Suzette Malveaux, a nationally recognized expert on civil rights law and class action litigation, has joined the University of Colorado Law School as the Provost Professor of Civil Rights Law. She will also direct the school’s Byron R. White Center for the Study of American Constitutional Law, the cornerstone of Colorado Law’s public service program that engages law students, lawyers, judges, and interested citizens in our nation’s constitutional conversation.
“I am thrilled to welcome Suzette Malveaux to the faculty at the University of Colorado Law School,” said S. James Anaya, Dean and Charles Inglis Thomson Professor. “Her wide-ranging expertise, cutting-edge scholarship, and commitment to innovative teaching and public service will enrich the Colorado Law community.”
Professor Malveaux began her teaching career at the University of Alabama School of Law in 2003. She joined the faculty of The Catholic University of America Columbus School of Law in 2006 and served as professor of law, associate dean for academic affairs, and interim director of the Law and Public Policy Program. She was recently elected to the American Law Institute.
Prior to academia, she was a class-action litigation specialist and civil rights lawyer for eight years. She has tackled complex legal matters in high-profile civil rights cases including Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, where she represented over 1.5 million women in the largest employment discrimination class action in U.S. history to date.
Professor Malveaux also served as pro bono counsel to the plaintiffs in Alexander, et al,. v. State of Oklahoma, a suit filed on behalf of the victims of the 1921 Tulsa Race Riot. As part of a team of attorneys, she represented the riot victims before the U.S. federal courts, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (Organization of American States), and the U.S. House of Representatives.
She is the co-author of Class Actions and Other Multi-Party Litigation; Cases and Materials (West, 2006, 2012) and author of several articles exploring the impact of procedural mechanisms on civil rights enforcement. She has published articles in the Harvard Law Review Forum, Washington University Law Review, and George Washington Law Review, and has been cited by widely by scholars, practitioners, and judges, including the U.S. Supreme Court.
Professor Malveaux is a frequent commentator on various legal issues involving the U.S. Supreme Court, the civil legal system, and civil rights. She has appeared on CNN, MSNBC, Fox News 5, Al Jazeera English, and the PBS NewsHour. She has been interviewed by The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The National Law Journal, and The Atlantic.
Malveaux graduated from Harvard University magna cum laude, earned her JD from New York University School of Law as a Root-Tilden Scholar, and clerked for the Honorable Robert L. Carter, United States District Court (S.D.N.Y.).