Event: Litigating Second Amendment Cases in a post-Bruen World with Erin Murphy
Date: Thursday, March 9, 2023
Time: 12:00 p.m.–1:00 p.m.
Location: Munsch Hardt Kopf & Harr, P.C., 500 N. Akard St. #3800, Dallas, Texas 75201
CLE Credit: CLE credit is pending

Erin Murphy is a founding partner at Clement & Murphy.  She is widely recognized as one of the nation’s leading Supreme Court and appellate advocates.  Erin has argued dozens of cases in appellate and trial courts throughout the country, including the U.S. Supreme Court and nearly all of the federal courts of appeals.

Before launching her current firm, Erin was a partner at Kirkland & Ellis and a partner at Bancroft PLLC.  Erin clerked for Chief Justice John Roberts on the U.S. Supreme Court and for Judge Diane Sykes on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.  She also served as a Bristow Fellow in the Office of the Solicitor General of the United States.  Erin earned her law degree from Georgetown University Law Center—where she now serves as an adjunct professor—and she received her Bachelor of Science from Northwestern University Medill School of Journalism.

Erin represented the petitioners in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen.  In that case, the U.S. Supreme Court was asked whether the Second Amendment allows the government to prohibit ordinary law-abiding citizens from carrying handguns outside the home for self-defense.  The Court held that New York’s proper-cause requirement for obtaining an unrestricted license to carry a concealed firearm violates the Fourteenth Amendment in that it prevents law-abiding citizens with ordinary self-defense needs from exercising their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.  In light of the Court’s June 2022 opinion, Erin will discuss how courts are dealing with the historical tradition test and the types of laws that are being passed in a post-Bruen world.

Event: The New Originalist Majority with Carrie Severino
Date: Wednesday, February 22, 2023
Time: 12:00 p.m.–1:00 p.m.
Location: Belo Mansion, 2101 Ross Ave., Dallas, Texas 75201
CLE Credit: CLE credit is pending

Carrie Campbell Severino is the president of the Judicial Crisis Network, and co-author with Mollie Hemingway of the bestselling book Justice on Trial: The Kavanaugh Confirmation and the Future of the Court.  As a go-to expert on the confirmation process, Mrs. Severino has been extensively quoted in the media.  She regularly appears on television, including FOX, CNN, MSNBC, C-SPAN, and ABC’s This Week.

Mrs. Severino writes and speaks on a wide range of judicial issues, including the constitutional limits on government, the federal nomination process, and state judicial selection.  She has testified before Congress on constitutional questions and briefed Senators on judicial nominations, and regularly files briefs in high-profile Supreme Court cases.  She was a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and to Judge David B. Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and is a graduate of Harvard Law School (J.D.), Duke University (B.A., Biology), and Michigan State University (M.A., Linguistics).