Senate confirms University of Montana professor Johnstone for 9th circuit

University of Montana constitutional scholar and law professor Anthony Johnstone was confirmed Monday to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals by the U.S. Senate.

Montana’s senators split on the 49-45 vote to confirm Johnstone, former State Solicitor and Assistant Attorney General in Montana who has taught at the UM Alexander Blewett III School of Law for more than a decade.

U.S. Sen. Jon Tester, a Democrat, supported the nomination of Johnstone, who had extensive backing from the legal community and wide and bipartisan support from Montana.

“Montanans expect their judges to apply the law without bias, in a common sense way – and that’s exactly what Anthony Johnstone has done throughout his entire legal career,” Tester said in a statement from his office. “He has an outstanding record of service to the people of the Montana, and I have no doubt that he will serve the American people well on the Ninth Circuit bench.

“I’m confident that Anthony will continue standing up for our constitution, and I’m proud to have helped push this Montanan’s confirmation through the United States Senate.”

U.S. Sen. Steve Daines, a Montana Republican, opposed the confirmation. Six senators didn’t vote, but three Independents joined Democrats in voting yes, as did Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine.

Elaine Gagliardi, dean of the UM Alexander Blewett III School of Law, also praised the confirmation.

“It has been an exceptional privilege to work with Professor Johnstone for the past 16 years,” Gagliardi said in a statement from UM. “As a professor at the University of Montana’s Blewett School of Law, he has trained a generation of Montana lawyers. I am proud to say that Judge Johnstone is the fourth professor or alumnus of Montana’s Law school to sit on the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

“He follows Chief Judges Walter Pope, Jim Browning and Sidney Thomas. Sixteen alumni from our small, yet outstanding, law school have become Article III judges, and many more have become federal and state judges.”

Johnstone will occupy the seat on the court vacated by Chief Judge Emeritus Sidney R. Thomas, a 1978 graduate of UM’s Alexander Blewett III School of Law.

Monday, Tester spoke on the Senate floor urging his colleagues to confirm Johnstone, and he first introduced Johnstone at his first Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in October 2022, his office said.

Tester’s office also shared the letters of support Johnstone received: former Montana Attorneys General Steve Bullock (Democrat) and Tim Fox (Republican); Retired Montana Supreme Court justices; Former Republican Montana solicitor general; Montana faith leaders; Chippewa Cree Tribe; Little Shell Tribe Of Chippewa Indians Of Montana; Assiniboine and Sioux Tribes of the Fort Peck Reservation; Fort Belknap Indian Community; Blackfeet Nation; current and former students; academics support; former Judge Sidney Thomas Clerks; Yale College classmates; Chicago Law School classmates.

Johnstone began his legal career by serving as a law clerk for Judge Sidney Thomas on the Ninth Circuit. Johnstone holds a bachelor’s from Yale University and a law degree with honors from the University of Chicago Law School, according to his UM biography.

“Professor Johnstone’s scholarship has been cited more than one hundred times by judges, scholars, and practitioners,” said the bio. “He has served as counsel in more than two dozen published cases in state and federal courts, including petition-stage or merit-stage briefs for six cases at the Supreme Court of the United States.”

Keila Szpaller is deputy editor of the Daily Montanan, a nonprofit newsroom. To read the article as originally published, click here.