Owen Fiss is Sterling Professor Emeritus of Law at Yale University. He clerked for Thurgood Marshall when he served on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and later for William J. Brennan, Jr. on the Supreme Court. Fiss also served in the Civil Rights Division of the Department of Justice from 1966 to 1968. He is the author of many books, including The Law As It Could Be, The Irony of Free Speech, and Pillars of Justice. In 2020, the American Philosophical Society awarded Fiss the Henry M. Phillips Prize for his lifetime achievement in jurisprudence.