Joseph Thai

Presidential Professor of Law
A.B., English, Harvard College, 1995
J.D., Harvard Law School, 1998

• Email: thai@ou.edu

Professor Joseph Thai joined the law faculty in 2003. He teaches Supreme Court Decision Making, First Amendment, and Criminal Procedure at the law school, and co-teaches a "Mind-bending" course on morality, law, and science on main campus.

Thai has served as law clerk to Justice John Paul Stevens and Justice Byron White of the Supreme Court, as well as Judge David Ebel of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.

Prior to joining the law faculty, Thai practiced in the Office of the Attorney General in Massachusetts and GableGotwals in Oklahoma. He currently engages in pro bono litigation on constitutional matters.

Thai writes about the Constitution, the Supreme Court, and Justice Stevens. He frequently comments in local and national media on constitutional law and the Supreme Court. He also co-created and runs Crimprof Multipedia (opens in new window), an online multimedia teaching resource for criminal law and procedure professors worldwide.

In 2005, and again in 2008, Thai was named the outstanding faculty member of the College of Law by its students. In 2005, Thai was also named the university-wide outstanding faculty member by students across campus. In 2007, he received the President's Associates Presidential Professorship.

Select Publications—All links open in a new window

• THE SUPREME COURT SOURCEBOOK (Aspen 2013)
• My Boss, Justice Stevens, NEW YORK TIMES (April 9, 2010)
• A Justice of the Greatest Generation, WASHINGTON POST (April 9, 2010)
• Did Justice Stevens Change?, SCOTUSBLOG, reprinted on SALON.COM (April 2010)
• The Case for Oral Argument in the Supreme Court of Oklahoma, 61 OKLAHOMA LAW REVIEW 695 (2008) (with Andrew M. Coats)
• John Paul Stevens, ENCYCLOPEDIA OF THE SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES (Macmillan 2008).
• The Other Side, THIS I BELIEVE (2007)
• Closing the Courthouse Doors, McClatchy-Tribune newspapers nationwide (July 2007).
• A Wild Pitch on Eavesdropping, BOSTON GLOBE A9 (Aug. 2, 2006)
• The Law Clerk Who Wrote Rasul v. Bush: John Paul Stevens's Influence from World War II to the War on Terror, 92 VIRGINIA LAW REVIEW 501 (2006)
• John Paul Stevens, ENCYCLOPEDIA OF AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES (Routledge 2006)
• Is Data Mining Ever a Search Under Justice Stevens's Fourth Amendment, 74 FORDHAM LAW REVIEW 1731 (2006)
• Constitutionally Excluded Confessions: Applying America's Lessons to a Democratic Iraq, 58 OKLAHOMA LAW REVIEW 37 (2005)