Harold Koh

Harold Hongju Koh is Martin R. Flug '55 Professor of International Law at Yale University, from which he is on leave to serve as Legal Adviser to the United States Department of State. He began teaching at Yale Law School in 1985 and served from 2004 until 2009 as its fifteenth Dean. He has argued before the United States Supreme Court and he has testified before the U.S. Congress more than twenty times. While he is considered a liberal in international law and U.S. constitutional law, he is also acknowledged as a legal teacher and thinker across the ideological spectrum: the very conservative John Yoo, in the introduction to a 2005 book, wrote "Harold Koh sparked my interest in foreign affairs and the Constitution;" Yoo often quotes Koh as an authority on the other side of Yoo's argument.

Obama Administration

On June 25, 2009, the U.S. Senate confirmed Professor Koh, after considerable controversy and political maneuvering. Opponents claimed that his views on transnationalism meant that he wanted to subordinate the sovereignty of the United States to international organizations, and make foreign court decisions binding on U.S. judicial decisions. Supporters say that this is a visceral and untrue response to anyone who would undo the unilateralism of the George W. Bush Administration.

One specific accusation, by former George W. Bush Administration speechwriter Meghan Clyne in a New York Post , was thaty at a 2007 dinner of the Greenwich Yale Club, according to lawyer Steven Stein, says that, in addressing the Yale Club of Greenwich in 2007, Koh claimed that "in an appropriate case, he didn't see any reason why sharia law would not be applied to govern a case in the United States.". Clyne also wrote, "Worse, the State job might be a launching pad for a Supreme Court nomination. (He's on many liberals' short lists for the high court.) Since this job requires Senate confirmation, it's certainly a useful trial run."

The organizer of the event at which he was alleged to have made this statement wrote

I was the organizer of the Yale Club of Greenwich event on March 13, which Meghan Clyne references.

The account given by Steve Stein of Dean Koh's comments is totally fictitious and inaccurate. I was in the room with my husband and several fellow alumni, and we are all adamant that Koh never said or suggested that sharia law could be used to govern cases in US courts.

The subject of his talk was Globalization and Yale Law School, so, of course, other forms of law were mentioned. But never did Koh state or suggest that other forms of law should govern or dictate the American legal system.

His confirmation hearing was in April. "To the disappointment of his excitable critics, Koh has never suggested the subordination of the American legal system to foreign powers. He has championed respect for our obligations under treaties to which the U.S. has explicitly signed. He views international legal sources as a valid--but not binding--source of inspiration and perspective for U.S. courts.The use of such nonbinding sources to bolster legal arguments is a central and uncontroversial tenet of the American judicial process: Law review articles and other academic sources are a lynchpin of the opinions of courts everywhere; current Chief Justice John Roberts has even cited a Bob Dylan song."

Previous Administrations

From 1998 to 2001, he served as U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, and previously had served on the Secretary of State's Advisory Committee on Public International Law.

Awards

He has been awarded eleven honorary doctorates and three law school medals and has received more than thirty awards for his human rights work.

He is recipient of the 2005 Louis B. Sohn Award from the American Bar Association International Law Section and the 2003 Wolfgang Friedmann Award from Columbia Law School for his lifetime achievements in International Law.

Early career

Before joining Yale, he practiced law at Covington and Burling from 1982-83 and at the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice from 1983-85.

Memberships

He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the American Philosophical Society, an Honorary Fellow of Magdalen College, Oxford, a former Visiting Fellow at All Souls College, Oxford, and a member of the Council of the American Law Institute. He has held fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation and the Century Foundation. He has sat on the Board of Overseers of Harvard University and sits on the Boards of Directors of the Brookings Institution, Human Rights First, the American Arbitration Association, and the National Democratic Institute.

Awards

He is recipient of the 2005 Louis B. Sohn Award from the American Bar Association International Law Section and the 2003 Wolfgang Friedmann Award from Columbia Law School for his lifetime achievements in International Law. He has been named one of America's “45 Leading Public Sector Lawyers Under The Age of 45” by American Lawyer magazine and one of the “100 Most Influential Asian-Americans of the 1990s” by A magazine.

Education

• B.A. degree from Harvard College
• B.A. and M.A. degrees from Oxford University, where he was a Marshall Scholar
• J.D. from Harvard Law School, where he was Developments Editor of the Harvard Law Reviewserved as a *law clerk for Justice Harry Blackmun of the Supreme Court of the United States and Judge Malcolm Richard Wilkey of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.