Former State Department legal adviser offers advice to students
“It was an interesting time. It was the end of the Cold War, the fall of the Berlin Wall, the first Gulf War, the invasion of Panama, Tiananmen Square. For someone interested in foreign affairs, it was a little like being a kid in a candy store.”
John B. Bellinger III ’86, chief legal adviser to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during the Bush administration, on his career as a special assistant to CIA Director William Webster. In a talk sponsored by the Office of Public Interest Advising on Sept. 13, Bellinger, now a partner heading the public international law practice at Arnold & Porter in Washington, D.C., traced his own career in government and private practice to demonstrate how a young lawyer interested in government service might proceed. Read Q-and-A.
In the echo of Gekko
“I was very intimidated by Harvard Law School and thought I was in for massive annihilation, so I holed up in Langdell and spent too much time there. I wish I had spent more time meeting my classmates. I encourage students to spend time meeting each other.”
Anthony Scaramucci ’89—the founder of SkyBridge Capital, author of “Goodbye Gordon Gekko: How to Find Your Fortune Without Losing Your Soul” and adviser to the movie “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps”—shared career advice with Harvard Law School students at an event co-sponsored by the Traphagen Distinguished Alumni Speakers Series and the Office of Career Services on Sept. 29. Read Q-and-A.
When ‘The Nine’ overrule the 9th
“The 9th Circuit got it wrong in 81 percent of its cases that the Supreme Court agreed to hear.”
Ninth Circuit Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain ’63, in a talk at the law school on Sept. 17, reflected on how cases from his court have fared in the Supreme Court. Over the past decade, the U.S. Supreme Court has overruled the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in 148 of 182 cases—a “strikingly poor record” for the circuit court, said O’Scannlain, who is in his 25th year on the federal bench. The talk was sponsored by the Federalist Society.
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