On Sept. 27, 2018, the Hon. Carlos F. Lucero, Circuit Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, delivered the seventh annual John Paul Stevens Lecture. Hosted by the Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law at the University of Colorado Law School, Lucero’s talk, "A Constitutional Call to Arms and Reflections on a Judicial Career,” focused on contemporary challenges to the Constitution and what role lawyers have to support and defend the Constitution.
The lecture included a Q&A discussion with Suzette Malveaux, Provost Professor of Civil Rights Law and director of the White Center. Lucero also responded to questions from student leaders Leah Fugere (’20), president of the Christian Legal Society; Nicholas Monck (’19), president of the Student Bar Association; and Hannah Regan-Smith (‘19), editor-in-chief of the University of Colorado Law Review.
Watch the recording:
Lucero was appointed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit by President Clinton on June 30, 1995. A native Coloradan, Lucero received his undergraduate degree from Adams State College and his law degree from the George Washington University Law School. After law school, he clerked for Judge William E. Doyle on the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado. Lucero then entered private practice in Alamosa, Colorado, where he became senior partner of Lucero, Lester and Sigmund. He served as president of the Colorado Bar Association from 1977 to 1978.
Notable opinions authored by Lucero include Kitchen v. Herbert, 755 F.3d 1193 (10th Cir. 2014) (first among the circuits in ruling that state bans on same-sex marriage are unconstitutional); Hawker v. Sandy City Corp., 774 F.3d 1243 (10th Cir. 2014) (concurring opinion) (criticizing the school-to-prison pipeline); and Peterson v. Martinez, 707 F.3d 1197 (10th Cir. 2013) (holding that the Second Amendment does not protect a right to concealed carry).
Lucero has received the Professional Service Award of the Colorado Hispanic Bar Association, the Professional Service Award of the League of United Latin American Citizens, the Distinguished Alumnus Award from George Washington University, and the National Jurist of the Year Award from the Hispanic National Bar Association. He is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, International Academy of Trial Lawyers, International Society of Barristers, American Bar Foundation, and the Colorado Bar Foundation. Lucero is also an honorary member of the University of Colorado Law School Order of the Coif.
This year’s lecture was sponsored by the Colorado LGBT Bar Association and the Colorado Hispanic Bar Association.
The annual Stevens Lecture brings a distinguished jurist to Colorado to lead a public discussion of judging and the judicial system. On Sept. 26, 2017, Jonathan Lippman, former chief judge of New York and a pioneer in addressing access to justice, delivered the sixth annual Stevens Lecture on “Changing the Dialogue on Access to Justice.” In 2016, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor visited Boulder and participated in a Q&A conversation with more than 1,500 participants for the fifth annual Stevens Lecture. Past jurists have been Justices John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sandra Day O’Connor, and the late Antonin Scalia. Previous attendance numbers have exceeded 1,000 people, with additional audiences watching via live video stream at the Wolf Law Building on campus and satellite locations at other colleges and universities throughout Colorado.