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Author: William A. Jacobson

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William A. Jacobson

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.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 18, 2010 3 Comments

We really do need wealthy people, after all. Wealthy Reduce Buying in a Blow to the Recovery:The economic recovery has been helped in large part by the spending of the most affluent. Now, even the rich appear to be tightening their belts.Late last year, the...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 18, 2010 13 Comments

There were two important developments recently in the continued unraveling of the Obamacare public relations BS.First, the Obama administration cemented its legal position that the health care mandate is a tax, which means that Obama is raising taxes on people making less than $250,000 a...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 18, 2010 9 Comments

I've been in Los Angeles for the past couple of days at a conference, and had the pleasure of having dinner at The Grill on the Alley in Beverly Hills.The Grill is a really good steak and seafood house, and the meal was excellent.  Fortunately,...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 17, 2010 3 Comments

This is the latest in a series on the use of the race card for political gain:I have a dream.That the week will arrive when the race card will not have been played. And I will have nothing about which to write on a Saturday...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 17, 2010 15 Comments

I haven't posted previously on the New Black Panther group voter intimidation controversy. There have been plenty of other things to cover.The issue is significant not so much because two guys stood in front of a polling station with night sticks -- that would be...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 16, 2010 6 Comments

Once again, someone is using the username "Legal Insurrection" to post comments elsewhere, this time at FoxNation. For the record, that person is not me, and is not authorized to use the name "Legal Insurrection."The last time, it was as HuffPo, and I convinced...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 16, 2010 3 Comments

The New York Times, July 14, 2010:There are plenty of things to buy in Gaza; goods are brought over the border or smuggled through the tunnels with Egypt. That is not the problem. In fact, talk about food and people here get angry because it...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 16, 2010 5 Comments

Sharron Angle will not be able to match Harry Reid in fundraising, because Reid has used his position as Majority Leader to squeeze big dollars out of Big Pharma and Big Mass Tort Lawyers and all the other Bigs.Reid's campaign pockets are so full of...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 16, 2010 0 Comments

It really is frustrating to hear Obama administration officials tout 3 million jobs saved or created.How many of those jobs did several miles of sidewalks in Warren, Rhode Island, save or create?Now that the project is over, the jobs are gone. But you still count...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 15, 2010 3 Comments

I am not someone who tries to keep track of how many of my predictions have come true. That sort of gamesmanship by hindsight is beneath me.And I don't try to settle scores with people who criticize me. That would be petty.So it...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 15, 2010 6 Comments

There is a silver lining for Democrats in recent PPP polling of hypothetical 2012 matchups.Obama trails Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich by low single digits, and is tied with Sarah Palin.That last one must have Andrew Sullivan spinning while he waddles in his...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 15, 2010 4 Comments

Think Progress is possibly the worst of the worst when it comes to twisting words and sentences out of context to accuse anyone who opposes the Obama agenda of being violent and racist.It is what Think Progress, with its large budget, does best.Think Progress had...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 15, 2010 16 Comments

Scott Brown didn't see the forest for the trees in deciding to support Chris Dodd and Barney Frank's financial reform legislation.Although Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins went along also, they did so only after Brown made his announcement. If Brown had come out strongly against...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 14, 2010 1 Comment

Harry Reid now:At a press conference announcing a package of proposals to help small business, the Nevada Democrat said Republicans were obstructing legislation to help the economy for political reasons.“They think the worse the economy is come November, the better they’re going to do election-wise,”...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 14, 2010 42 Comments

to allow trolls, that is the question. For example, the Regular Troll: This guy is openly 180-degrees opposed to the purpose and/or ideological orientation of the blog. Whatever you're for, he's against, and vice-versa. If you're doing a free-market blog about tax policy, he's yelling...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 14, 2010 3 Comments

In response to my post, Harry Reid's Iraq Failure, reader A.W. alerted me to a story which should define the Harry Reid-Sharron Angle race.If you want a good idea at how upset people are with Harry Reid, take a look at the story in The...

Posted by William A. Jacobson on July 14, 2010 10 Comments

It's beginning to feel like the hot August of 2009, again.You can feel it. A growing discontent with the top-down, big government, free-spending, patronizing, arrogant ways of Washington, D.C.If that were all there were, it would merely be another year.What kicked off the hotly debated...

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