Professor of Law

The diversity of David Sloss’ scholarship mirrors the diversity of his career.

After graduating from the Kennedy School of Government in 1983, Professor Sloss was a foreign affairs analyst with the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency where he drafted and negotiated treaty text for three major East-West arms control treaties. When he became director of the agency’s Nuclear Safeguards and Technology Division, his responsibilities included formulating and implementing U.S. policy to curb the spread of nuclear weapons.

He earned his J.D. from Stanford in 1996, clerked for one year on the 9th Circuit and then became an associate with a Silicon Valley law firm where he litigated antitrust, securities and intellectual property cases. He assisted software clients in their bid to persuade the U.S. Justice Department to file an antitrust lawsuit against Microsoft.

Professor Sloss joined the School of Law in 1999 with a desire to pursue his interests through scholarship. His research focuses on the interface between domestic constitutional and public international law, including the constitutional law governing the conduct of U.S. foreign relations.

“One of the main areas where the U.S. comes under international criticism is for failing to live up to international human rights norms in relation to the death penalty,” says Sloss, who, with his colleagues, is undertaking a major empirical study of capital punishment in Missouri.

Professor Sloss has also established himself as an expert on the judicial enforcement of international treaties in the United States. He says U.S. courts have inadvertently triggered numerous violations of U.S. treaty obligations, without appreciating the constitutional or international ramifications of their decisions. “It undermines the international legal system,” he says. “It’s one thing if Congress makes a conscious policy choice to violate international law. It has the constitutional power to do that. But that’s not what the courts are supposed to do.”

Professor Sloss is a member of the School’s Center for International and Comparative Law and is the faculty adviser for the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Team. He has a forthcoming article examining whether the president is bound by the Geneva Conventions — treaties that regulate the treatment of enemy combatants, such as those captured in Afghanistan and Iraq.