NELSON MADDEN BLACK - Key Persons
Barry Black is an experienced litigator and trial lawyer. He has represented religious institutions and associations, municipalities, universities, clergy and other clients in a variety of disputes ranging from governance, property and employment matters to religious liberty and other First Amendment claims. He has extensive knowledge of and experience with corporate and governance concerns of religious organizations. Mr. Black has advised clients of various faiths and denominations, and provided counsel to municipal and corporate clients on a wide array of matters connected with Religion Law. He has counseled and represented both religious institutions and ministers on clergy-related issues, from compensation, parsonage, retirement and tax matters to intraorganizational and property disputes, in federal and state court, including in the United States Supreme Court, as well as in mediation and arbitration.
Clients of Mr. Black, a former litigation partner at a large New York City law firm, range from municipalities and banking institutions to corporations involved in international litigation. Mr. Black is experienced in trial, post-verdict and appellate advocacy.
Mr. Black has represented clients in a number of high profile matters, including:
Represented a major Christian denomination in multiple lawsuits brought under New York State's Child Victims Act, by challenging on constitutional grounds the jurisdiction of the court to engage in matters ecclesiastical where the denomination and the local church affiliate are, as codified in New York's Religious Corporations Law, entirely independent corporate entities.
Represented New York City Department of Education employees in a highly publicized lawsuit against the City of New York in a religious discrimination claim based upon the City's denial of their applications for religious exemption from the Covid-19 vaccination mandate. Links to Mr. Black's four oral arguments before the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on this matter follow:
November 10, 2021 oral argument before Second Circuit merits panel.
November 22, 2021 oral argument before Second Circuit Merits Panel.
January 18, 2022 oral argument before Second Circuit Motions Panel.
February 24, 2022 oral argument before Second Circuit Merits Panel.
Represented New York City workers in a class action lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the City's refusal to grant them religious exemptions form its vaccine mandates.
Represented the Bishop and a Diocese of a Christian Church denomination in an action seeking to quash a judicial subpoena compelling testimony concerning a religious ruling.
Represented a Hasidic psychotherapist in his lawsuit against the City of New York in a pre-enforcement challenge to a law that censored private conversations between the doctor and his patients in violation of his First and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The matter was resolved when the City repealed the law and paid $100,000 in attorney's fees.
Advised an international Christian university concerning the constitutional validity of its employment and tenure policies.
Represented a New Jersey township in a high-profile religious discrimination matter.
Represented a major Hasidic congregation in a challenge to a local municipality's tax assessment upon the residence of its religious leader, resulting in a judicial determination that the residence was not subject to taxation and the substantial tax assessments over the course of approximately ten years were null and void.
Mr. Black is the Religion Law columnist for the New York Law Journal, and has lectured and taught Continuing Legal Education courses on a variety of Religion Law topics for organizations such as the New Jersey State Bar Association and the Federal Bar Association. He has appeared on various national television and radio programs, such as Fox News' Tucker Carlson Tonight and NewsNation.
Education
Hofstra University, B.B.A. 1991
Hofstra University School of Law, J.D. 1994
Christopher Byrnes is an experienced counselor for mission-oriented nonprofit organizations and educational institutions with experience in constitutional and appellate litigation and a passion for religious liberty. He has helped his high-profile clients navigate a myriad of compliance and governance issues so that they can stay on mission while minimizing risk.
Prior to joining Nelson Madden Black, Mr. Byrnes served as chief legal officer for the nation's premier public policy research and educational institute, The Heritage Foundation, advising on and overseeing all legal, regulatory, and compliance matters for Heritage and its related organizations, and was the legal advisor and primary staff liaison to Heritage's Board of Trustees. Previously, Mr. Byrnes served as in-house associate counsel for Strayer University, a major proprietary university headquartered in Herndon, Virginia. Mr. Byrnes also served as a senior attorney-advisor at the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, where he helped conduct the agency's high-profile investigations into affirmative action in law schools and the alleged benefits of diversity in elementary and secondary education, among other issues. Mr. Byrnes also served as an attorney-advisor at the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights and as an attorney at Defenders of Property Rights, practicing constitutional and appellate litigation with a nonprofit, public interest legal foundation dedicated to protecting the rights of property owners.
Mr. Byrnes graduated cum laude from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service and earned his J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center, where he served as president of the student chapter of the Federalist Society.
Education
Georgetown University, B.S.F.S. 1998
Georgetown University Law Center, J.D. 2002
Hillary Byrnes has extensive experience in advocating for the rights of religious institutions and their adherents to practice their faith in the public square.
Ms. Byrnes previously served as Director of Religious Liberty and Associate General Counsel for the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops in Washington, D.C. for almost eight years. As Director of the USCCB's Committee for Religious Liberty, Ms. Byrnes focused on the growing concerns over the erosion of freedom of religion and legal issues affecting Catholic education in the United States. Ms. Byrnes' work included drafting federal regulatory comments and amicus briefs, including before the United States Supreme Court. Ms. Byrnes has discussed religious liberty topics in speeches, on radio and television, and in print media.
Prior to her work at the USCCB, Ms. Byrnes practiced in the area of Antitrust and Competition law at the global law firm of Hunton & Williams LLP (now Hunton Andrews Kurth) from 2008 to 2012. Before that, she served as a Trial Attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice Civil Rights Division's Voting Section from 2006 to 2008, entering the DOJ via its prestigious Honors Program for recent law school graduates.
Ms. Byrnes currently serves on the board of directors of the Catholic Bar Association, an organization that seeks to build community, nationally and internationally, among Catholic members of the legal profession. Ms. Byrnes is also a Blackstone Fellow with the Alliance Defending Freedom.
Ms. Byrnes graduated cum laude from Notre Dame Law School, where she was an Article Editor of the Notre Dame Journal of Law, Ethics & Public Policy. Ms. Byrnes also served on Notre Dame Law School's Jessup International Law Moot Court Team, which competed in Aberdeen, Scotland. Before law school, Ms. Byrnes graduated magna cum laude from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service.
Education
Georgetown University, B.S. 2002
Notre Dame Law School, J.D. 2006
Mr. Madden clerked for Lloyd F. MacMahon, then Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, in 1979-80 following graduation from Harvard Law School. He then practiced for 27 years both as a trial lawyer (serving as first chair in 13 commercial trials and arbitrations going to verdict), and as a corporate lawyer negotiating and drafting commercial agreements. From 2007-2010 Mr. Madden served as General Counsel & Secretary for Lincoln Center Development Project, Inc., which undertook the $1.2 billion renovation of the Lincoln Center campus.
Since 2010, Mr. Madden has practiced with his own firm, focusing on projects for not-for-profit clients in the New York City area, and was a founding member of Nelson Madden Black LLP in 2016. He has significant experience with New York Religious Corporations Law, New York Not-for-Profit Law and related governance issues.
Mr. Madden's work has included representation of San Francisco Theological Seminary in assuring its ongoing existence as a religious institution in the context of a merger with a public institution, the University of Redlands; and representation of Greek Orthodox American Leaders, a group of lay members of the Greek Orthodox Church in litigation with the Church concerning governance issues.
Education
Yale College , B.A. 1976, magna cum laude
Harvard Law School, J.D. 1979, cum laude
Jonathan Nelson practices primarily in the fields of civil litigation and corporate law, concentrating on the representation of religious institutions. He is a highly-regarded church law practitioner.
In 1991, after eight years of practice in corporate litigation and financial transactional work with major law firms in Chicago and New York City, Mr. Nelson founded an independent law practice that he later brought to Nelson Madden Black. Mr. Nelson represented or advised hundreds of clients in the religious community, including Christian churches of many kinds, a religious order, Hindu temples, Jungians, a Yoruba cultural center, mosques, pastors, church trustees, missionaries, and victims of religious persecution seeking asylum. Mr. Nelson has advised lay boards and clergy on a wide variety of legal concerns. Mr. Nelson has been a panelist at meetings organized by the American Bar Association and other lawyers' groups. He also served as lead counsel in numerous judicial and administrative litigations, including a precedent-setting lawsuit brought by the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church against the City of New York in 2001 to enforce the church's First Amendment rights to serve homeless people on the steps of the church. Mr. Nelson has been listed in SuperLawyers since 2012, and has been rated "AV Preeminent" since 1998.
Education
Yale College, B.A. 1978
Northwestern University School of Law, J. D. 1983
The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University, M.A. 1984