Judge Kenneth Starr, who from 1994 to 1999 was appointed to serve as independent counsel for five federal investigations, including Whitewater, will be the speaker at USC Aiken's spring commencement at 6 p.m. Wednesday at the Convocation Center.
USCA is expected to award 402 degrees at a combined ceremony for May and August graduates. For May, 305 undergraduate candidates and 13 graduate candidates will receive degrees. For August, 73 undergraduate and 11 graduate candidates will receive degrees.
University of South Carolina President Harris Pastides and USCA Chancellor Sandra Jordan also will participate.
An academician, lawyer, public servant and sixth-generation Texan, Starr is the chief executive officer of Baylor University in Waco, Texas, where he also is the president and chancellor.
Starr has argued 36 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, including 25 cases during his service as solicitor general of the United States from 1989 to 1993. He also was U.S. circuit judge for the District of Columbia from 1983 to 1989, a law clerk to Chief Justice Warren E. Burger from 1975 to 1977 and a law clerk to Fifth Circuit Judge David W. Dyer from 1973 to 1974.
Before coming to Baylor, Starr was the Duane and Kelly Roberts Dean and Professor of Law at Pepperdine University in California, at which he taught constitutional issues and civil procedure. He also has been counsel to the law firm of Kirkland and Ellis LLP, at which he was a partner from 1993 to 2004, specializing in appellate work, antitrust, federal courts, federal jurisdiction and constitutional law.
Starr previously was an adjunct professor of constitutional law at New York University School of Law and Chapman University School of Law. He is admitted to practice in California and the District of Columbia and before the U.S. Supreme Court.
Starr received his bachelor's degree from George Washington University, his master's from Brown University and his law degree from Duke University. He is the author of more than 25 publications, and his book, "First Among Equals: The Supreme Court in American Life," was published in 2002.