Anthony Michael Kreis

Assistant Professor of Law, Georgia State University
Professor Anthony Michael Kreis joined Georgia State University College of Law faculty in 2020, and holds a courtesy appointment with the department of Political Science. At the College of Law, he teaches constitutional law and employment discrimination. Professor Kreis’s academic interests span the areas of constitutional law, civil rights, legislation, the law of democracy, and American political development.

His research uses qualitative empirical methods and doctrinal analysis to assess how social change and the law interact and affect each other. A great deal of Professor Kreis’s research focuses on the relationship between American political history and the development of law over time.

Professor Kreis has published articles in several law reviews, including the George Washington Law Review, Illinois Law Review, Georgia Law Review, and the University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law. His book, "Constitutional Law and the Force of History," is currently under contract with the University of California Press. Online companions to the Texas Law Review, Yale Law Journal, and Harvard Law Review have also featured his work. He regularly contributes legal commentary and analysis to international and national media including The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, USA Today, National Public Radio, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, the BBC (British Broadcast Corporation) and the ABC (Australian Broadcast Corporation).

Active in law reform efforts, Professor Kreis has participated in civil rights litigation and civil rights legislative initiatives. He co-authored amicus briefs in major civil rights cases before the United States Supreme Court, including Bostock v. Clayton County and Comcast v. National Association of African American-Owned Media. In addition to appearances in state legislatures across the country, he has testified numerous times before the Georgia General Assembly about marriage, civil rights, employment discrimination, LGBTQ rights, and religious liberty. In 2017, Professor Kreis authored the Illinois state law banning gay and transgender panic defenses in murder trials, the second law of its kind in the United States, which has served as a model for other jurisdictions.

Before coming to Georgia State Law, Professor Kreis taught at Chicago-Kent College of Law. He also completed a Ph.D. in political science and public administration at the University of Georgia. Kreis was a visiting scholar-in-residence at Emory University School of Law while a doctoral student. Before his time at the University of Georgia, Professor Kreis earned his law degree from Washington and Lee University and a bachelor’s degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.