Henry Monaghan

Henry Paul Monaghan

  • Professor of Law
Education

LL.M., Harvard Law School, 1960
LL.B., Yale Law School, 1958
B.A., University of Massachusetts, 1955
A.A., Holyoke Junior College, 1953

Areas of Study
Areas of Specialty

Constitutional Law
Federal Jurisdiction
Federal Courts
First Amendment
Presidency

As one of the nation’s preeminent scholars of constitutional law and federal courts, Henry Paul Monaghan has inspired generations of students and practitioners through his teaching and writing. His rigorous and analytic work illuminates complex constitutional law and federal jurisdiction issues for scholars, lawyers, and Supreme Court justices alike.

Monaghan is best known for penning a series of landmark articles in both constitutional law and federal courts in the Columbia Law Review: “Marbury and the Administrative State” (1983), “Stare Decisis and Constitutional Adjudication” (1988), “The Protective Power of the Presidency” (1993), and “On Avoiding Avoidance, Agenda Control, and Related Matters” (2012). American Constitutional Law: Selected Essays (Carolina Academic Press, 2018) offers a primer on the overall trajectory of his constitutional law arguments.

Monaghan’s robust body of scholarship was recognized in 2017 by the Federal Courts Section of the Association of American Law Schools (AALS), which presented him as a co-recipient with the inaugural Daniel J. Meltzer Award. In 2010, he received Columbia Law School’s Medal for Excellence alongside Attorney General of the United States Eric Holder ’76. In 2019, he was elected to Who’s Who in America. 

Since joining the faculty in 1984, Monaghan has played an instrumental role in enhancing Columbia Law School’s intellectual life. He helped develop the Center for Constitutional Governance, established to advance the study of constitutional structure and authority, and established a series of annual weekly summer workshops more than two decades ago on public law that engage faculty and visiting scholars in debate about trending legal issues and judicial rulings.

Publications

  • “Jurisdiction Stripping, Circa 2020: What ‘The Dialogue’ (Still) Has to Teach Us,” 69 Duke Law Journal, 2019
  • “Al Hill: A Grandmaster Has Passed,” 117 Columbia Law Review, May 2017
  • “A Cause of Action, Anyone?: Federal Equity and the Preemption of State Law,” 91 Notre Dame Law Review 1807, 2016 (Symposium)”Supremacy Clause Fundamentalism,” 110 Columbia Law Review, April 2010
  • “Supranational Judicial Review,” 107 Columbia Law Review 833, 2007
  • “John Hart Ely,” special issue, Yale Law School, 2004
  • “John Hart Ely, Jr., Requiem,” 58 Miami Law Review 979, 2004
  • “John Hart Ely, Jr.: The Harvard Years," 117 Harvard Law Review 1748, 2004
  • “Doing Originalism," 104 Columbia Law Review 32, 2004
  • “Supreme Court Review of State Court Determinations of State Law in Constitutional Cases,” 103 Columbia Law Review 1919, 2003
  • “A Legal Giant Is Dead,” 100 Columbia Law Review 1370, 2000
  • “Antisuit Injunctions and Preclusion Against Absent Nonresident Class Members,” 98 Columbia Law Review 1148, 1998
  • “Comments on Campaign Finance Reform,” 6 Brooklyn J. of L. Pol. 129, 1997
  • “The Sovereign Immunity Exception,” 110 Harvard Law Review 102, 1996
  • “We the People[s], Original Understanding and Constitutional Amendment,” 96 Columbia Law Review 121, 1995
  • “The Age of Statutory Fundamental Rights,” XIV The Torqueville Review 139, 1993
  • “The Protective Power of the Presidency,” 93 Columbia Law Review 1, 1993
  • “Federal Statutory Review Under Section 1983 and the APA,” 91 Columbia Law Review 233, 1990

Honors and Awards

Faculty Mentoring Award (Columbia University)

2024

Marquis, Who’s Who in America

2019

Co-recipient of first Daniel J. Meltzer Federal Courts Award

2017

Tenth Annual Scarpa Conference Honoree

2015

Medal for Excellence (Columbia Law School)

2010

Harlan Fiske Stone Professor of Constitutional Law (Columbia Law School)

1988-2019

Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences

1986

News and Press