Jeffrey Stuart Sutton (born October 31, 1960) is an American lawyer and jurist serving as the

chief judge Chief judge may refer to: In lower or circuit courts The highest-ranking or most senior member of a lower court or circuit court with more than one judge. * Chief judge (Australia) * Chief judge (United States) In supreme courts Some of Chief ...

of the

United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit (in case citations, 6th Cir.) is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts: * Eastern District of Kentucky * Western District of K ...

. Sutton was appointed to the Sixth Circuit in 2003 by President

George W. Bush George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician and businessman who was the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Bush family and the Republican Party (United States), Republican Party, he i ...

and has served as its chief judge since 2021.

Early life and career

Sutton received a

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

degree in history from

Williams College Williams College is a Private college, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States. It was established as a men's college in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim ...

in 1983. Sutton worked as a

paralegal A paralegal, also known as a legal assistant or paralegal specialist, is a legal professional who performs tasks that require knowledge of legal concepts but not the full expertise of a lawyer with an admission to practice law. The market for p ...

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

, and spent a summer at an

archaeological dig In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...

site in

Jordan Jordan, officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, is a country in the Southern Levant region of West Asia. Jordan is bordered by Syria to the north, Iraq to the east, Saudi Arabia to the south, and Israel and the occupied Palestinian ter ...

as part of a

United States Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy of the United State ...

cultural exchange Culture ( ) is a concept that encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, attitudes, and habits of the individuals in these ...

program, then returned to Ohio to be a high school history teacher and varsity soccer coach at the

Columbus Academy Columbus Academy (CA) is an independent college- preparatory school for students from pre-kindergarten to twelfth grade. The school is located on a large, secluded campus surrounded by wooded areas in Gahanna, Ohio, in the United States, 8 miles ...

, a private school in

Gahanna, Ohio Gahanna is a city in northeastern Franklin County, Ohio, United States. It is a suburb of Columbus, Ohio, Columbus. The population was 35,726 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It was founded in 1849. History Gahanna was founded al ...

. Sutton received his

Juris Doctor A Juris Doctor, Doctor of Jurisprudence, or Doctor of Law (JD) is a graduate-entry professional degree that primarily prepares individuals to practice law. In the United States and the Philippines, it is the only qualifying law degree. Other j ...

from

Ohio State University The Ohio State University (Ohio State or OSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio, United States. A member of the University System of Ohio, it was founded in 1870. It is one ...

Moritz College of Law The Michael E. Moritz College of Law is the law school of Ohio State University, a public land-grant research university in Columbus, Ohio. Founded in 1891, the school is located in Drinko Hall on the main campus of the Ohio State University in C ...

in 1990. He then clerked for Judge

Thomas Meskill Thomas Joseph Meskill Jr. (January 30, 1928 – October 29, 2007) was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. He previously served as the 82nd governor of Connecticut, as a United States rep ...

of the

United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit (in case citations, 2d Cir.) is one of the thirteen United States Courts of Appeals. Its territory covers the states of Connecticut, New York (state), New York, and Vermont, and it has ap ...

from 1990 to 1991. Next he clerked at the

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...

for Justice

Lewis F. Powell Jr. Lewis Franklin Powell Jr. (September 19, 1907 – August 25, 1998) was an American lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1972 to 1987. Born in Suffolk, Virginia, he graduated ...

, who had assumed senior status, then for Justice

Antonin Scalia Antonin Gregory Scalia (March 11, 1936 – February 13, 2016) was an American jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1986 until his death in 2016. He was described as the intellectual an ...

from 1991 to 1992. Scalia later said that Sutton was "one of the very best law clerks eever had". Sutton was in private practice in Columbus at the law firm

Jones Day Jones Day is an American multinational law firm based in Washington, D.C. As of 2023, it is one of the largest law firms in the United States, with 2,302 attorneys, and among the highest-grossing in the world with revenues of $2.5 billion. Foun ...

from 1992 to 1995 and 1998 to 2003, serving as

Solicitor General of Ohio The Solicitor General of Ohio, Ohio Solicitor General, State Solicitor of Ohio, or Ohio State Solicitor is the top appellate solicitor or lawyer for the U.S. state of Ohio. It is an appointed position in the Office of the Ohio Attorney General ...

from 1995 to 1998. He has also served as an adjunct professor of law at the

since 1994 and more recently as a visiting lecturer at

Harvard Law School Harvard Law School (HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a Private university, private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, Harvard Law School is the oldest law school in continuous operation in the United ...

. He teaches state constitutional law, a subject in which he is particularly interested and about which he has written extensively.

Federal judicial service

Sutton was first nominated by President

on May 9, 2001, to a seat on the Sixth Circuit vacated by David A. Nelson, who assumed senior status on October 1, 1999. That nomination, made during the

107th United States Congress The 107th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives. It met in Washington, D.C., from January ...

, never received a floor vote in the

United States Senate The United States Senate is a chamber of the Bicameralism, bicameral United States Congress; it is the upper house, with the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives being the lower house. Together, the Senate and ...

. Sutton was not confirmed until almost two years later, on April 29, 2003, when the Senate of the

108th United States Congress The 108th United States Congress was a meeting of the legislative branch of the United States federal government, composed of the United States Senate and the United States House of Representatives from January 3, 2003, to January 3, 2005, durin ...

confirmed him by a 52–41 vote. He received his commission on May 5, 2003. He became Chief Judge on May 1, 2021.

Notable opinions

In 2007, Sutton dissented in part when the Sixth Circuit held that a police officer did not have

qualified immunity In the United States, qualified immunity is a legal principle of federal law that grants government officials performing discretionary (optional) functions immunity from lawsuits for damages unless the plaintiff shows that the official violated "c ...

for arresting a speaker for using foul language at a town meeting. In June 2011, Sutton became the first judge appointed by a Republican to rule in favor of the

health care Health care, or healthcare, is the improvement or maintenance of health via the preventive healthcare, prevention, diagnosis, therapy, treatment, wikt:amelioration, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other disability, physic ...

mandate in President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...

's Health Care law. In November 2014, Sutton authored the 2–1

opinion An opinion is a judgement, viewpoint, or statement that is not conclusive, as opposed to facts, which are true statements. Definition A given opinion may deal with subjective matters in which there is no conclusive finding, or it may deal ...

ruling upholding same-sex marriage bans in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee in the Sixth Circuit reversing six previous federal district court rulings. The ruling was the second federal court ruling and the only Federal Court of Appeals ruling to uphold same-sex marriage bans after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a portion of the

Defense of Marriage Act The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) was a United States federal law passed by the 104th United States Congress and signed into law by President Bill Clinton on September 21, 1996. It banned federal recognition of same-sex marriage by limitin ...

in ''

United States v. Windsor ''United States v. Windsor'', 570 U.S. 744 (2013), is a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark United States Supreme Court civil rights case concerning same-sex marriage in the United States, same-sex marriage. The Cou ...

'' in June 2013. This ran counter to rulings by the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the 4th, 7th, 9th and 10th circuits, which then led the U.S. Supreme Court to grant

writ of certiorari In law, ''certiorari'' is a court process to seek judicial review of a decision of a lower court or government agency. ''Certiorari'' comes from the name of a prerogative writ in England, issued by a superior court to direct that the record of ...

to review same-sex marriage bans when it previously declined to do so. In ''

Obergefell v. Hodges ''Obergefell v. Hodges'', ( ), is a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court which ruled that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of th ...

'' the Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Sixth Circuit. On December 17, 2021, in ''In re MCP No. 165, OSHA, Interim Final Rule: COVID-19 Vaccination & Testing'', 20 F.4th 264 (6th Cir. 2021), Chief Judge Sutton dissented from the denial of initial hearing en banc. The case concerned a rule issued by the Secretary of Labor requiring “roughly 80 million workers to become vaccinated or face a weekly self-financed testing requirement and a daily masking requirement.” Chief Judge Sutton’s opinion argues that the Secretary of Labor lacks “authority to impose this vaccine-or-test mandate.” On April 12, 2022, in ''Arizona v. Biden'' (6th Cir. 2022), Judge Sutton wrote a concurrence suggesting that nationwide injunctions "seem to take the judicial power beyond its traditionally understood uses, permitting district courts to order the government to act or refrain from acting toward nonparties in the case." On July 8, 2023, Sutton temporarily halted a lower court injunction on Tennessee's law banning gender affirming care for minors. Sutton reasoned that there is no "deeply rooted" historical or traditional evidence that the treatment is allowed. He did note that the current ruling allowing the ban on gender-affirming care to go into effect is temporary, saying, "We may be wrong." He has currently set forth a tentative date of September 30, 2023 to have a final judgement on the matter. On July 12, 2024, in ''Gore v. Lee'' (6th Cir. 2024), Chief Judge Sutton authored a majority opinion that upheld a Tennessee law that “treats the sex listed on a birth certificate as a historical fact unchangeable by an individual’s transition to a different gender identity.” The opinion described biological sex as “a medical fact of birth collected by the State about everyone” and rejected arguments that the U.S. Constitution “require Tennessee to change the biological sex listed on the birth certificates of transgender individuals to match their gender identities.” Judge

Helene White Helene N. White (born December 2, 1954) is a Senior status, senior United States federal judge, United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. Previously, she was a judge on the Michigan Court of Appeals. ...

authored a dissenting opinion arguing that Tennessee impermissibly “classifies individuals based on the State’s generalizations of what it means to be truly male and female.”

Feeder Judge

Since joining the bench, Judge Sutton has been one of the most prolific feeder judges, sending a number of his law clerks to the Supreme Court.

Other

Sutton chaired the Advisory Committee on Appellate Rules of the

Judicial Conference of the United States The Judicial Conference of the United States, formerly known as the Conference of Senior Circuit Judges, was created by the United States Congress in 1922 with the principal objective of framing policy guidelines for administration of judicial co ...

from 2009 to 2012, and served on the committee beginning in 2005. He went on to chair the Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure from 2012 to 2015.

Other views

On a

podcast A podcast is a Radio program, program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. Typically, a podcast is an Episode, episodic series of digital audio Computer file, files that users can download to a personal device or str ...

with

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other tertiary education, post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin ...

Noah Feldman Noah Raam Feldman (born May 22, 1970) is an American legal scholar and academic. He is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School and chairman of the Harvard Society of Fellows. He is the author of 10 books, host of the podcas ...

, Judge Sutton, a

conservative Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy and ideology that seeks to promote and preserve traditional institutions, customs, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civiliza ...

originalist Originalism is a legal theory in the United States which bases constitutional, judicial, and statutory interpretation of text on the original understanding at the time of its adoption. Proponents of the theory object to judicial activism a ...

, expressed the view that the

's December 2000 decision in ''

Bush v. Gore ''Bush v. Gore'', 531 U.S. 98 (2000), was a landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States, United States Supreme Court on December 12, 2000, that settled a recount dispute in Florida's 2000 presidential election between George W ...

'' was wrongly decided.

Published works

*Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Browning Symposium Opening Comments
'. (15 April 2023). ''Montana Law Review''. 84 (2): 9–18. *Levi, David F., Lohier Jr., Raymond J., Sutton, Jeffrey S., & Wood, Diane P.
Losing Faith: Why Public Distrust in the Judiciary Matters - And What Judges Can Do about It
'. (2022). ''Judicature''. 106 (2): 71–77. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
What Should Be National and What Should Be Local in American Judicial Review
'.(2022). ''The Supreme Court Review''. 2022: 191-218 *Rockenbach, John L. & Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Respect and Deference in American Administrative Law
'. (17 November 2022). ''Boston University Law Review''. 102 (6): 1937–1948. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
21st Century Federalism: A View from the States
'. (5 March 2022). ''Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy''. 46: 31–41. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Who Decides?: States as Laboratories of Constitutional Experimentation
' (Oxford Univ. Press 2021) ISBN 9780197582183 *Scalia, Antonin. 2020. Sutton, Jeffrey S., & Whelan, Edward, ed.s
The Essential Scalia: On the Constitution, the Courts, and the Rule of Law
' (Forum Books 2020) ISBN 9781984824103 *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Response to the University of Illinois Law Review Symposium on 51 Imperfect Solutions
'. (2020). ''Illinois Law Review''. 2020 (5): 1393–1400. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Great Proceduralist
'. (2020). ''Ohio State Law Review''. 81 (4): 605–609. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
The Enduring Salience of State Constitutional Law
'. (12 November 2019). ''Rutgers University Law Review''. 70 (4): 791–801. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
A Response to Justice Goodwin Liu
'. (28 March 2019). ''The Yale Law Journal Forum''. 936–942. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
51 Imperfect Solutions: States and the Making of American Constitutional Law
' (Oxford Univ. Press 2018). ISBN 9780190088811 *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Change Agents: Looking to State Constitutions for Rights Innovations
'. (2018). ''Judicature''. 102 (2): 27–30. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
2018 James R. Browning Distinguished Lecture in Law
'. (16 November 2018). ''Montana Law Review.'' 79 (2): 1–12. *Jones, Brittany & Sutton, Jeffrey S
''The Certiorari Process and State Court Decisions''
(May 2018). ''Harvard Law Review''. 131 (7): 167–178. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Remembering Justice Scalia
'. (June 2017). ''Stanford Law Review''. 69: 1595–1601. *Sutton, Jeffrey S. & Webb, Derek A.
Bold and Persistent Reform: The 2015 Amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and the 2017 Pilot Projects
'. (Fall 2017). ''Judicature''. 101 (3): 13–21. *Garner, Bryan A., Bea, Carlos, Berch, Rebecca White, Gorsuch, Neil M., Hartz, Harris L., Hecht, Nathan L., Kavanaugh, Brett M., Kozinski, Alex, Lynch, Sandra L., Pryor Jr., William H., Reavley, Thomas M., Sutton, Jeffrey S., & Wood, Diane P.
The Law of Judicial Precedent
' (Thomson Reuters, 2016). ISBN 9780314634207 *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Courts, Rights, and New Technology: Judging in an Ever-Changing World
'. (17 September 2014). ''NYU Journal of Law & Liberty''. 8: 260-278 *Sutton, Jeffrey S
''Courts as Change Agents: Do We Want More — Or Less?''
(14 March 2014). ''Harvard Law Review''. 127 (5): 1419–1445. *Sutton, Jeffrey S
Barnette'', Frankfurter, and Judicial Review''
(Fall 2012). ''Marquette Law Review''. 96 (1): 133–150. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
What Does—and Does Not—Ail State Constitutional Law
'. (14 May 2011). ''University of Kansas Law Review''. 59: 687–714. *Holland, Randy J., McAllister, Stephen R., Shaman, Jeffrey M., & Sutton, Jeffrey S.
State Constitutional Law: The Modern Experience
'. (2010). ISBN 9781634596824 *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Hon. David A. Nelson U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
'. (11 October 2010). ''Federal Bar Association''. *Sutton, Jeffrey S
''A Review of Richard A. Posner ''How Judges Think
(2008). ''Michigan Law Review''. 108 (6): 859–876. *Sutton, Jeffrey S
''The Role of History in Judging Disputes About the Meaning of the Constitution''
(17 September 2008). ''Texas Tech Law Review''. 41: 1173–1192. *Sutton, Jeffrey S.
Why Teach—And Why Study—State Constitutional Law
'. (Summer 2009). ''Oklahoma City University Law Review.'' 34 (2): 165–178. *Sutton, Jeffrey S
San Antonio Independent School District v. Rodriguez ''and its Aftermath''
(December 2008). ''Virginia Law Review''. 94 (8): 1963–1986. *Sutton, Jeffrey S
''An Appellate Perspective on Federal Sentencing After'' Booker ''and'' Rita
(1 January 2007). ''Denver University Law Review.'' 79: 79-91 *Sutton, Jeffrey S
Measuring Damages Under the United Nations Convention on the International Sale of Goods
(1989). ''Ohio State Law Journal''. 50 (3): 737-752.

References

External links

*
Appearances at the U.S. Supreme Court
from the

Oyez Project The Oyez Project is an unofficial online multimedia archive website for the Supreme Court of the United States. It was initiated by the Illinois Institute of Technology's Chicago-Kent College of Law and now also sponsored by Cornell Law School Le ...

Federalist Society membership

American Law Institute
, - {{DEFAULTSORT:Sutton, Jeffrey 1960 births Living people 20th-century American lawyers 21st-century American lawyers Jones Day people Judges of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit Law clerks of the Supreme Court of the United States Ohio State University Moritz College of Law alumni People from Dhahran Solicitors general of Ohio United States court of appeals judges appointed by George W. Bush Williams College alumni