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Biography
Kathleen Sullivan, the former Dean of Stanford Law School, has been recognized as one of the nation’s preeminent appellate litigators. The National Law Journal has twice named her one of the 100 Most Influential Lawyers in America and has twice named her as one of the 50 Most Influential Women Lawyers in America. She is a one of only ten lawyers to be named by the Daily Journal for ten consecutive years as one the 100 Most Influential Lawyers in California, and in 2006, California Lawyer magazine named her Appellate Attorney of the Year. With twenty-five years of experience as a law professor at Harvard Law School and Stanford Law School, she is also a nationally renowned scholar and teacher of constitutional law, and edits the nation's leading casebook in the field.
Ms. Sullivan has argued four cases before the United States Supreme Court; numerous cases in the US Courts of Appeals for the First, Second, Ninth and Federal Circuits; and various cases in state courts including the California courts of appeal, the New York Court of Appeals, and the Delaware Chancery Court. Her practice has involved issues of constitutional, media, antitrust, securities, patent, copyright, trademark, bankruptcy and commercial contract law, as well as white-collar criminal defense.
Notable Representations
Represent the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers in a federal preemption challenge to state greenhouse gas regulations.
Represented Allegheny Energy, Inc. in a successful appeal to the Second Circuit unanimously overturning a $188 million judgment against Allegheny and reinstating $350 million in counterclaims in a complex commercial contract case concerning the sale of an energy trading business.
Represented Hearst News and the San Francisco Chronicle in the Ninth Circuit in defending reporters who broke the BALCO steroids in baseball story against disclosing confidential sources of leaked grand jury testimony.
Represented the Kamehameha Schools/Bishop Estate in a successful defense of its Native Hawaiian admissions policy against challenge under 42 U.S.C. § 1981, culminating in an 8-7 victory from an en banc panel of the Ninth Circuit.
Represented Nokia in the Federal Circuit in a successful defense of arbitrators’ jurisdiction to decide the arbitrability of claims.
Represented Intuit in the New York Court of Appeals in a unanimous victory affirming attorneys’ latitude to interview a litigation opponent’s former employees.
Represented California wineries and Michigan wine consumers in a successful challenge to discriminatory state bans on the interstate direct shipment of wine, obtaining a 5-4 victory in the US Supreme Court in Granholm v. Heald, 544 U.S. 460 (2005).
Represented Siebel Systems and its officers in the first litigated challenge to the SEC's enforcement of Regulation FD, obtaining complete dismissal of the SEC complaint in the SDNY.
Represented Independent Ink, Inc., in the US Supreme Court in a case involving an antitrust challenge to tying sales of patented and non-patented goods.
Represented Senator Mitch McConnell and several candidates and advocacy groups in the US Supreme Court in various free speech challenges to the Bipartisan Campaign Finance Reform Act.
Represented the City of Honolulu in the Ninth Circuit, successfully defending the City against First Amendment challenges to its anti-peddling laws as applied to t-shirt sales in Waikiki and its news rack laws as applied to a free weekly newspaper.
Represented PhRMA in a constitutional challenge to a Maine law requiring pharmaceutical companies to pay rebates to Maine residents as a condition of selling Medicaid prescriptions.
Served as co-counsel to the National Association of Broadcasters in successfully defending cable must-carry rules against First Amendment challenge in the US Supreme Court in Turner Broadcasting v. FCC.
Served as co-counsel to ABC Broadcasting in defending its use of hidden cameras in news investigation in Food Lion v. Capital Cities/ABC.
Represented a taxpayer in the US Supreme Court in Freytag v. Commissioner, a constitutional challenge to the use of special trial judges by the Tax Court.
Represented clients pro bono in a variety of civil rights and civil liberties cases involving free speech, privacy and equal protection, including Bowers v. Hardwick, Rust v. Sullivan, and Anderson v. Green (which laid the ground for Saenz v. Roe).
