NRL News
Page 8
September 2009
Volume 36
Issue 9

NRLC General Counsel James Bopp Named
Republican Lawyer of the Year

The Board of Governors of the Republican National Lawyers Association (RNLA) has recognized NRLC General Counsel James Bopp, Jr., as the 2009 Republican Lawyer of the Year. The Republican Lawyer of the Year award recognizes lawyers for outstanding professional accomplishments and years of dedicated service to the Republican Party and its ideals. Mr. Bopp received his award September 9 at the Capitol Hill Club in Washington, D.C.

Mr. Bopp, a member of the law firm of Bopp, Coleson & Bostrom, is best known to pro-lifers for his 31 years as general counsel for National Right to Life, the preeminent grassroots organization in the world. His legal expertise ranges from abortion, to withdrawing life-sustaining medical treatment and assisted suicide, through campaign finance and election law. Mr. Bopp has argued before the United States Supreme Court five times.

As general counsel for the National Right to Life Committee since 1978, Mr. Bopp’s efforts were instrumental in persuading the Supreme Court to uphold restrictions on abortion funding, the ban on partial-birth abortions, and requirements for informed consent. Furthermore, he was a leader in the successful effort to prevent the courts from recognizing a constitutional right to assisted suicide. Mr. Bopp has published two books on pro-life issues, Restoring the Right to Life: The Human Life Amendment and Human Life and Health Care Ethics.

Mr. Bopp, who currently serves as a member of the Board of Governors of the Republican National Lawyers Association and as its vice president for election education, is “perhaps the most prominent lawyer in the country in campaign finance and election law,” according to the ABA Journal. Bopp has participated in more than 100 election-related cases, including recounts, redistricting, and First Amendment challenges to state and federal campaign finance laws. He has won over 90% of those legal challenges on the merits, including four cases he argued in the United States Supreme Court.

Among these, Jim argued and won Republican Party of Minnesota v. White, the seminal case in the field of judicial elections; Randall v. Sorrell, which struck down Vermont’s low contribution and expenditure limits; and Wisconsin Right to Life v. Federal Election Commission, which held that McCain-Feingold’s prohibition on broadcast ads could not be applied to grassroots lobbying.

Mr. Bopp has been vice chairman of the Republican National Committee since 2008 and Indiana Republican Party national committeeman since 2006. He is a member of The Federalist Society and served as co-chairman of its Election Law Subcommittee from 1996 to 2005.

He previously served on the President’s Committee on Mental Retardation, the Congressional Biomedical Ethics Advisory Committee, and the National Institutes of Health’s Fetal Tissue Transplant Research Panel. Mr. Bopp is also president of the National Legal Center for the Medically Dependent and Disabled, general counsel for the James Madison Center for Free Speech, editor-in-chief of the quarterly law review Issues in Law and Medicine, and general counsel for the Indiana Republican Party. He resides in Terre Haute, Indiana, with his wife, Christine. They have three college-aged daughters.