Vita & Contact

See summary below of my scholarly and volunteer nonprofit activities, employment, education, and writings, followed by a short personal statement and a copyright and permissions note which applies to all contents of this blog site (feel free to contact me at bryanw@gmail.com).

Most Recent Publication

Book Review, Randy E. Barnett & Evan D. Bernick, The Original Meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment: Its Letter and Spirit (Harvard University Press, 2021), 112 Journal of American History 164 (Issue 1, June 2025) (revised and republished on this blog, Dec. 12, 2025)

Cited by U.S. Supreme Court

McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 742, 763 n. 10, 829 n. 10, 830 n. 12, 841 (2010), and Timbs v. Indiana, 139 S. Ct. 682, 691 (2019) (see news release and article cited)

Employment

University of San Diego School of Law, Adjunct Professor (2025) (teaching Constitutional Law in LLM program), Visiting Professor (2021) (teaching American Indian Law)

California Western School of Law (San Diego), Adjunct Professor (2025) (teaching American Indian Law)

Thomas Jefferson School of Law (San Diego), Professor Emeritus (since 2018), Visiting Professor (2018–20, 2022, and 2024), Professor (2008–18), Associate Professor (1999–2008, tenured 2002), Assistant Professor (1996–99) (teaching Constitutional Law, American Indian Law, Civil Procedure, Federal Courts & Jurisdiction, and other courses)

University of Nice (France) Faculty of Law (now part of Côte d’Azur University), Visiting Professor (2011) (by courtesy, teaching Comparative Constitutional Law in joint summer program with Thomas Jefferson School of Law)

Chicago-Kent College of Law (Illinois Institute of Technology), Visiting Assistant Professor (1994–96) (teaching Legal Research & Writing, Criminal Procedure, and Immigration Law)

Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering (now WilmerHale) (Washington, D.C.), Associate (1992–94)

Law Clerk (1990–92) to the Honorable Michael F. Cavanagh, Justice (1983–2015), Chief Justice (1991–95), Michigan Supreme Court (Lansing) (Chief Justice Cavanagh, 1940–2025, was one of the most admired and beloved jurists, and the longest-serving state appellate judge, in Michigan history. He died on May 20, 2025. See the statement by his daughter Megan K. Cavanagh, also now Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court, and his obituary.)

Law Clerk (1989–90) to the Honorable Frank M. Johnson Jr., U.S. Circuit Judge (1979–96), U.S. Court of Appeals, 11th Circuit (Montgomery, Alabama) (Judge Johnson, 1918–99, served as U.S. District Judge, 1955–79, playing a historic role working toward desegregation and racial justice in Alabama; the U.S. Courthouse in Montgomery was named for him in 1992 and he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1995. See his New York Times obituary.)

Law Clerk (Summer 1988), Minnesota State Attorney General’s Office (Hubert H. Humphrey III, Attorney General) (St. Paul)

Law Clerk (Summer 1987), Warner, Norcross & Judd (Grand Rapids, Michigan)

Attorney Licensure

Bar of the Supreme Court of the United States (since June 1, 2010) (U.S. Supreme Court Journal, 2009–10 Term, pp. 913–14)

State Bar of Michigan (since Dec. 10, 1990)

District of Columbia Bar (1993–94)

Nonprofit Leadership

Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship (educational society devoted to English literature, history, and the Shakespeare authorship question), Trustee (Nov. 5, 2016–July 1, 2020, and Sept. 27–Dec. 4, 2025), Vice President (Oct. 13, 2018–July 1, 2020), Website Editor (April 25, 2020–Oct. 9, 2021, and Oct. 15–Dec. 1, 2025), and founding member of the unified Fellowship (since 2013)

Education

Stanford Law School, J.D. with Distinction (1989); Stanford Law Review (1987–89) (Senior Editor; received Board of Editors Award); Teaching Assistant, Stanford University Political Science Department (1988) (assembled and edited all course reading materials and led two sections of major lecture course on Civil Rights & Civil Liberties taught by Professor Jim Steyer); Hilmer Oehlmann Jr. Prize for Outstanding Legal Research and Writing (1987)

Stanford University, A.B. with Distinction and Departmental Honors (Political Science) (1986); Senior Honors Thesis, “The Contradictory Politics of Judicial Decisionmaking” (1986) (revised and published 1990 in Arizona Law Review as “Judicial Philosophies in Collision: Justice Blackmun, Garcia, and the Tenth Amendment”)

Oxford University (Magdalen College), Stanford-in-Oxford Summer Program on Anglo-American Law (Summer 1985) (credit applied to Stanford A.B.)

Books

Early Shakespeare Authorship Doubts (2019) (see 2017 preview lecture and 2020 follow-up lecture)

Native American Sovereignty on Trial: A Handbook With Cases, Laws, and Documents (2003) (textbook from leading academic publisher ABC-CLIO, now an imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing)

Editorial Work

Stanford Law Review, Senior Editor (1988–89) (Vol. 41), Member (1987–89) (Vols. 40–41), received Board of Editors Award (1989)

Faculty Editor, Thomas Jefferson School of Law Research Paper Series, Legal Scholarship Network, Social Science Research Network (SSRN) (2007–16) (Vols. 9–18) (managed and edited online postings of scholarly papers by more than two dozen faculty colleagues)

Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship, “Twenty Poems of Edward de Vere Echo in the Works of Shakespeare” (2018) (co-edited and co-researched major new edition of early Elizabethan poetry)

Editorial Board, The Oxfordian, 2017–21 (Vols. 19–23) (peer-reviewed scholarly journal on English literature, history, and the Shakespeare authorship question, published since 1998 by the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship)

Leading Articles

“Nationalizing the Bill of Rights: Revisiting the Original Understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1866–67,” 68 Ohio State Law Journal 1509 (2007) (SSRN), cited by U.S. Supreme Court in McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U.S. 742, 763 n. 10, 829 n. 10, 830 n. 12, 841 (2010) (opinion of the Court, concurring opinion, and numerous briefs on both sides), and in Timbs v. Indiana, 139 S. Ct. 682, 691 (2019) (concurring opinion in unanimous decision) (see news release)

“Federal Labor Law, Indian Sovereignty, and the Canons of Construction,” 86 Oregon Law Review 413 (2007) (SSRN), cited in Cohen’s Handbook of Federal Indian Law (the leading treatise in the field of American Indian Law), 2012 ed. § 2.03, p. 123 n. 2, and 2024 ed. § 3.02, p. 164 n. 2 (influencing 2012 and 2024 revisions of section on “Federal Laws of General Applicability” in what is now chapter 3, “Principles of Interpretation”)

“Indian Sovereignty, General Federal Laws, and the Canons of Construction: An Overview and Update,” 6 American Indian Law Journal 98 (2017) (available on Seattle University School of Law website and on SSRN), cited in Cohen’s Handbook of Federal Indian Law (the leading treatise in the field of American Indian Law), 2024 ed. § 3.02, p. 166 n. 14

Additional Articles (in reverse chronological order)

“The Speaker of the House and Presidential Succession: An Argument and Addendum,” TJSL Research Paper No. 3714362 (Oct. 18, 2020, rev. 2021) (SSRN) (shorter version originally published on Jurist, Oct. 16, 2020)

“The Oxfordian Era on the Supreme Court” (Aug. 30, 2016, rev. 2020) (on the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship website)

“Nationalizing the Bill of Rights: Scholarship and Commentary on the Fourteenth Amendment in 1867–1873,” 18 Journal of Contemporary Legal Issues 153 (2009) (abstract on University of San Diego School of Law website) (full article on SSRN)

“How the Ninth Circuit Overruled a Century of Supreme Court Indian Jurisprudence — And Has So Far Gotten Away With It,” 2008 Michigan State Law Review 547 (2008) (SSRN)

“Fighting the Lone Wolf Mentality: Twenty-First Century Reflections on the Paradoxical State of American Indian Law,” 38 Tulsa Law Review 113 (2002) (SSRN)

“The Road to Twining: Reassessing the Disincorporation of the Bill of Rights,” 61 Ohio State Law Journal 1457 (2000) (SSRN)

“The Lost Compromise: Reassessing the Early Understanding in Court and Congress on Incorporation of the Bill of Rights in the Fourteenth Amendment,” 61 Ohio State Law Journal 1051 (2000) (SSRN)

“To Say ‘I Do’: Shahar v. Bowers, Same-Sex Marriage, and Public Employee Free Speech Rights,” 15 Georgia State University Law Review 381 (1998) (SSRN)

“The Right of Confrontation, Justice Scalia, and the Power and Limits of Textualism,” 48 Washington and Lee Law Review 1323 (1991) (SSRN)

“Judicial Philosophies in Collision: Justice Blackmun, Garcia, and the Tenth Amendment,” 32 Arizona Law Review 749 (1990) (revised undergraduate honors thesis) (SSRN)

“State Parochialism, the Right to Travel, and the Privileges and Immunities Clause of Article IV,” 41 Stanford Law Review 1557 (1989) (SSRN)

Shorter Essays, Chapters, and Reviews (selected, in reverse chronological order, not including essays appearing solely on this blog)

“Whatever You Think of Garland, We Must Shield the Attorney General From Politics,” Jurist (Aug. 29, 2022)

“Defend Democracy Before It’s Too Late: A One-Page Bill Would Do It,” Jurist (June 26, 2021)

“D.C. Statehood Is Within Congress’s Power But Must Be Done Right,” Jurist (May 26, 2021)

“The Fake Filibuster: A Clear and Present Danger to Democracy,” Jurist (Feb. 8, 2021)

“The People’s Right to Elect Senators,” Jurist (Dec. 10, 2020)

“Republicans, the Rule of Law, and the Fate of American Democracy,” Jurist (Nov. 29, 2020)

“The Snobbery Slander: The Most Outrageous and Ironic Attacks on Oxfordians and Other Shakespeare Authorship Doubters” (July 15, 2019, rev. 2021) (on the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship website)

“Reflections on Spelling and the Shakespeare Authorship Question: ‘What’s in (the Spelling of) a Name?’” (Aug. 9, 2018, rev. 2021) (on the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship website)

“Shapiro ‘On the Media’: Name-Calling and Bullying Students and Doubters,” Shakespeare Oxford Newsletter (Summer 2018) (vol. 54, no. 3, p. 25) (SSRN) (and see my updated essay on this blog)

“The Electoral College: A Bipartisan Disaster For Democracy,” San Diego Union-Tribune (Jan. 15, 2017, p. B11) (online Jan. 13, 2017)

“Hillary Clinton’s Electoral College Defeat: It Almost Happened to George W. Bush in 2004,” TJSL Research Paper No. 2883806 (Dec. 13, 2016) (SSRN)

“Remembering Rollett and Debunking Shapiro (Again)” (July 13, 2016, rev. 2021) (on the Shakespeare Oxford Fellowship website)

Book Review: “An Inside Account of a Very Canadian Revolution,” Barry L. Strayer, Canada’s Constitutional Revolution (University of Alberta Press, 2013), H-Net Reviews in the Humanities & Social Sciences (2014)

“A Personal Perspective on Marriage, Time, Space, Uncertainty, and the Law,” 2011 Michigan State Law Review 229 (2011) (SSRN)

“On Birthright Citizenship, We Should Honor the Constitution,” Los Angeles Daily Journal (2010) (republished on this blog, Dec. 25, 2025)

“Swayne, Noah Haynes” (U.S. Supreme Court Justice), in The Yale Biographical Dictionary of American Law (Yale University Press, Roger K. Newman ed. 2009) (p. 532)

“Amendments, Post-Civil War,” in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (Macmillan [Gale Cengage], David S. Tanenhaus et al. eds. 2008) (v. 1, p. 56)

“Incorporation Debate” (Bill of Rights and 14th Amendment), in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (Macmillan [Gale Cengage], David S. Tanenhaus et al. eds. 2008) (v. 2, p. 455)

“Miller, Samuel F.” (U.S. Supreme Court Justice), in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (Macmillan [Gale Cengage], David S. Tanenhaus et al. eds. 2008) (v. 3, p. 290)

“Shapiro v. Thompson,” in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (Macmillan [Gale Cengage], David S. Tanenhaus et al. eds. 2008) (v. 4, p. 395)

“State Action,” in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (Macmillan [Gale Cengage], David S. Tanenhaus et al. eds. 2008) (v. 4, p. 452)

“Travel,” in Encyclopedia of the Supreme Court of the United States (Macmillan [Gale Cengage], David S. Tanenhaus et al. eds. 2008) (v. 5, p. 66)

“A Reply to Professor Thomas,” 68 Ohio State Law Journal 1659 (2007) (SSRN), replying to George C. Thomas III, “The Riddle of the Fourteenth Amendment: A Response to Professor Wildenthal,” 68 Ohio State Law Journal 1627 (2007) (SSRN) (Professor Thomas responded to my 2007 article cited above, “Nationalizing the Bill of Rights: Revisiting the Original Understanding of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1866–67”)

Book Review, Ronald M. Labbé & Jonathan Lurie, The Slaughterhouse Cases: Regulation, Reconstruction, and the Fourteenth Amendment (University Press of Kansas, 2003), 91 Journal of American History 1030 (Issue 3, Dec. 2004)

Book Review, Brian Edward Brown, Religion, Law, and the Land: Native Americans and the Judicial Interpretation of Sacred Land (Greenwood, 1999), 16 Journal of Law and Religion 743 (2001) (SSRN)

Book Review: “Civil War Without End: The Sociology and Synergy of Law and History,” Pamela Brandwein, Reconstructing Reconstruction: The Supreme Court and the Production of Historical Truth (Duke University Press, 1999), 2001 University of Illinois Law Review 629 (2001) (SSRN) (originally published on H-Net Reviews in the Humanities & Social Sciences, 2000)

“How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Slaughter-House Cases: An Essay in Constitutional-Historical Revisionism,” 23 Thomas Jefferson Law Review 241 (2001) (SSRN)

“Native American Religious Rights” (with Patrick M. O’Neil), in Religion and American Law: An Encyclopedia (Garland, now Routledge) (Paul Finkelman ed. 2000) (p. 330)

“Law Professor Queries: Should THLA = GLB + T?,” Tom Homann Law Association Newsletter (April 1999) (p. 3) (successfully advocating inclusion of transgender people and rights in mission of THLA, San Diego’s LGBT Bar Association) (SSRN)

Personal Statement

I have lived in San Diego since 1996, now residing in the Point Loma area with my husband Ashish (a doctor specializing in pulmonary and critical care medicine) and mother-in-law Pushpa.

I’ve spent more than half my life in California but was born in Houston, Texas, in 1964, and also lived when very young in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and Bryan, Texas. I grew up mainly in the Lansing area of Michigan (1969–82), attending public schools and graduating from Okemos High School in 1982. I still have lots of family in mid-Michigan, and also in Texas, New Mexico, California, Washington State, Colorado, and other states, and in India.

I attended school and lived for eight months (Dec. 1972–Aug. 1973) in München (Munich), Germany, learning quite a bit of German, which I’ve mostly forgotten but can still pronounce like a parrot. I read and speak some French at a rudimentary level. Plans to learn Hindi (my husband’s mother tongue) have never quite materialized but I’ve picked up a few words (same for Spanish). One of my great educational regrets is that I never studied Latin: a good retirement project!

I attended Stanford University and Law School (1982–89), then lived and worked in Montgomery, Alabama (1989–90), the Lansing area of Michigan (1990–92), Washington, D.C., and Bethesda, Maryland (1992–94), and Chicago and Evanston, Illinois (1994–96).

I’m an avid reader and a passionate fan of good movies and TV. My interests include history, science, a wide range of fiction and poetry, and science-fiction.

I played the cello from ages 7 to 18, including in the Okemos High School Symphony Orchestra, which is still going strong. I enjoyed this concert available on YouTube and this YT channel has several nice OHSSO performances. I still have my cello from those days but have never found time to get back to it. I love “classical” music (baroque to the present), especially symphonic, chamber, cello, and piano works.

Not surprisingly, given my fascination with Shakespeare, I love live theatre too. My husband and I, and his mother, try to see as much as we can.

Copyright & Permissions Note

All contents of this blog (everything on the https://profbhw.org website, except for public-domain images or text, the WordPress trademark logo, or fair-use or permitted quotations of text copyrighted by others) are copyright 2023–25 by Bryan H. Wildenthal (the author), all rights reserved.

With regard to print or electronic copies not posted on the internet, I grant permission, to the extent of my own copyright, to copy and distribute any and all text or images on this blog, in whole or in part, for any nonprofit uses (educational or personal), subject to crediting me as author and citing the relevant internet address of this blog or the relevant page within it.

With regard to internet postings, I request that you link to the relevant internet address of this blog or the relevant page within it, rather than copying and reposting anything in this blog elsewhere on the internet, and I do not grant permission for such copying or reposting (except for reasonable fair-use quotations, which are of course fine). I’m also glad, however, to consider any copyright permission requests on an individual basis (please email bryanw@gmail.com).

When quoting this blog online within the reasonable bounds of fair use, I request that a link be provided to the relevant internet address of this blog or the relevant page within it. Simply linking to this blog obviously does not require permission or notice, but I always appreciate hearing from those who may choose to do so. Thank you!