Edward Whelan
Distinguished Senior Fellow and Antonin Scalia Chair in Constitutional Studies
Edward Whelan is a Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and holds EPPC’s Antonin Scalia Chair in Constitutional Studies. He is the longest-serving President in EPPC’s history, having held that position from March 2004 through January 2021.
Edward Whelan is a Distinguished Senior Fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center and holds EPPC’s Antonin Scalia Chair in Constitutional Studies. He is the longest-serving President in EPPC’s history, having held that position from March 2004 through January 2021.
Mr. Whelan directs EPPC’s program on The Constitution, the Courts, and the Culture. His areas of expertise include constitutional law and the judicial confirmation process.
As a contributor to National Review Online’s Bench Memos blog, Mr. Whelan has been a leading commentator on nominations to the Supreme Court and the lower courts and on issues of constitutional law. In his Confirmation Tales newsletter, he draws lessons from his three decades of experience in judicial-confirmation battles.
Mr. Whelan has written essays and op-eds for leading newspapers—including the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and the Washington Post—opinion journals, and academic symposia and law reviews. The National Law Journal has named him among its “Champions and Visionaries” in the practice of law in D.C.
Mr. Whelan is co-editor of three volumes of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s work: Scalia Speaks: Reflections on Law, Faith, and Life Well Lived (Crown Forum, 2017), a New York Times bestselling collection of speeches by Justice Scalia; On Faith: Lessons from an American Believer (Crown Forum, 2019), a collection of Justice Scalia’s writings on faith and religion; and The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law (Crown Forum, 2020), a collection of Justice Scalia’s views on legal issues.
Mr. Whelan, a lawyer and a former law clerk to Justice Scalia, has served in positions of responsibility in all three branches of the federal government. From just before the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, until joining EPPC in 2004, Mr. Whelan was the Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel in the U.S. Department of Justice. In that capacity, he advised the White House Counsel’s Office, the Attorney General and other senior DOJ officials, and departments and agencies throughout the executive branch on difficult and sensitive legal questions. Mr. Whelan previously served on Capitol Hill as General Counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on the Judiciary. In addition to clerking for Justice Scalia, he was a law clerk to Judge J. Clifford Wallace of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
In 1981 Mr. Whelan graduated with honors from Harvard College and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa. He received his J.D. magna cum laude in 1985 from Harvard Law School, where he was a member of the Board of Editors of the Harvard Law Review.
For more on Mr. Whelan’s background, see this interview.
Ed Whelan's Response to New York Times's Public Editor
Edward Whelan
When I sent my complaint about Linda Greenhouse's conflict of interest to the New York Times's public editor (or “readers' representative”),…
Uncategorized
Bench Memos / January 22, 2008
Judicial Activism Awards Fixed!
Edward Whelan
As Smith Barney might put it, the epithet of “liberal judicial activism” has acquired its stigma the old-fashioned way: It’s…
Uncategorized
Los Angeles Times / October 24, 2007
Going South on Southwick?
Edward Whelan
A big fight is brewing in the United States Senate over President Bush’s nomination of former Mississippi judge Leslie H….
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National Review Online / July 12, 2007
The Next Supreme Court Vacancy
Edward Whelan
If a Supreme Court vacancy unexpectedly develops this summer, the conventional wisdom is that President Bush will find it extremely…
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National Review / June 21, 2007
Justices on Trial
Edward Whelan
Confirmation Wars:Preserving Independent Courts in Angry Times by Benjamin Wittes, Rowman & Littlefield, 168 pp., $22.95 Benjamin Wittes, a former…
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Weekly Standard, Volume 012, Issue 38 / June 18, 2007
Back to the States
Edward Whelan
Partial-birth abortion hasn’t been a good issue for the pro-abortion movement. It’s generally true that the more Americans focus on…
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National Review Online / May 29, 2007
Supreme Bias
Edward Whelan
Supreme Discomfort: The Divided Soul of Clarence Thomas by Kevin Merida and Michael Fletcher, Doubleday, 422 pp., $26.95. In their…
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National Review, Vol. 59, No. 8 / May 14, 2007
The Face-Off Over Partial-Birth Abortion
Edward Whelan
In last week’s Supreme Court ruling in Gonzales v. Carhart, the five justices in the majority who upheld the constitutionality…
Articles
National Review Online / April 23, 2007
"Painfully Awkward"? No, Just Plain Stupid
Edward Whelan
In the aftermath of the Supreme Court’s ruling upholding the constitutionality of the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act of 2003, some…
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National Review Online / April 24, 2007
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