William A. Jacobson is a Clinical Professor of Law and Director of the Securities Law Clinic at Cornell Law School.
He is a 1981 graduate of Hamilton College and a 1984 graduate of Harvard Law School. At Harvard he was Senior Editor of the Harvard International Law Journal and Director of Litigation for the Harvard Prison Legal Assistance Project.
Prior to joining the Cornell law faculty in 2007, Professor Jacobson had a highly successful civil litigation and arbitration practice in Providence, Rhode Island, concentrating in investment, employment, and business disputes in the securities industry, including many high profile cases reported in leading newspapers and magazines.
Professor Jacobson has argued cases in numerous federal and state courts, including the Courts of Appeal for the First, Fifth and Sixth Circuits, and the Rhode Island Supreme Court.
Professor Jacobson has a national reputation as a leading practitioner in securities arbitration. He was Treasurer, and is a former member of the Executive Committee and Board of Directors of the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association, a professional organization of attorneys dedicated to protecting public investors. He frequently is quoted in national media on issues related to investment fraud and investor protection, and in the past has served as one of a small number of private practice attorneys who trained new arbitrators for the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.
Professor Jacobson is co-author of the Securities Arbitration Desk Reference (Thomson-Reuters), updated annually.
Professor Jacobson is frequently quoted in the media on political and legal topics, has authored many Op-Eds in major publications, and appears on television and radio to discuss politics and the law.
A more complete listing of Professor Jacobson’s professional background is available at the Cornell Law School website. The views expressed here are his own and not those of any employer or organization,
The best way to reach Prof. Jacobson is by e-mail here.
Donald Trump and Mitch McConnell’s long march towards remaking the federal judiciary is moving along.
Just this week, the Third Circuit “flipped” to majority Republican-appointees, the Second Circuit is on the brink of flipping, and several other evenly split Circuits are likely to go Republican.
Timing is everything in politics, and Elizabeth Warren received a huge break when a devastating Washington Post investigation of Warren’s legal practice when she was a law professor was published on Monday, July 15, 2019. That was the day after Trump’s tweets telling four congresswomen “go back and help fix the...
It still sends chills up my spine.
At 21:56:15 p.m. Eastern Standard on this date 50 years ago, men walked on the moon for the first time.
Elizabeth Warren’s Native American problem just won’t go away.
On the surface, Warren has put it behind her, having found a new campaign theme: “I have a plan for that.”
The $25 million damages judgment plus the over $6.5 million attorney’s fees and expenses award, puts Oberlin College almost $32 million in debt to Gibson’s Bakery and its owners.
Post-judgment interest in Ohio is 5%, which if my math is correct, on $32 million equals $1.6 million a year just in interest,...
We have seen this movie before.
When the media goes on a feeding frenzy against a Republican, there’s nothing like it.
I was in D.C. speaking at the DOJ Summit on Combatting Anti-Semitism when the latest outrage news cycle took place … in D.C.
But I hardly knew it, I had other things on my mind.
The Court has just ruled on the request by Gibson’s Bakery for attorney’s fees and costs against Oberlin College on top of the $25 million judgment.
For background on the attorney’s fees issue, see these posts:
On July 15, 2019, I spoke at the Department of Justice Summit on Combatting Anti-Semitism, on a panel regarding Anti-Semitism on Campus. My presentation was on “Intersectionality.”
Attorney General William Barr, in his opening statement to the Summit, specifically noted the importance of intersectional anti-Semitism:
The post-verdict fight over legal fees continues in the Gibson’s Bakery v. Oberlin College case.
The jury decided that Gibson’s would get attorney’s fees, but it is up to Judge John Miraldi to determine the amount.
On February 18, 2016, Tuvia Yanai Weissman, 21, was stabbed to death in a supermarket while he was shopping with his wife and baby daughter.
Willem Van Spronsen, 69, of Vashon Island, Washington, attacked an ICE Detention Center in Tacoma earlier today with incendiary devices and while armed with a rifle. He was killed in a shootout with police.
Earlier this week, the Court of Appeals for the 2d Circuit ruled against Donald Trump in a lawsuit asserting that his blocking some people from viewing his Twitter account was unconstitutional.
The U.S. Department of Justice is holding a Summit on Combatting Anti-Semitism on July 15 in D.C.
I was asked to speak at the event. The full Agenda and speaker list is at the bottom of this post.
I’ve written many times about “The Flight 93 Election,” the September 5, 2016, article in the Claremont Review of Books, by Michael Anton, writing at the time under the pseudonym Publius Decius Mus.
The thrust of the concept of the Flight 93 Election was that whatever Trump’s faults, the alternative was definitively...
The $11 million compensatory and $33 million punitive damage verdicts won by Gibson’s Bakery and its owners against Oberlin College later were reduced to $25 million under Ohio tort reform caps.
But...
The Washington Post and ABC News just released a poll, and it’s not good news for The Washington Post and ABC News.
ABC News headlines the poll: Trump reaches career-high approval, yet faces a range of re-election risks: Poll:
