Monday, October 1, 2007
Page 3
Alex Kozinski Gets Witkin Medal From State Bar
By a MetNews Staff Writer
Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Alex Kozinski was presented Friday with the State Bar of California’s Bernard Witkin Medal.
The medal, established in 1993, recognizes “those legal giants among us who have altered the landscape of California jurisprudence.” It is conferred on people “who, through a career of extraordinary service, have made significant contributions to the quality of justice and legal scholarship in our state.”
Outgoing State Bar President Sheldon Sloan presented the medal to Kozinski, 57, at the State Bar’s convention in Anaheim.
Kozinski has been a judge on the Ninth Circuit since 1985. At the time President Reagan appointed him to what was then a new seat on the bench, he was the youngest federal appeals court judge in the country.
A graduate in economics from UCLA, and a graduate of UCLA law school, Kozinski began his career as a law clerk for then-Ninth Circuit Judge Anthony Kennedy. He then clerked for then-Chief Justice Warren Burger before beginning his own practice.
Three years later, in 1980, he served as deputy legal counsel for Ronald Reagan’s presidential campaign, and was later made assistant White House counsel. In 1981, he was named special counsel of the Merit Systems Protection Board, and in 1982, Reagan named him chief judge of the newly formed Court of Federal Claims.
The medal proclamation read:
“Judge Kozinski’s lifelong commitment and outstanding contributions toward equality and justice for all, his dedication to his profession, his work for the protection of the public, as well as diversity and equality in the profession, and the preservation and improvement of our social and justice systems, is greatly admired and respected by all who know him.”
Copyright 2007, Metropolitan News Company