Paul D. Clement is a partner in the Washington, D.C., office of King & Spalding, and head of the firm’s national appellate practice. Mr. Clement served as the 43rd Solicitor General of the United States from June 2005 until June 2008. Prior to his confirmation as Solicitor General, he served as Acting Solicitor General for nearly a year and as Principal Deputy Solicitor General for over three years. His more than seven years of service in the Office of Solicitor General is the longest period of continuous service in the Office by a Solicitor General since the Nineteenth Century. He has argued over 50 cases before the United States Supreme Court, including McConnell v. FEC, Tennessee v. Lane, Rumsfeld v. Padilla, Credit Suisse v. Billing, United States v. Booker and MGM v. Grokster. He also argued many of the government’s most important cases in the lower courts, such as Walker v. Cheney and the successful appeal in United States v. Moussaoui.

Mr. Clement is a native of Cedarburg, Wisconsin, and a graduate of the Cedarburg public schools. He received his bachelor’s degree summa cum laude from the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service, and a master’s degree in economics from Cambridge University. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law School, where he was the Supreme Court editor of the Harvard Law Review.

Following graduation, Mr. Clement clerked for Judge Laurence H. Silberman of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, and for Associate Justice Antonin Scalia of the U.S. Supreme Court. After his clerkships, Mr. Clement went on to serve as Chief Counsel of the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on the Constitution, Federalism and Property Rights. Afterwards, he was a partner in the Washington, D.C., office of King & Spalding, where he headed the firm’s appellate practice. Mr. Clement rejoined the firm in November 2008.

Mr. Clement also served from 1998 to 2004 as an Adjunct Professor at the Georgetown University Law Center, where he taught a seminar on the separation of powers.  Immediately before rejoining King & Spalding, Mr. Clement served as a Visiting Professor of Law at the Georgetown University Law Center and as a Senior Fellow of the Law Center’s Supreme Court Institute.

Awards & Recognition

• Edmund Randolph Award, United States Department of Justice’s highest honor
  
  
• Office of the Secretary of Defense Medal for Exceptional Public Service
  
  
• Profiled, “New at the Top,” Washington Post, December 22, 2008
  
  
• Profiled, “Supreme Performer” in “Top Litigators Under 45”, American Lawyer, January 2007