Stephen Smith

Diane and M.O. Miller II Research Professor of Law

Office: 3162 Eck Hall of Law
Phone: 574.631.3097
Email: ssmith31@nd.edu
Staff Assistant: Alicia Cummins
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SSRN: View

Stephen F. Smith came to Notre Dame Law School in 2009 from the University of Virginia where he was the John V. Ray Research Professor. He taught criminal law and an appellate advocacy seminar in the fall 2008 semester at Notre Dame Law School as a Visiting Professor.

Smith earned his bachelor’s degree from Dartmouth College and his Juris Doctor from the University of Virginia School of Law. As a student at the law school, he served as articles editor for the Virginia Law Review and was inducted into the Order of the Coif and the Raven Society. Upon graduation, he clerked for Judge David B. Sentelle of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and for Justice Clarence Thomas of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Before returning to the law school, Smith served in the Supreme Court and appellate practice group of Sidley & Austin in Washington, D.C. He also served as associate majority counsel to a 1996 House of Representatives select subcommittee investigating U.S. involvement in Iranian arms transfers to Bosnia and as an adjunct professor at George Mason University School of Law. He is actively involved in a number of community service organizations and civic projects.

Smith’s area of research is criminal law and criminal procedure. He teaches courses on criminal law, criminal adjudication, and federal criminal law.

Courses Taught

LAW60302, Criminal Law

LAW73314, Appellate Advocacy Seminar

LAW70362, Federal Criminal Law

LAW70451, Constitutional Criminal Procedure (Adjudication)

Scholarship

Articles

Smith, Corporate Criminal Liability: End It, Don't Mend It, --- J. Corp. L. --- (Apr./May 2022)

Has the “Machinery of Death” Become a Clunker?, --- U. Rich. L. Rev. --- (2015) (symposium issue)

Overcoming Overcriminalization, 102 J. Crim. L. & Criminology 537 (2013).

Fixing Federalization (in progress).

The Criminal Justice System as the Enemy of Liberty (reviewing William J. Stuntz, The Collapse of American Criminal Justice (Harv. Univ. Press 2011)).

Localism and Capital Punishment, 64 Vand. L. Rev. En Banc 105 (2011).

Taking Strickland Claims Seriously, 93 Marquette L. Rev. 515 (2010).

Clarence X?: The Black Nationalist Behind Justice Thomas's Constitutionalism, 4 NYU J.L. & LIB. 583 (2009).

Proportional Mens Rea, AM. CRIM. L. REV. 127 (2009);

The Supreme Court and the Politics of Death, 94 Va. L. Rev. 283 (2008).

'Innocence' and the Guilty Mind (in progress)

Proportionality and Federalization, 91 Va. L. Rev. 879 (2005).

Activism as Restraint: Lessons from Criminal Procedure, 80 Tex. L. Rev. 1057 (2002).

Book chapters

Criminal Procedure after Rehnquist, in The Constitutional Legacy of William H. Rehnquist (West 2015) (Bradford P. Wilson, ed.)

Essays/Book Reviews

Yates v. United States: A Case Study in Overcriminalization, 163 U. Pa. L. Rev. Online 147 (2014)

Response to Michael Sandel,_ in _Symposium: A Common Morality for the Global Age: In Gratitude for What We Are Given, 3 J. L. PHILOSOPHY & CULTURE (2009).

Jail for Juvenile Child Pornographers? A Reply to Professor Leary, 15 Va. J. Soc. Pol'y & Law ---- (2008) (Issue 3)

Cultural Change and Catholic Lawyers, 1 Ave Maria L. Rev. 31 (2003). (solicited piece for inaugural issue)

'We the Protestants', First Things: The Journal of Religion in Public Life, Dec. 2002 issue, at 43 (reviewing SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE by Philip Hamburger).

The Rehnquist Court and Criminal Procedure, 73 U. Colo. L. Rev. 1337 (2002) (symposium).

Taking Lessons from the Left? Judicial Activism on the Right, 1 Geo. J. L. & Pub. Pol'y 57 (2002) (solicited piece for inaugural issue)

Areas of Expertise

• Capital Punishment – Sentencing
• Constitutional Criminal Procedure
• Constitutional Law
• Criminal Law
• Federal Criminal Law & Procedure