Marco Basile is a historian of U.S. law in relation to the wider world. His interests span the constitutional law of foreign relations, international law in the U.S. legal system, jurisdiction and conflict of laws, and interpretation of both domestic and international laws. His most recent article on the historical relationship between U.S. constitutional law and international law is forthcoming in the University of Chicago Law Review. His writing has also appeared in the Virginia Law Review and Harvard Law Review, among other venues. In 2025, the American Society for Legal History recognized him among early-career scholars as a J. Willard Hurst Fellow.
Basile previously taught at Harvard Law School as a Climenko Fellow and Lecturer on Law, and he has held the Alexander Fellowship and Golieb Fellowship in Legal History at New York University School of Law. Before entering academia, he was a litigator in Boston with a focus on legal issues and appeals. He clerked for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the U.S. Supreme Court, Judge David Barron on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit in Boston, and Judge Paul Watford on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit in Pasadena.
Basile received a Ph.D. in History, a J.D. magna cum laude, and an A.B. summa cum laude from Harvard University. He also earned an M.Phil. in Political Thought and Intellectual History from the University of Cambridge. During graduate school, he was the book reviews editor for the Harvard Law Review, an associate at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, and a resident pre-law tutor at one of Harvard’s undergraduate residential colleges. For his work with students, Harvard awarded him the John R. Marquand Award for Exceptional Advising and Counseling.
Basile currently serves as the U.S. book reviews editor for the American Journal of Legal History.
