Stuart Taylor joined Newsweek as a contributing editor in January 1998, writing on legal issues. He was a finalist for the 1997 National Magazine Awards for his article on Paula Jones' sexual harassment lawsuit against President Clinton. Since November 1997, Taylor has also been a senior writer for National Journal, where he writes a weekly column.

Before Taylor began working for Newsweek and National Journal, he had been a senior writer with American Lawyer Media, which owns The American Lawyer magazine and several weekly and daily legal newspapers, including Legal Times. He wrote a weekly opinion column for seven weekly and daily newspapers, focusing on legal-political issues on the national level. He has also previously written in-depth feature articles and essays for The American Lawyer. Taylor has been a guest on broadcasts for ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, Fox News Channel, C-Span and National Public Radio.

His journalism honors include two nominations as a finalist for a National Magazine Award (1997 and 1993), a shared National Magazine Award given to The American Lawyer in 1991 for Best Single Issue (for a March 1990 special issue on the war on drugs), the 1991 Golden Quill Award for Excellence in Editorial Writing from the International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors, a special citation in 1990 from the Penn State School of Communications for improving journalism through critical evaluation and a nomination by The New York Times in 1988 for a Pulitzer Prize for his supreme court coverage.

Taylor was a legal affairs reporter from 1980-1985 and Supreme Court reporter from 1985-1988 in the Washington bureau of The New York Times. Prior to that post, he was a lawyer with Washington's Wilmer, Cutler and Pickering from 1977-1974. He graduated from Princeton University in 1970 with an A.B. in History, and from Harvard Law School in 1997, where he was a member of the law review. He lives in Washington with his wife, Sally Lamar Ellis, and their two daughters.