The Honorable Corinne A. Beckwith
Bio
Corinne Beckwith was appointed to the District of Columbia Court of Appeals in 2011 by President Barack Obama. Judge Beckwith was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and attended the public schools there. She received her bachelor’s degree from Kalamazoo College, where she graduated with honors in English in 1985. After receiving her master’s degree in journalism from the University of Illinois in 1987, Judge Beckwith worked as a newspaper reporter at the Midland Daily News in Midland, Michigan, and also taught journalism and English composition at Central Michigan University.
Judge Beckwith changed course in 1989 and left journalism for law school. She attended the University of Michigan Law School, where she was editor-in-chief of the Michigan Law Review. After receiving her law degree in 1992, Judge Beckwith served as a law clerk to Judge Richard D. Cudahy on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago and then for Justice John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court of the United States.
Prior to her appointment to the D.C. Court of Appeals, Judge Beckwith spent her legal career as a public defender, handling the appeals of indigent criminal defendants who had been convicted of serious offenses. She first worked as an appellate attorney at Michigan’s State Appellate Defender Office in Detroit, where she also taught a criminal appellate practice course at Wayne State University Law School. Judge Beckwith returned to Washington in 1999 and worked as a staff attorney and then a supervising attorney in the Appellate Division of the Public Defender Service for the District of Columbia until her appointment to the Court of Appeals.
For information about clerking for Judge Beckwith, please email BCA [at] dcappeals.gov.
Details
Phone number
Clerkships & Internships
Judge Beckwith has completed hiring for the 2026–2027 term.
Judge Beckwith will begin accepting applications from law school graduates and third year law students for the 2027–2028 term in fall 2025. Consistent with the amended federal law clerk hiring plan, Judge Beckwith will not review applications from students who entered law school in 2024 before June 8, 2026. Second-year students may submit applications before spring grades are released, but should supplement their application packets once updated transcripts become available.
Clerkship terms are for one year and typically begin in late August or early September. The judge welcomes applicants with diverse backgrounds and employment experience prior to or after law school.
Applicants should submit a cover letter, a resume, an official or unofficial law school transcript, an undergraduate transcript (optional), a writing sample, and at least two letters of recommendation. These materials should be sent electronically—preferably in a single PDF file—to BCA [at] dcappeals.gov. Recommenders may transmit their letters separately.
Please feel free to email or call Judge Beckwith’s office with any questions.