Catherine E. Smith
Professor of Children’s Constitutional Rights
Chauncey G. Wilson Memorial Research Chair
303-871-6180 (Office)
Office 464A, Frank H. Ricketson Law Bldg., 2255 East Evans Ave. Denver, CO 80208
Specialization(s)
Employment and Labor Law, Torts, Workplace Law
Professional Biography
Catherine Smith joined the faculty at the University of Denver Sturm College of Law in 2004. After graduating from the University of South Carolina School of Law, Professor Smith clerked for the late Chief Judge Henry A. Politz of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and for U.S. Magistrate Judge William M. Catoe Jr. She then served as a legal fellow at the Southern Poverty Law Center. Professor Smith teaches Torts, Sexuality, Gender and the Law, and a seminar on Children’s Rights and the Constitution. Her most recent scholarship seeks to understand and contribute to a robust children’s equality law. Her co-authored amicus brief on children’s rights was cited and relied upon in the same-sex marriage decision, Obergefell v. Hodges. She recently completed a chapter (“concurring opinion”) in, What Obergefell v. Hodges Should Have Said: The Nation’s Top Legal Experts Rewrite America’s Same-Sex Marriage Opinion (Jack M. Balkin, ed., Yale University Press, 2020) and currently serves as an expert in Juliana v. United States, the landmark climate case brought by twenty-one young people suing the federal government for its role in the climate crisis.
Op-Ed
The Smartest Constitutional Argument For Marriage Equality that No One is Making,
Blog posts
Obergefell and the Interests of Children
Ban Proponents Slept Through a Revolution: But Not the One You Think
How Marriage Bans Harmed Children of Same-Sex Parents
Degree(s)
- JD, University of South Carolina, 1996
- MA, University of South Carolina, 1993
- BA, Government and French, Wofford College, 1991
Featured Publications
- Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars of the Constitutional Rights and Interests of Children in Support of Respondents, co-authored with Tanya Washington, Lauren Fontana, Jessica Dixon Weaver, Cary Martin Shelby, Angela Onwauchi-Willig (August 27, 2020).
- State Action That Penalizes Children as Evidence of a Desire to Harm Politically Unpopular Parents, 51 Suffolk L. Rev. 439 (2018).
- Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars of The Constitutional Rights and Interests Of Children in Support of Respondents in Masterpiece Cakeshop LTD, et al v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, co-authored with Lauren Fontana, Angela Onwuachi-Willig,Tanya M. Washington, Barbara Bennett Woodhouse (2017).
- Obergefell’s Missed Opportunity, 79 Law & Contemporary Problems 223 (2016).
- Brief of Amici Curiae Scholars of the Constitutional Rights of Children in Support of Petitioners in Obergefell v. Hodges, co-authored with Lauren Fontana, Tanya Washington and Susannah Pollvogt (March 9, 2015).
- Brief for Amici Curiae Scholars of the Constitutional Rights of Children in Support of Respondent Edith Windsor Addressing the Merits and Supporting Affirmance, co-authored with Jay Brown, Kyle Velte, Susannah Pollvogt, Tanya Washington (2015).
- Children as Proto-Citizens: Equal Protection, Citizenship, and Lessons from the Child-Centered Cases, co-authored with susannah pollvogt, UC Davis Law Review, Forthcoming.
- Looking to Torts: Exploring the Risks of Workplace Discrimination, 75 Ohio State Law Journal 1207 (2014).
- Amicus Brief of Scholars of the Constitutional Rights of Children, co-authored with Susannah Pollvogt , Tanya Washington, filed in United States v. Windsor, No. 12-307 (2013), reprinted in 17 J. Gender, Race & Just. 467 (2014).
- Equal Protection for Children of Same-Sex Parents, 90 Washington University Law Review 1589 (2013).
- Foreword to Social Class, Race and Legal Education, co-authored with Joyce Sterling, 88 Denv. U. L. Rev. (2012).
- Seven Principles: Increasing Access to Law School Among Students of Color, 96 Iowa Law Review 1677 (2011).
- The Rights of the Child, 88 Denv. U. L. Rev. Online (2011).
- Equal Protection for Children of Gay and Lesbian Parents: Challenging the Three Pillars of Exclusion - Legitimacy, Dual-Gender Parenting, and Biology, 28 Law and Inequality 307 (2010) Selected as one of the best sexual orientation law review articles of 2010 by the Williams Institute, UCLA Law School; Reprinted in 10 Dukeminer L.J. 97 (2011).
- A Cautionary Tale: Obama’s Coalition, Anti-Subordination Principles and Proposition 8, 86 DENV. UNIV. L. REV. 819 (2008-2009).
- Unconscious Bias and “Outsider” Interest Convergence, 40 CONN. L. REV. 1077 (2008).
- John Calmore’s America, co-authored with Robert Chang, 86 N.C. L. REV. 739 (2008).
- Queer as Black Folk?, 2007 Wis. L. Rev.
- Peace and Protest: Can city officials force protesters to identify themselves by name?, INTELLIGENCE REPORT, No. 121, Spring 2006.
- The Group Dangers of Race-Based Conspiracies, 59 Rutgers Law Review 55 (2006).
- Citizens' Unrest: In Arizona, a county prosecutor opens the door for vigilante justice, INTELLIGENCE REPORT, No. 120, Winter 2005.
- (Un)masking Race-Based Intra-Corporate Conspiracies Under the Ku Klux Klan Act, 11 Va. J. Soc. Pol'y & L. 129 (2004).
- Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress: An Old Arrow Targets the New Head of the Hate Hydra, 80 Denv. U. L. Rev. 1 (2002).
