- 2025: The Meaning of Academic Freedom as a First Amendment Right, David M. Rabban, Dahr Jamail, Randall Hage Jamail and Robert Lee Jamail Regents Chair and University Distinguished Teaching Professor, University of Texas School of Law
- 2024: Not Born a Democracy: How to Reclaim the Preconditions for Constitutional Self-Governance, Martha Minow, 300th Anniversary University Professor, Harvard Law School
- 2023: The Rule of Law in the United States: An Unfinished Project of Black Liberation, Paul Gowder, Professor of Law and Associate Dean of Research & Intellectual Life, Northwestern Pritzker School of Law
- 2022: The Work of Democracy, Justin Levitt, White House Senior Policy Advisor for Democracy and Voting Rights, Professor of Law, Loyola Marymount University
- 2021: Break 'Em Up: Recovering Our Freedom from Big Ag, Big Tech, and Big Money, Zephyr Teachout, Professor of Law, Fordham University
- 2019: Banned: Immigration Enforcement in the Time of Trump, Shoba Sivaprasad, Samuel Weiss Faculty Scholar; Clinical Professor of Law; Director, Center for Immigrants' Rights Clinic; and Instructor of Education, Penn State Law
- 2018: Pregnancy, Poverty, & The State, Michele Goodwin, Chancellor Professor of Law and Director, Center of Biotechnology & Global Health Policy, University of California, Irvine
- 2017: Expulsion, Statehood, and the Future of Puerto Rico, Mitu Gulati, Professor of Law, Duke University
- 2015: Ferguson 2.0: Violence Race and Law, Paul Butler, Professor of Law, Georgetown University
- 2013: The Democratic Paradox: Legal Education and Civic Illiteracy, Victoria F. Nourse, Professor of Law, Georgetown University
- 2012: A Civil Rights History in the "Age of Obama", Kenneth W. Mack, Professor of Law, Harvard University
- 2010: Methodology of Originalism, Hon. Antonin Scalia, Associate Justice, United States Supreme Court
- 2009: Unbundling Constitutionality, Richard Primus, Professor of Law, University of Michigan
- 2008: The Boy Scouts, Gay Rights and Freedom of Association, Andrew Koppelman, John Paul Stevens Professor of Law and Professor of Political Science, Northwestern University
- 2007: Law and the Positive Emotions: Some Reflections on Hope, Kathryn Abrams, Herma Hill Kay Distinguished Professor of Law, University of California, Berkeley
- 2006: Political Science, Judicial Politics and the Rule of Law, Howard Gillman, Professor of Political Science, History & Law, University of Southern California
- 2005: A Tale of Two Cities: The Supreme Court and Political Gerrymandering, Pamela S. Karlan, Kenneth and Harle Montgomery Professor of Public Interest Law, Stanford University