John B. Bellinger III

John B. Bellinger, III


Legal Adviser of the Department of State
In office April 6, 2005 – March 23, 2009
President	George W. Bush
Preceded by	William Howard Taft IV
Succeeded by	Harold Hongju Koh
Personal details
Alma mater	Princeton University; Harvard Law School

John B. Bellinger III is an American lawyer, who served as the Legal Adviser for the U.S. Department of State and the National Security Council during the George W. Bush administration. He is now a partner at the Washington, D.C. law firm Arnold & Porter, and Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

Bellinger was educated at St. Albans School in Washington, D.C. Thereafter, he received his A.B. cum laude in 1982 from Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and his J.D. cum laude in 1986 from Harvard Law School. He also received an M.A. in Foreign Affairs in 1991 from the University of Virginia, where he was awarded a Woodrow Wilson Foreign Affairs Fellowship.

Bellinger served as Counsel for National Security Matters in the Criminal Division of the Department of Justice from 1997 to 2001. He served previously as Counsel to the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (1996), as General Counsel to the Commission on the Roles and Capabilities of the U.S. intelligence community (1995–1996), and as Special Assistant to Director of Central Intelligence William Webster (1988–1991). From 1991 to 1995, he practiced law with Wilmer Cutler & Pickering in Washington, D.C.