Howard J. Trienens Visiting Judicial Scholar Program

The Howard J. Trienens Visiting Judicial Scholar Program was established at Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law in 1989 by partners of Sidley and Austin to honor Howard J. Trienens’s (’45, ’49 JD) service to the firm and Northwestern. Mr. Trienens, who headed Sidley and Austin’s Executive Committee from 1977 to 1993, joined the firm in 1949 as an associate and became a partner in 1956. 

Mr. Trienens joined the Northwestern University Board of Trustees in 1967 and chaired the board from 1986 to 1995. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Northwestern University in 1945 and a J.D. in 1949. He was editor-in-chief of the Illinois Law Review. After graduating, he taught a course in criminal law at the Law School. From 1950 to 1952, he clerked for the Hon. Fred M. Vinson, Chief Justice of the United States. Mr. Trienens passed away in 2021 at the age of 97. 

The Howard J. Trienens Visiting Scholar Program enables Northwestern Pritzker Law to invite a leading jurist to the School to lecture and provide students and faculty with a perspective on the judicial process and contemporary legal issues.

Speakers and lectures include, among others:

2022 Hon. Elena Kagan, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

2021 Chief Judge Algenon L. Marbley, United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio

2019 Justice Goodwin Liu, Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court

2018 Right Honourable Lord Wilson of CulworthJustice of the U.K. Supreme Court

2017 Hon. Gerard E. Lynch, Senior Judge for the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

2015 Hon. Elena Kagan, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

2013 Hon. Guido Calabresi, Senior Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit

2012 Hon. Alex Kozinski, Chief Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

2011 Hon. Sonia Sotomayor, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

2009 (Fall) Hon. Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

2009 (Spring) Hon. William A. Fletcher, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

2008 Hon. Stephen F. Williams, United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit

2007 Hon. John G. Roberts Jr., Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court

2004 Hon. J. Harvie Wilkinson III, United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit

2003 (Fall) Hon. John T. Noonan Jr., Judge, United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

2003 (Spring) Hon. Anthony M. Kennedy, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

2001 Hon. Richard J. Goldstone, Justice, Constitutional Court of South Africa, "International Criminal Justice - Why We Need It"

1997 Hon. Sandra Day O'Connor, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

1995 The Rt. Hon. Sir Thomas Bingham, Master of the Rolls, Royal Court of Justice, London, "Anglo American Reflections"

1992 Hon. John Paul Stevens, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, "Is Justice Irrelevant?"

1990 Hon. William H. Rehnquist, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, gave the inaugural lecture "The Impeachment Clause: A Wild Card in the Constitution."