Paul Figley
Associate Director of Legal Rhetoric
Legal Rhetoric Instructor
Office: Room 129B
Phone: 202-274-4316
E-mail: pfigley@wcl.american.edu
Professor Figley, the Associate Director of the Legal Rhetoric Program, came to WCL in 2006. Prior to joining WCL, he was a career litigator for the U.S. Department of Justice, representing the United States and its agencies in appellate and district court litigation involving torts, national security, and information law. His expertise is in motions practice. Figley is a graduate of Southern Methodist University School of Law, where he was leading articles editor for the Journal of Air Law & Commerce. Since joining the WCL faculty, Figley has given writing workshops to national organizations and government agencies and has written for national legal writing publications and scholarly journals. In addition to Legal Rhetoric, he teaches first year Torts and upper level Advanced Lawyering Skills: Tort Litigation.
Currently Teaching
- LAW-522-005 Torts
- LAW-516-002 LegalRhetoric:Wrtng&Rsrch I
- LAW-516-003 LegalRhetoric:Wrtng&Rsrch I
Degrees & Universities
- J.D., Southern Methodist University School of Law
- B.A., Franklin & Marshall College
Selected Publications
- Paul Figley & Jay Tidmarsh, The Appropriations Power and Sovereign Immunity, 107 Mich. L. Rev. 1207 (2009).
- Paul Figley, Understanding the Federal Tort Claims Act: A Different Metaphor, 44 Tort Tr. & Ins. Prac. L.J. 1105 (2009). SSRN Link
- Paul Figley, Teaching Novice Legal Writers to Complete Their Arguments; A Useful Metaphor, The Second Draft: Bulletin of the Legal Writing Institute (Fall 2007).
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Selected Works in Progress- Paul Figley, In Defense of Feres, (forthcoming).