The Symposium will take place on Friday, February 20, 2026, from 1:10 PM to 5:00 PM, at the Donna E. Shalala Student Center, North and South Activities Room.
Symposium Program PDF
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This year’s symposium, titled The Constitutional Mosaic: The Balance of Federal Powers in Modern America, will explore how the executive branch has evolved from the Founding to the modern era and how the executive branch interacts with the legislative and judicial branches, as well as administrative agencies.
By focusing on the Constitution and the balance of federal powers, we aim to foster discussions that examine the evolution of the executive branch from its constitutional origins to modern day. The Symposium will reflect on how these historical developments and shifts in legal doctrine have shaped presidential power, and how these changes impact the separation of powers, democratic accountability, and the rule of law today.
We are thrilled to welcome Professor Bamzai to deliver the opening keynote address. His address will examine the evolution of the executive branch from its constitutional origins to modern day. It will explore the ebbs and flows of presidential power and discuss how the dynamic nature of executive power affects the separation of powers, democratic accountability, and the rule of law today.
Welcome and Opening Remarks (1:10 PM – 1:15 PM)
The symposium will begin with brief welcoming remarks, setting the stage for an afternoon of thoughtful discussion on the evolution of the executive branch from the Founding to the modern era, and its relationship with the legislative and judicial branches, as well as administrative agencies, within the broader balance of federal powers.
Opening Keynote Address (1:15 PM – 1:45 PM)
SPEAKER
Aditya Bamzai, Professor of Law, University of Virginia
Professor Aditya Bamzai is a Professor of Law at the University of Virginia. He has taught administrative law, civil procedure, computer crime and conflicts of law, as well as seminars on advanced administrative law, sovereign debt and the Constitution, and legal controversies of the Founding era. His work on these and related subjects has been published in a variety of leading journals. He is also a co-author of the ninth edition of the casebook “Administrative Law: The American Public Law System, Cases and Materials.”
Panel I — Constitutional Conflicts: Executive Authority and Judicial Review (1:50 PM – 2:35 PM)
MODERATOR
Former Justice Raoul G. Cantero was the first justice of Hispanic descent appointed to the Florida Supreme Court. As a justice, he heard hundreds of appeals and authored over 100 opinions. In 2008, he joined the Miami office of White & Case. He is currently the Miami office’s managing partner and also leads its litigation practice. For over a decade, Chambers USA has ranked him Band 1 in Florida Appellate Practice. He has handled over 400 appeals and over 200 oral arguments. The publication LawDragon lists him as one of the top 500 lawyers in the United States.
PANELISTS
Judge Roy Altman, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Florida
Judge Roy Altman serves as a United States District Judge for the Southern District of Florida. At 36, he became the youngest federal district court judge in the country—and the youngest federal judge ever appointed in the Southern District of Florida. After graduating Yale Law School, the Judge clerked on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals for the Honorable Stanley Marcus. Judge Altman then became a federal prosecutor at the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Miami, where he twice received the Director of the Executive Office of U.S. Attorneys’ Award for Superior Performance by a federal prosecutor.
Judge Melissa Damian, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Florida
Judge Melissa Damian serves as a United States District Judge for the Southern District of Florida. Before she was sworn in as a District Judge, Judge Damian served as a Magistrate Judge in the Southern District of Florida since January 2022. From 2010 until taking the bench, Judge Damian practiced law in private practice, specializing in civil appeals and complex federal litigation, most recently as Of Counsel to the law firm Damian & Valori, Culmo Trial Partners in Miami, and, prior to that, as appellate counsel for the Ferraro Law Firm, specializing in product liability appeals. From 1999 to 2010, Judge Damian was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, most recently serving in the National Security Section where she earned the Attorney General’s Award for her work on matters of national security. Before joining the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Judge Damian was an associate with the law firm Kenny Nachwalter in Miami, where she specialized in securities litigation. From 1995 to 1997, Judge Damian served as a law clerk to the Honorable Ursula Ungaro in for the Southern District of Florida.
Judge Rodolfo Armando Ruiz II, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Florida
Judge Rodolfo “Rudy” Armando Ruiz II serves as a United States District Judge for the Southern District of Florida. Prior to his confirmation to the federal bench, Judge Ruiz was a Circuit Court Judge on the Eleventh Judicial Circuit of Florida, and a Miami-Dade County Court Judge. Before taking the state court bench, Judge Ruiz was an Assistant County Attorney with the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office. As an Assistant County Attorney, Judge Ruiz represented Miami-Dade County and government employees in federal and state court at both trial and appellate levels. Judge Ruiz was also an associate with White & Case L.L.P. before joining the Miami-Dade County Attorney’s Office.
Fireside Chat — The Evolution of Executive Power (2:45 PM – 2:15 PM)
MODERATOR
Professor Caroline Corbin is Professor of Law at the University of Miami School of Law. She teaches U.S. Constitutional Law I, U.S. Constitutional Law II, First Amendment, the Religion Clauses, the Free Speech Clause, Feminism and the First Amendment, and Advanced Topics in Reproductive Rights. Her scholarship focuses on the First Amendment’s speech and religion clauses, particularly their intersection with equality issues.
SPEAKER
Elizabeth Price Foley, Partner, Holtzman Vogel, PLLC
Elizabeth Price Foley is a Partner in the Washington, D.C. and Miami offices of Holtzman Vogel, PLLC, where she practices constitutional and appellate law. She is also a tenured Professor of Law at Florida International University College of Law, where she teaches constitutional law and separation of powers. Professor Foley is the author of three books on constitutional law published by Yale, Harvard, and Cambridge University Presses; is a frequent contributor to the opinion page of the Wall Street Journal; and is regularly asked to testify before Congress on issues of constitutional law. She previously served as a judicial clerk for Judge Carolyn Dineen King on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and as a senior legislative aide on Capitol Hill.
Panel II — Constitutional Tug-of-War: The Executive and Legislative Branch (3:25 PM – 4:05 PM)
MODERATOR
Professor Elizabeth Iglesias is the director of the Doctor of Juridical Science Program and a Professor of Law at the University of Miami School of Law. She is an expert in Civil Rights, Constitutional Law, Law and Political Economy, LatCrit Theory and Philosophy of Law, and International Criminal Law and Procedure. Professor Iglesias’s body of work reflects a sustained, interdisciplinary engagement with the protection of democracy, racial and social justice, international human rights, and the structural dynamics of power. A major theme across her work is the defense of democratic institutions against executive overreach.
PANELISTS
Professor Michael Gerhardt is the Burton Craig Distinguished Professor of Jurisprudence at the University of North Carolina Law School. He earned degrees from Yale University (BA, magna cum laude), London School of Economics (M.Sc.), and the University of Chicago (JD, cum laude). After graduating law school, Professor Gerhardt clerked for two federal judges and practiced law for three years in Washington, D.C. He is the author of nine books, has testified more than twenty times before Congress, and has served as special counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee for six Supreme Court nominations and to the Presiding Officer in the second impeachment trial of Donald Trump. In 2024, he received UNC’s Thomas Jefferson Award, its highest honor in recognition of his public service. He has served as CNN’s resident expert on impeachment during the impeachment proceedings against President Clinton and the first impeachment of President Trump.
Professor Victoria Nourse is one of the nation’s leading scholars of Congress, the separation of powers, and statutory interpretation. In addition to her scholarship, she has practiced as an attorney in the White House, the Department of Justice, the Senate, and in private practice. The story of her pioneering work on gender equality is told in Equal: Women Reshape American Law.
Panel III — The Fourth Branch? Executive Control and the Administrative State (4:15 PM – 4:55 PM)
MODERATOR
Professor Charlton Copeland is Professor of Law at the University of Miami School of Law. His scholarship has focused primarily on the ways in which federalism as a constitutional and political structure is mediated in the relationship between federal and state courts, the jurisprudence of remedies for state violations of federal law, and the relationship between state and federal implementation of federal policy.
PANELISTS
Professor Noah Rosenblum is an Associate Professor of Law at New York University School of Law and faculty director of the Vanderbilt Scholars Program and Katzmann Symposium. Professor Rosenblum works primarily in administrative law, constitutional law, and legal history. His research takes a historical approach to the study of state institutions, seeking to understand how law can be used to promote democratic accountability. He is currently pursuing several projects on the history of the place of the president in the administrative state.
Professor Kimberly Wehle is an expert in constitutional law and the separation of powers, with particular emphasis on presidential power and administrative agencies. She is a tenured law professor at the University of Baltimore School of Law, where she teaches constitutional law, civil procedure, administrative law, and federal courts. Winner of the University of Maryland System Board of Regents Award for excellence in scholarship, she writes in the areas of administrative and constitutional law, with particular interest in separation of powers questions and the modern Supreme Court. She has published in the Notre Dame Law Review, the Stanford Law and Policy Review, and the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Law and Public Affairs, among many other scholarly journals.
Closing Remarks (4:55 PM – 5:00 PM)
Symposium Sponsors
We would like to thank this year’s symposium sponsors, LAFAC and the University of Miami School of Law. The support is greatly appreciated.
