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35 Yale J. Int'l L. Online 4 (2009)

handle is hein.journals/yejloillwo35 and id is 1 raw text is: Essay
Practicing International Law in the Obama
Administration
Harold Hongju Koht & Aaron Zelinskyt
I.    INTRODUCTION
Over the past half-century, the Office of the Legal Adviser in the U.S.
Department of State has grown significantly in size and scope. During that
time, a handful of articles have described the work of the Legal Adviser.' This
Essay builds upon those accounts by describing the role of the Legal Adviser
in the still-young Obama Administration.
The United States currently faces a defining moment for its relationship
with international law, as we stand at the cusp of what President Obama has
called a new era of engagement.2 The defining image of this new world is
not a world divided by a Berlin Wall, but a globe connected by the World
Wide Web. As America resumes its leadership role on the world stage,
renewed respect for international law and institutions will be crucial to
achieving our goals of peace, justice, and prosperity. In this new era, the
t    The Legal Adviser, U.S. Department of State; Martin R. Flug '55 Professor of
International Law, Yale Law School (on leave). All views expressed herein are solely those of the
authors and not necessarily those of the United States, the Office of the Legal Adviser, or the
Department of State.
t t  Yale Law School, Class of 2010; summer intern, Office of the Legal Adviser, 2009.
1.   See, e.g., Richard B. Bilder, The Office of the Legal Adviser: The State Department
Lawyer and Foreign Affairs, 56 AM. J. INT'L L. 633 (1962); Ashley Deeks, Inside L: Some Thoughts
on the Office of the Legal Adviser, 2 CHI. J. INT'L L. 503 (2001); Ernest A. Gross, Operation of the Legal
Adviser's Office, 43 AM. J. INT'L L. 122 (1949); Current Development, The Role of the Legal Adviser of
the Department of State, 85 AM. J. INT'L L. 358 (1991); L.H. Woolsey, The Legal Adviser of the
Department of State, 26 AM. J. INT'L L. 124 (1932).
2.   Barack Obama, President of the U.S., Remarks by the President to the United Nations
General Assembly (Sept. 23, 2009), available at http://www.whitehouse.gov/thepressoffice/
Remarks-by-the-President-to-the-United-Nations- General-Assembly.

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