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James C. Phillips has a unique breadth of legal experience, being one of a small group who have both worked on dozens of matters at the United States Supreme Court and published dozens of academic articles. He has worked in private practice for both D.C. and Utah appellate boutiques, at Utah’s largest law firm, and has also worked for a D.C.-based public interest law firm. Besides the U.S. Supreme Court, James has worked on matters in the majority of the U.S. Courts of Appeal and other state and federal appellate and trial courts around the country. He clerked for Judge Thomas B. Griffith on the U.S. Court of Appeal for the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Thomas R. Lee on the Utah Supreme Court. He is a member of the Utah and D.C. bars.
James is a fellow of the Public Law and Policy Program with the UC-Berkeley School of Law. Starting August 2026, he will be an Associate Professor of Law at St. Thomas University (Miami Gardens). James has been an Associate Professor and Director of the Wheatley Institute’s Constitutional Government Initiative at Brigham Young University. Before that he was a law professor at Chapman University, where he taught Civil Procedure I & II, Constitutional Law, Professional Responsibility, Family Law, and Religion and the Constitution. He has also been a Visiting Assistant Professor at Brigham Young University’s J. Reuben Clark Law School where he taught Administrative Law. His scholarship has been cited by federal and state judges around the country, including at the U.S. Supreme Court. He earned his JD from U.C. Berkeley School of Law, where he was Order of the Coif and a member of the law review. He also has a PhD in Jurisprudence and Social Policy from U.C. Berkeley.