’s Office, working in the Narcotics and Criminal Appeals divisions, respectively. He graduated from Brigham Young University’s J. Reuben Clark Law School, where he served as president of the Federalist Society. He was also active with the International Center for Law and Religion Studies during law school. Mr. Prince holds a B.A. in Russian from BYU.
Aaron Reitz
Aaron Reitz is a law clerk for Justice Jimmy Blacklock on the Texas Supreme Court. Before clerking for Justice Blacklock, Aaron was an associate at Bracewell LLP in Houston. He graduated from the University of Texas School of Law in 2017. In law school, he was President of the Texas Federalist Society, Editor in Chief of the Texas Review of Law & Politics, Executive Editor of the Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy, and a Blackstone Fellow. Before law school, Aaron was a Captain in the United States Marine Corps. He deployed once to the Helmand Province of Afghanistan, where he served with 2d Battalion, 4th Marines’ Embedded Training Team advising the Afghan National Army. Aaron graduated from Texas A&M University in 2009 with a B.S. in political science and was a member of the Corps of Cadets. He and his wife Meredith have two children, six-year-old William and four-year-old Caroline.
Paul Schmitt
Paul Schmitt is a litigation associate at Ice Miller LLP in Indianapolis, where he specializes in financial litigation and appellate practice. He will clerk for the Honorable Michael S. Kanne of the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit for the 2018-2019 term. Mr. Schmitt previously served as summer clerk at Ice Miller and a legal extern at the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for the Family. Prior to law school, Mr. Schmitt served on active duty as a captain in satellite operations for the United States Air Force and worked for the Illinois State Senate. He received his J.D. magna cum laude from the University of Illinois College of Law and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. As an undergraduate, he served as the campus Student Member to the Board of Trustees.
Peter Torstensen
Peter Torstensen is a litigation associate with Arnold & Porter in New York, where he works on product liability, securities, and general commercial litigation matters. Mr. Torstensen will clerk for Judge Margaret A. Ryan of the United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces for the 2018 term. He received his J.D. from Notre Dame Law School, magna cum laude, and his B.A. in Economics from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prior to law school, he was a high school English teacher and a tax accountant. He is most interested in the practical implications of restoring a deeper understanding of first principles to our national jurisprudence.
Derek A. Webb
Derek A. Webb is an associate at Sidley Austin, LLP, where he focuses on Supreme Court and Appellate litigation. He received his B.A. in philosophy from Yale University, Ph.D. in political theory from the University of Notre Dame, and J.D. from Georgetown Law School. Following law school, he was a Fellow in Stanford Law School's Constitutional Law Center, a Supreme Court Fellow in the Office of the Counselor to the Chief Justice, and a law clerk to Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals. He has been published in Law and History Review, The American Journal of Legal History, The Journal of American Political Thought, The Journal of Legal Education, and Judicature. In 2012 he received the Warren E. Burger Prize from the American Inns of Court for his article "The Original Meaning of Civility: Democratic Deliberation at the Philadelphia Constitutional Convention." Derek will partake in the 2018 Fellowship as both a Faculty Member and as a Fellow.
Philip Williamson
Philip Williamson is a litigation associate at Taft Stettinius & Hollister LLP, where he works on state and federal civil litigation, appellate, and antitrust matters. Prior to entering private practice, he was a judicial law clerk for Judge Lavenski R. Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, Judge Amul R. Thapar of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, and Judge Raymond M. Kethledge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Philip is a 2013 graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law and a 2011 Blackstone Fellow. He graduated summa cum laude from Ouachita Baptist University in 2010 with a triple major in Theology, Philosophy, and Political Science.
