President: Shaun Rieley
Vice-Presidents: Luke C. Sheahan, Thomas W. Pauken
Treasurer: Matthew T. Cantirino
Secretary: Jay Schalin
Board of Directors
Eric Adler
University of Maryland
Eric Adler is Professor and Chair of Classics at the University of Maryland, College Park. He earned his Ph.D. in classical studies from Duke University. His scholarship focuses on Roman historiography, the history of the humanities, and the history of classical scholarship. Adler is the author of three monographs: Valorizing the Barbarians: Enemy Speeches in Roman Historiography (2011), Classics, the Culture Wars, and Beyond (2016), and The Battle of the Classics: How a Nineteenth-Century Debate Can Save the Humanities Today (2020). His articles have appeared in such venues as the American Journal of Philology, Classical Receptions Journal, Arion, and the International Journal of the Classical Tradition. He serves on the editorial board of the journal Humanitas.
Katherine L. Bradshaw
Ancient Language Institute
Katherine L. Bradshaw is a Latin and Greek Fellow at the Ancient Language Institute and an Adjunct Faculty Member at Abilene Christian University. She earned an M.A. in Classics from the University of Maryland and an M.A. in English from the George Washington University (GW), in addition to a B.A. in Classical Studies and English from GW. Bradshaw is a Phi Beta Kappa member (inducted 2015), as well as a recipient of both the Pellegri Scholar Fellowship from the National Italian American Foundation (2017–2018) and the Elena and Antonio De Luca Young Classicist Award from the Italian Cultural Society (2018). Her work has appeared at the James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal, New Humanists, The Optimistic Curmudgeon, Reviewing Shakespeare, and Secunda Mensa. She has also served as an editorial consultant for Armfield Academic Press since 2019. Bradshaw’s scholarly focus is on the classical tradition in English literature, particularly William Shakespeare’s depictions and adaptations of Roman virtues. Her other interests include Latin poetry, Greco-Roman biography, and food in the classical world.
Matthew T. Cantirino
University of Dallas
Matthew T. Cantirino is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Dallas. Previously, he taught at Texas State University, Assumption University, and the Catholic University of America. He earned his PhD at the Catholic University of America and holds a bachelor’s in government from Georgetown University. His PhD dissertation centered around the American writer Henry Adams and the place of the person in history. His interests include the republican and constitutional traditions of the United States, “big picture” debates about foreign policy and self-government, the intersection of literature, art, and imaginative works with political philosophy, and the question of historicity and normativity, including philosophies of history and their discontents. He also serves as an editor for the scholarly journal Humanitas and (prior to academia) worked as an editor for the ecumenical journal First Things.
W. Winston Elliott III
The Free Enterprise Institute
W. Winston Elliott III is Editor-in-Chief of The Imaginative Conservative and President of The Free Enterprise Institute. Additionally, Mr. Elliott is Visiting Professor of Liberal Arts in the Honors College of Houston Christian University, and member of the Board of Rosary College. He earned his Master of Arts in Liberal Arts from St. John’s College, Master of Arts in Theology from the University of St. Thomas (Houston), and Master of Business Administration, with Honors, from the University of Houston.
Michael P. Federici
Middle Tennessee State University
Michael P. Federici is professor and chair of the Political Science and International Relations Department at Middle Tennessee State University. He received his B.S. in economics from Elizabethtown College and his M.A. and Ph.D. in politics from The Catholic University of America. He has published six books, The Challenge of Populism, Eric Voegelin: The Restoration of Order, The Political Philosophy of Alexander Hamilton, Rethinking the Teaching of American History, The Culture of Immodesty in American Life and Politics: The Modest Republic, and The Catholic Writings of Orestes Brownson. He serves on the Editorial Board of the journal Humanitas and was president of The Academy of Philosophy and Letters and the National Humanities Institute.
Ryan R. Holston
Virginia Military Institute
Ryan R. Holston is Professor and Jonathan M. Daniels ’61 Chair at Virginia Military Institute. He is also Editor at the journal Humanitas. His work has appeared in History of Political Thought, Harvard Theological Review, and Telos, among other places. He is most recently the author of a book entitled Tradition and the Deliberative Turn: a Critique of Contemporary Democratic Theory (SUNY Press, 2023) and previously edited a collection of essays called The Historical Mind: Humanistic Renewal in a Post-Constitutional Age (SUNY Press, 2020). Currently, he is writing a book at the intersection of politics and literature, which examines the authority of science in public life. Its working title is Promethean Politics: the Cult of Science in the Modern Imagination.
Jeffrey O. Nelson
The Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal
Jeff Nelson is Executive Director and CEO of The Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal, which he co-founded with Annette Kirk in 1995. Prior to that, he spent the better part of three decades as a senior officer at the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, most recently serving as the Institute’s Chief Academic Officer. He holds a B.A. from the University of Detroit, an M.A. from Yale University Divinity School, and a Ph.D. in American history from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. For ten years he edited The Intercollegiate Review, The University Bookman, and was founding editor and publisher of ISI Books. He was also president of the Thomas More College of Liberal Arts. He is treasurer of the Edmund Burke Society of America, and editorial advisor to its journal, Studies in Edmund Burke and His Time. Dr. Nelson is the editor or co-editor of several books, including Redeeming the Time by Russell Kirk, American Conservatism: An Encyclopedia, The Political Principles of Robert Taft by Russell Kirk and James McClellan, Perfect Sowing by Henry Regnery, and Remembered Past by John Lukacs.
Thomas W. Pauken
The William A. Solomene Foundation
A native Texan, Tom Pauken is a graduate of Jesuit High School in Dallas and Georgetown University. While at Georgetown, Tom was elected national chairman of the college Republicans. He also led a nationwide effort to support our soldiers in Vietnam before enlisting himself and serving as an Army Intelligence officer in Vietnam. Upon returning to civilian life, Tom served as a White House staff assistant and associate director of the White House Fellowship program from 1970 to 1971. Tom served on President Ronald Reagan’s White House staff. Named director of the Action agency by President Reagan, he eliminated the use of federal tax dollars to fund Saul Alinsky-style leftist organizers. Elected Texas Republican State Chairman in 1994, Tom helped build up a Republican majority in Texas from the grassroots. Tom served as Chairman of the Texas Workforce Commission from 2008 through 2012 where he championed efforts to provide more opportunities for vocational education and a return to local control of education. Tom is the author of The Thirty Years War: The Politics of the Sixties Generation, and Bringing America Home: How America Lost Her Way and How We Can Find Our Way Back.
Shaun Rieley
Hillsdale College – DC Campus
Shaun Rieley is Director of Educational Programs & Teaching Fellow at Hillsdale College’s Washington, DC campus where he oversees the numerous programs and events offered annually, including the James Madison Fellowship and the AWC Lecture series, and teaches courses in political philosophy for the Van Andel Graduate School of Government.
He earned a Ph.D. in political theory, with a minor in American government, from the Catholic University of America where he wrote a dissertation on the political philosophy of St. Thomas More. He also earned a master’s degree from St. John’s College in Annapolis, MD where he studied great books in philosophy, political theory, and literature. As an undergraduate he studied political science at the University of Delaware.
He served as an enlisted infantryman in the Army National Guard for nine years, attaining the rank of sergeant. His service included overseas tours in support of contingency operations in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba and Iraq.
A native of Delaware, he currently resides in Maryland with his wife and two daughters.
Luke C. Sheahan
Duquesne University
Luke C. Sheahan is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at Duquesne University and a Non-Resident Scholar in the Program for Research on Religion and Urban Civil Society (PRRUCS) at the University of Pennsylvania. He researches the intersection of First Amendment rights and political theory. Sheahan’s scholarly articles and reviews have appeared in Humanitas, The Political Science Reviewer, and Perspectives on Political Science and he has lectured widely on religious liberty, freedom of speech, and freedom of association. His popular writing has appeared in Law and Liberty, Real Clear Civics, and other venues. He is author of Why Associations Matter: The Case for First Amendment Pluralism (2020). Sheahan is also working on a manuscript tentatively titled Pluralism and Toleration: Difference, Justice, and the Social Group.
Sheahan received a PhD and MA in political theory from the Catholic University of America and a B.S. in political science from the Honors College at Oregon State University. From 2016-2018 he was a postdoctoral associate in the Department of Political Science at Duke University and from 2018-2019 he was Associate Director and Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Freedom Project, an academic institute at Wellesley College. Sheahan is a five-time recipient of the Humane Studies Fellowship from the Institute for Humane Studies, a 2014 recipient of the Richard M. Weaver Fellowship from the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI), a 2015-2016 recipient of a dissertation research fellowship from the Catholic University of America, and a 2018 recipient of the Leonard Liggio Memorial Fellowship.