William H. (Chip) Mellor serves as President and General Counsel of the Institute for Justice, which he co-founded. Mellor litigates cutting-edge constitutional cases nationwide protecting economic liberty, property rights, school choice and the First Amendment.  He was recently described by Inc. magazine as one of Washington entrepreneurs’ best friends. 

Under his leadership, the Institute has won two U.S. Supreme Court victories, one upholding Cleveland’s voucher program and the other striking down New York’s prohibition on interstate wine sales.  Mellor is also responsible for breaking open Denver’s 50-year-old taxi monopoly, ending the funeral industry’s monopoly on casket sales in Tennessee, defending New Jersey’s welfare reform, drawing national attention to eminent domain abuse through the now infamous Kelo U.S. Supreme Court case, and launching the Institute for Justice Clinic on Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago. He has teamed up with University of Chicago professor Richard Epstein on amicus briefs in eight property rights cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Wall Street Journal wrote of the Institute and its clients, “Meet the new civil rights activists. Their belief is that the right to earn a living free from excessive regulation is guaranteed by the Constitution.” “The Institute for Justice’s influence is being felt across the nation,” noted Investor’s Business Daily.

Mellor has appeared in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, New York Times, USA Today, Financial Times, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Washington Times, Philadelphia Inquirer, New York Sun, Boston Globe, New York Post, Forbes, National Law Journal, Reason, National Review, Investor’s Business Daily, ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, The Today Show, and numerous other radio and television broadcasts and publications.

From 1986 until 1991, Mellor served as president of the Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy, a nationally recognized “think tank” located in San Francisco. Under his leadership, the Institute commissioned and published the path-breaking books on civil rights, property rights, technology and the First Amendment that serve as the Institute for Justice’s long-term, strategic litigation blueprint.

Prior to his time at the Pacific Research Institute, Mellor served in the Reagan Administration as Deputy General Counsel for Legislation and Regulations in the Department of Energy. From 1979 to 1983, he practiced public interest law with Mountain States Legal Foundation in Denver, Colorado. Mellor received his J.D. from the University of Denver School of Law in 1977. He graduated from Ohio State University in 1973.

Chip is a board member of the Property and Environment Research Center, the nation’s oldest and largest institute dedicated to original research that brings market principles to resolving environmental problems.