Speaker Biographies

Henry N. Butler is the executive director of the Searle Center and senior lecturer at Northwestern University School of Law. Before joining Northwestern in 2007, Mr. Butler was the James Farley Professor of Economics in the George L. Argyros School of Business and Economics and professor of law (by courtesy) at Chapman University in Orange, California. Mr. Butler has served as director of the Judicial Education Program at the AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies since 2002. Before moving to Chapman in 2001, he was the Fred C. and Mary R. Koch Distinguished Professor of Law and Economics at the University of Kansas Schools of Law and Business. He has held academic positions at Texas A&M University, the University of Chicago Law School, and George Mason University School of Law. Mr. Butler is an expert on the economic analysis of law, and he has published numerous articles and several books on a variety of topics. His articles have appeared in leading economics journals and law reviews, including the Journal of Law and Economics, the Journal of Legal Studies, the Journal of Law, Economics, and Organizations, the Virginia Law Review, the Cornell Law Review, and the Yale Journal on Regulation. Mr. Butler serves on the Legal Advisory Council of the AEI Legal Center for the Public Interest, the advisory board of the Atlantic Legal Foundation, and the Legal Policy Advisory Board of the Washington Legal Foundation.

Rick Geddes is an associate professor and director of undergraduate studies in the Department of Policy Analysis and Management at Cornell University. He served as a commissioner on the National Surface Transportation Policy and Revenue Study Commission in May of 2006. From August 2004 to July 2005, Mr. Geddes was a senior staff economist at the President’s Council of Economic Advisers. He is also a member of the advisory board of Systems Alliance, Inc. He has written books on postal reform and antitrust issues, and his articles have appeared in the American Economic Review, the Journal of Regulatory Economics, the Encyclopedia of Law and Economics, the Journal of Legal Studies, the Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, and the Journal of Law and Economics, among others. He teaches courses at Cornell on corporate governance and the regulation of industry. He was a visiting faculty fellow at Yale Law School during the 1995–96 academic year and a national fellow at the Hoover Institution in 1999–2000. He taught in the economics department at Fordham University from 1991 to 2002.

Kate Litvak is an assistant professor at the University of Texas Law School. She clerked for Judge Ralph K. Winter of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals and for Judge Frank H. Easterbrook of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. Her primary scholarly interests are in the areas of corporate and securities laws, venture capital and private equity, and corporate finance. Ms. Litvak’s current projects include several studies of the impact of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act on foreign companies and a large study of venture capital contracts and litigation surrounding those contracts.

Peter J. Wallison holds the Arthur F. Burns Chair in Financial Policy Studies at AEI, where he codirects the Institute’s program on financial market deregulation. He previously practiced banking, corporate, and financial law at Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington, D.C., and New York. From June 1981 to January 1985, Mr. Wallison was general counsel of the United States Treasury Department, where he had a significant role in the development of the Reagan administration’s proposals for deregulation in the financial services industry. He also served as general counsel to the Depository Institutions Deregulation Committee and participated in the Treasury Department’s efforts to deal with the debt held by less-developed countries. During 1986 and 1987, Mr. Wallison was White House counsel to President Ronald Reagan. Between 1972 and 1976, Mr. Wallison served first as special assistant to Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller and, subsequently, as counsel to Mr. Rockefeller when he was vice president of the United States.

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