Alex J. Luchenitser
Senior Litigation Counsel, Americans United for Separation of Church and State
Alex J. Luchenitser has served as Litigation Counsel for Americans United for Separation of Church and State since January 2001 and as Senior Litigation Counsel since May 2004. Mr. Luchenitser litigates church-state cases all over the country and also periodically authors and edits friend-of-the-court briefs that are filed in federal courts of appeals on behalf of Americans United. Mr. Luchenitser’s work has included cases challenging governmental funding of religious social-service providers, cases challenging governmental religious displays on public property, cases challenging attempts to inject “intelligent design” and other religious anti-evolution teachings into public school curricula, and cases challenging other government-sponsored religious activity (such as prayer) in public schools.
Mr. Luchenitser was born in Kiev, Ukraine (then part of the Soviet Union) in 1969 and immigrated to the United States in 1977. He received his A.B. magna cum laude in Government and Economics from Harvard University in 1991, and he received his J.D. with distinction from Stanford Law School in 1994. After finishing law school, Mr. Luchenitser served two one-year judicial clerkships, with Justice Warren W. Matthews, Jr. of the Alaska Supreme Court, and with U.S. Magistrate Judge Wayne D. Brazil of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California. Mr. Luchenitser then spent four years in private practice in Northern California, participating in the prosecution of class actions on behalf of investors, consumers, and trust beneficiaries.
Mr. Luchenitser is the author of Casting Aside the Constitution: The Trend Toward Government Funding of Religious Social Service Providers, 35 Clearinghouse Review 615 (Jan.-Feb. 2002), and “InnerChange”: Conversion as the Price of Freedom and Comfort — A Cautionary Tale About the Pitfalls of Faith-Based Prison Units, 6 Ave Maria Law Review 445 (Spring 2008). Mr. Luchenitser is an active member of the District of Columbia Bar, is an inactive member of the State Bar of California, and has been admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court and the U.S. Courts of Appeals for the Third, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, Eleventh, Federal, and District of Columbia Circuits.