William H. Lash, III was sworn in as Assistant Secretary of Commerce
for Market Access and Compliance, July 25, 2001. In this position,
Assistant Secretary Lash and his team work to ensure that foreign
governments fully comply with the more than 250 trade agreements
the United States has signed. He is particularly committed to the
protection of U.S. investments and intellectual property rights
and aggressively engages in the solving of commercial disputes involving
foreign governments. Assistant Secretary Lash also chairs the Department's
Iraq and Afghanistan Reconstruction Task Forces, which provide information
and resources to businesses interested in participating in reconstruction
efforts and commerce in these two countries. He also serves as the
United States Economic Commissioner to the Organization for Security
and Cooperation in Europe.
Prior to entering government service, he was Professor of Law
at George Mason University School of Law, Arlington, Virginia.
His areas of teaching and research included international business
transactions, international environmental law, regulation of foreign
trade, corporate acquisitions and mergers, and corporate finance.
He has served as Distinguished Senior Fellow at the Center for
the Study of American Business at Washington University, on the
Board of Advisors for the CATO Institute for Trade Policy Studies,
and as an Adjunct Fellow at Citizens for a Sound Economy. In addition,
he has served on the board of directors of publicly traded and
privately held corporations. Mr. Lash has been the director of
several nonprofit corporations and has served as a Legal Analyst
for several television networks including ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX NEWS,
FOX, CNN, CNN/FN, PBS, MSNBC, CNBC, and ESPN.
Assistant Secretary Lash has previously served as the Associate
Dean and Director of the Law and Economics Center at George Mason
University, Assistant Professor of Law at Saint Louis University
and Assistant Professor of Law at Western New England College
School of Law. Prior to entering academia he was a litigation
attorney in the Washington, D.C. office of Fried, Frank, Harris,
Shriver & Jacobson.
During the Reagan Administration, Mr. Lash served as Counsel
to the Hon. Susan W. Liebeler, Chairman of the United States International
Trade Commission. Upon graduation from law school, he was Law
Clerk to the Hon. Alan B. Handler, Associate Justice of the New
Jersey Supreme Court and a Foreign Legal Consultant for Dutilh,
Van der Hoeven & Slager (now Nauta Dutilh).
Mr. Lash has published more than 100 articles on a wide variety
of business issues, appearing in scholarly journals, magazines
and newspapers as well as numerous books, monographs and contributing
chapters.
Assistant Secretary Lash earned his B.A. in political science
from Yale University and his J.D. from Harvard University.
|
