Fordham Law School announced today that former Wyoming Congresswoman Liz Cheney will be the 2024 recipient of the Fordham-Stein Prize. The award is presented annually to a member of the legal profession “whose work exemplifies outstanding standards of professional conduct, promotes the advancement of justice, and brings credit to the profession by emphasizing in the public mind the contributions of lawyers to our society and to our democratic system of government.”
Dean Matthew Diller praised Cheney for her career as a public servant and for her bipartisan leadership of the congressional investigation into the events of January 6, 2021.
“In an era marked by increasing political polarization and threats to democratic principles, Liz Cheney’s exemplary leadership on the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the United States Capitol stands out for her courage, bipartisanship, and unwavering commitment to the democratic process,” Diller said. “Her willingness to sacrifice her leadership position in Congress and her seat in the House of Representatives reflects the kind of commitment to advancing justice through the rule of law that the Stein Prize is intended to honor and celebrate as a beacon to the legal profession,” Diller continued.
Cheney has had a distinguished career in public service. She served as the U.S. representative for Wyoming’s at-large congressional district from 2017 to 2023. She chaired the House Republican Conference, the third-highest position in the House Republican leadership, from 2019 to 2021, and served as the vice chair of the Select Committee investigating the January 6 insurrection. She was also a member of the House Armed Services Committee, China Task Force, Natural Resources Committee, and the House Committee on Rules.
Before her election to Congress, she had served at the State Department as the principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs, and in positions for the United States Agency for International Development and the Department of State working in Poland, Hungary, Russia, and Ukraine. Earlier, Cheney had served at the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank and as an attorney at White & Case.
The prize will be conferred at Fordham Law School on November 7.
The Fordham-Stein Prize was created by Louis Stein LAW ’26 during the height of the Watergate investigation as a way to celebrate the greatest exemplars of integrity and ethics in the legal profession. Since 1976, the award has been given to outstanding legal and judicial luminaries, including nine U.S. Supreme Court justices, four former attorneys general, two chief justices, three former secretaries of state, and one solicitor general. The most recent Stein Prize recipients include Sherrilyn Ifill, Kenneth Frazier, and the Honorable Robert Katzmann.