List of Columbia Law School alumni

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This is a list of individuals who have attended Columbia Law School. For a full list of individuals who have attended or taught at Columbia University as a whole, see the list of Columbia University people.

Contents 1 Government 1.1 United States Government 1.1.1 Executive branch 1.1.1.1 Presidents 1.1.1.2 Cabinet members 1.1.2 Judicial branch 1.1.2.1 Supreme Court 1.1.2.2 Federal courts 1.1.3 Legislative branch 1.1.4 United States Diplomats 1.1.5 State government 1.1.6 City government 1.1.7 Miscellaneous United States government 1.2 Non-U.S. Government 2 Academia 2.1 University presidents 2.2 Legal academia 3 Arts and Letters 4 Business and philanthropy 5 Journalism 6 Private legal practice 7 Activism 8 Athletics 9 Notes 10 References

[edit] Government

[edit] United States Government

[edit] Executive branch

[edit] Presidents

• Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1904-1907)², Governor of New York (1929-33) and 32nd President of the United States (1933-45)
• Theodore Roosevelt², hero of the Spanish-American War, Governor of New York (1899-1901), 25th Vice President of the United States (1901), 26th President of the United States (1901-1909), Nobel Peace Prize winner (1906)

[edit] Cabinet members

• Bainbridge Colby (1891), founder of the United States Progressive Party (1912); Secretary of State (1920-21)
• Charles Evans Hughes (1884), Governor of New York (1907), Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1910-1916), Republican nominee for President of the United States (1916), Secretary of State (1921-29), and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1930-41)
• Harlan Fiske Stone (1898), professor (1902-05) and dean (1910-23) of Columbia Law, Attorney General (1924-25), Associate Justice (1925-41) and Chief Justice (1941-46) of the Supreme Court

[edit] Judicial branch

[edit] Supreme Court

• Samuel Blatchford (1837)¹, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1882-93)
• Benjamin Nathan Cardozo (attended), judge on the New York Court of Appeals (1914-32), Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1932-38)
• William O. Douglas (1925)², professor at Yale Law School (1928-34), Chairman of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (1936-39), and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1939-75)
• Ruth Bader Ginsburg (1959), professor at Rutgers (1963-72) and Columbia Law (1972-80), ACLU attorney (1972-80), judge on the DC Circuit (1980-93), and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1993-present)
• Charles Evans Hughes (1884), Governor of New York (1907), Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1910-1916), Republican nominee for President of the United States (1916), Secretary of State (1921-29), and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1930-41)
• John Jay (1764)¹, First Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1789-95)
• Stanley Forman Reed, Solicitor General (1935-38) and Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1938-57)
• Harlan Fiske Stone (1898), professor (1902-05) and dean (1910-23) at Columbia Law School, Attorney General (1924-25), Associate Justice (1925-41) and Chief Justice (1941-46) of the Supreme Court

[edit] Federal courts

• Marvin E. Frankel (1948), professor at Columbia, federal judge, partner at Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel (1983-2002)
• Gerard E. Lynch (1975), professor at Columbia (1977-present) and federal judge (2000-present)
• Constance Baker Motley (1946), attorney for the NAACP (1945-64); Manhattan Borough president (1964-66); first African American woman appointed to the federal bench (1966-86)
• Jack B. Weinstein (1948), professor at Columbia (1952-98) and federal judge (1967-present)
• Robert P. Patterson, Jr. (1950), federal judge, United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
• Daniel M. Friedman (1940), United States Court of Federal Claims
• Dora L. Irizarry (1979), United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York
• Anita B. Brody (1958), United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania
• S. Jay Plager (1961), United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit
• Wilfred Feinberg (1946), United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
• Robert D. Sack (1963), United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
• Joseph F. Bianco (1991), United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York
• Denise Page Hood (1977), United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan

[edit] Legislative branch

• Alva B. Adams (1899), senator from Colorado (1923-24, 1933-41)
• Perry Belmont (1876), congressman from New York (1880-88) and US Ambassador to Spain (1888-1889)
• Clifford P. Case (1928), congressman (1945-53) and senator (1955-79) from New Jersey
• Emanuel Celler (1912), congressman from New York (1923-1973)
• Colgate Darden (1923), congressman from Virginia (1933-37, 1939-41), Governor of Virginia (1942-46), and president of the University of Virginia (1947-59); namesake of the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration
• Samuel Fowler unspecified, represented New Jersey's 4th congressional district in the U.S. Representative from 1893-1895.^[1]
• Slade Gorton (1953), senator from Washington (1981-87, 1994-2001)
• Lister Hill (left 1915), congressman (1923-38) and senator (1938-69) from Alabama
• John Kean (1875), senator from New Jersey (1899-1911).^[2]
• Luke Lea (1903), senator from Tennessee (1911-17)
• Wayne Morse (1932), senator from Oregon (1945-69)
• Harrison A. Williams (1948), congressman (1953-57) and senator (1959-82) from New Jersey

[edit] United States Diplomats

• Perry Belmont (1876), congressman from New York (1880-88) and US Ambassador to Spain (1888-1889)
• William Joseph Donovan (1905), World War I hero, head of the OSS during World War II, and US Ambassador to Thailand (1953-54)
• Henry Morgenthau, Sr., US Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire (1913-16)
• Mitchell Reiss, former Director of Policy Planning at U.S. State Department (2003-2005); Vice-Provost of International Affairs and law professor at College of William and Mary; current U.S. Special Envoy to Ireland
• Edward T. Wailes (1927) US Ambassador to Iran (1958-61)
• Paul Warnke (1948), Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs, 1966-1969; SALT Negotiator and Director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, 1976-1978

[edit] State government

• Margery Bronster (1982), Hawaii attorney general (1995-99)
• Colgate Darden (1923), congressman from Virginia (1933-37, 1939-41), Governor of Virginia (1942-46), and president of the University of Virginia (1947-59); namesake of the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration
• Gray Davis (1967), Governor of California (1999-2003)
• Thomas E. Dewey (1925), Manhattan district attorney (1937-42), Governor of New York (1942-55), and Republican nominee for President of the United States (1944, 1948), name partner of New York law firm Dewey Ballantine
• Charles Evans Hughes (1884), Governor of New York (1907), Associate Justice of the Supreme Court (1910-1916), Republican nominee for President of the United States (1916), Secretary of State (1921-29), and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court (1930-41)
• John W. King (1943), Governor of New Hampshire (1963-1969)
• Robert Baumle Meyner (1933), Governor of New Jersey (1952-62)
• Charles J. O'Byrne (1984), Secretary to the Governor of New York David Paterson, contributor to the Columbia Spectator, former President of Columbia Alumni Association (2008-)
• George Pataki (1970), Governor of New York (1994-2006)
• Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1904-1907)², Governor of New York (1929-33) and 32nd President of the United States (1933-45)
• Theodore Roosevelt², hero of the Spanish-American War, Governor of New York (1899-1901), 25th Vice President of the United States (1901), 26th President of the United States (1901-1909), Nobel Peace Prize winner (1906)
• Rolando T. Acosta (1982), New York State Supreme Court Justice, New York County
• Robert S. Smith (1968), New York Court of Appeals

[edit] City government

• Michael Cardozo (1966), corporation counsel of New York City (2002-present)
• Rocky Delgadillo (1986), City Attorney of Los Angeles; first Latino in over 100 years to be elected city-wide in Los Angeles
• John Purroy Mitchell (1899), New York City mayor (1914-17)
• Constance Baker Motley (1946), attorney for the NAACP (1945-64); Manhattan Borough president (1964-66); first African American woman appointed to the federal bench (1966-86)

[edit] Miscellaneous United States government

• Richard Ben-Veniste (1967), federal prosecutor (1968-73), chief of the Watergate Task Force of the Special Prosecutor's Office (1973-75), and member of the 9/11 Commission (2002-2004)
• Moe Berg (1930), light-hitting catcher for the Brooklyn Robins (1923), Chicago White Sox (1926-1930), Cleveland Indians (1931, 1934), Washington Senators (1932-34) and Boston Red Sox (1935-39); able to speak twelve languages; spy for the OSS; according to Casey Stengel, "the strangest man ever to play Major League Baseball"
• Roy Cohn (1947), anti-communist attorney who was an influential aide to Senator Joseph McCarthy and was active in the espionage trial of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg
• William Colby (1947), career spy, Director of Central Intelligence (1973-76)
• William Joseph Donovan (1905), World War I hero, founder and head of the OSS, US Ambassador to Thailand (1953-54)
• John D. Hawke, Jr. (1960), Comptroller of the Currency (1998-2004)
• Bill Lann Lee 1974, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights (1997-2001)
• Irving Lewis "Scooter" Libby (1975), novelist, chief of staff for Vice President Dick Cheney (2001-2005), convicted on obstruction of justice charges for his role in the Plame affair (2007)
• Tracy Voorhees (1915), Undersecretary of the Army (1948-53)
• Lawrence E. Walsh (1935), Independent Prosecutor for the Iran-Contra Affair, Trustee of Columbia University
• Mary Jo White (1974), US Attorney for the Southern District of New York (1993-2002)
• Harvey J. Goldschmid (1965), Commissioner, United States Securities and Exchange Commission

[edit] Non-U.S. Government

• Giuliano Amato (1963), twice Prime Minister of Italy
• Mikhail Saakashvili (1994), president of Georgia (2005-present)
• Kim Hyun-chong (1985), South Korea's Ambassador to the United Nations

[edit] Academia

[edit] University presidents

• Lee Bollinger (1971), professor (1973-1994) and dean (1987-1994) at the University of Michigan Law School, Provost of Dartmouth College (1994-1996), President of the University of Michigan (1996-2002) and president of Columbia University (2002-present); defendant in the Supreme Court case Grutter v. Bollinger (2003)
• Colgate Darden (1923), congressman from Virginia (1933-37, 1939-41), Governor of Virginia (1942-46), and president of the University of Virginia (1947-59); namesake of the Darden Graduate School of Business Administration
• Barry Mills (1979), president of Bowdoin College (2001-present)
• Michael I. Sovern (1955), professor (1957-present) and dean (1970-79) at Columbia Law School, president of Columbia University (1980-93), and chairman of Sotheby's (2002-present)

[edit] Legal academia

• Lee Bollinger (1971), professor (1973-1994) and dean (1987-1994) at the University of Michigan Law School, Provost of Dartmouth College (1994-1996), President of the University of Michigan (1996-2002) and president of Columbia University (2002-present); defendant in the Supreme Court case Grutter v. Bollinger (2003)
• Felix S. Cohen (1931), expert on Native American law, legal philosopher, and professor at Yale Law School, the City College of New York, The New School, and Rutgers University; early proponent of legal realism
• Robert Cover (1968), professor at Columbia Law School (1971-72) and Yale Law School (1972-86); scholar of history, philosophy, literature, and law; author of the multidisciplinary analysis Justice Accused: Antislavery and the Judicial Process, and The Structure of Procedure
• Michael Cox (1981), Dean of Thomas M. Cooley Law School (1988-1996)
• Marvin E. Frankel (1948), professor at Columbia Law, federal judge, partner at Kramer, Levin, Naftalis & Frankel (1983-2002)
• Charles Fried (1960), professor at Harvard Law (1961-87, 1989-95, 1999-present), US Solicitor General (1985-89), and Associate Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court (1995-99)
• E. Allan Farnsworth (1952), expert on the law of contracts and professor at Columbia Law School (1952-2004)
• Jack Greenberg (1948), counsel for the NAACP (1949-84), in which capacity he argued Brown v. Board of Education (1954); professor at Columbia Law School (1984-present)
• Yale Kamisar (1955), expert on criminal law and professor at the University of Michigan Law School (1965-present)
• Soia Mentschikoff (1937), drafter of the Uniform Commercial Code, professor at University of Chicago Law School, dean of University of Miami School of Law
• Lawrence Sager (1966), dean of University of Texas Law School (2006-present)
• Michael I. Sovern (1955), professor (1957-present) and dean (1970-79) at Columbia Law School, president of Columbia University (1980-93), and chairman of Sotheby's (2002-present)
• Herbert Wechsler (1931), professor at Columbia Law School (1933-1978) and director of the American Law Institute (1963-84); argued in front of the Supreme Court in the seminal libel case New York Times v. Sullivan (1964)
• Jens Ohlin (2005), Faculty at Cornell Law School
• Sanford H. Kadish (1948), Influential professor of Criminal Law at Boalt Hall School of Law
• Robert A. Kagan (1962), professor of Political Science and Constitutional Law at the University of California, Berkeley

[edit] Arts and Letters

• John Kendrick Bangs (1883-84)², writer and satirist associated with so-called "Bangsian fantasy"
• Charles Chaille-Long (1880), soldier, explorer of Africa, writer
• Oscar Hammerstein II², writer, producer, and director of musicals
• Isaac Hollister Hall (1865), famed Orientalist and curator of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (1885-96)
• William Ivins, Jr. (1907), curator of prints at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (1916-1946)
• Rod MacDonald (1973), singer/songwriter
• Brad Meltzer (1996), New York Times best-selling novelist, DC Comics author, and co-creator of the television series Jack & Bobby'
• Edward Packard, children's author who developed the "choose your own adventure" style of storytelling
• Paul Robeson (1923), All-American athlete, actor, singer, and civil rights activist
• Nick Santora (1996), writer (Sopranos, Law & Order), producer (Prison Break) and novelist
• Charles Yu, writer

[edit] Business and philanthropy

• Dan Abrams (1992), general manager of MSNBC; formerly chief legal correspondent for NBC News and host of The Abrams Report
• Tom A. Alberg, co-founder of Madrona Venture Group
• William Waldorf Astor (1875), Anglo-American financier, son of John Jacob Astor, US Minister to Italy (1881-1885)
• Mark Attanasio (1982), investment banker and owner of the Milwaukee Brewers (since 2004, incumbent as of 2006)
• Roland W. Betts (1978), investor, film producer, lead owner in George W. Bush’s Texas Rangers partnership (1989-1998), and developer and owner of Chelsea Piers (since 1989, incumbent as of 2006)
• Douglas Black (1918), president of Doubleday (1946-63)
• Frank Blake, CEO of Home Depot
• Alan N. Cohen (1954), chairman and CEO of the Madison Square Garden Corporation (1974-77), principal owner of the New Jersey Nets, and principal owner of the Boston Celtics (1983-2004)
• J. Barkclay Collins II (1969), general counsel for Hess Corporation (1984-present)
• Philippe Dauman (1978), President and CEO of Viacom, parent company of Paramount Pictures and MTV Networks
• Henry Clay Folger (1881), president of the Standard Oil Company (1911-1923) and founder of the Folger Shakespeare Library
• Ted Forstmann (1965), co-founder of Forstmann Little & Company, chairman and CEO of Gulfstream Aerospace (1990-1999), and member of Forbes 400 (1998-2003)
• Stephen Friedman (1962), chairman of Goldman Sachs (1990-1994), director of the National Economic Council (2002-2005), chairman of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, incumbent as of 2006
• Jerome L. Greene (1928), real estate investor and namesake of Columbia's main building, Jerome L. Greene hall
• Edward S. Harkness (1928)³, Standard Oil Company heir, donated funds used to construct Butler Library at Columbia and most of the undergraduate dormitories at Yale and Harvard, as well as to Phillips Exeter Academy
• David W. Heleniak (1974), vice-chairman of Morgan Stanley
• Morton L. Janklow (1953), literary agent to Sidney Sheldon, Pope John Paul II, Danielle Steele, Ronald Reagan, and J.K. Rowling
• Michael Karlan (1992), founder of the nation's largest social and networking group, Professionals in the City
• Jerome Kohlberg, Jr. (1950), co-founder of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts, member of the Forbes 400.
• Orin Kramer (1970), chair of the New Jersey Pension Fund
• James T. Lee (1899), prolific Manhattan real estate developer/magnate; grandfather of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
• H. F. Lenfest (1958), media proprietor and member of Forbes 400 (from 1999)
• Randy Lerner (1987), Chairman and CEO of MBNA (2002-2005), owner of the Cleveland Browns (since 2002, -present) and Aston Villa Football Club (since 2006, incumbent as of 2006), and member of Forbes 400 (since 2002, incumbent as of 2006)
• Russell E. Train (1948), founding trustee, CEO, president, and chairman of the World Wildlife Fund
• Michael Lynne (1964), president (1990-2001), co-CEO and co-chairman (since 2001, incumbent as of 2006) of New Line Cinema
• Douglas H. McCorkindale (1964), CEO (since 2000, incumbent as of 2006) and chairman (since 2001, incumbent as of 2006) of Gannett
• Bruce Ratner (1970), founder (1985), president, and CEO of Forest City Ratner; principal owner of the New Jersey Nets
• Lawrence R. Riccardi (1965), general counsel of IBM (1995-2002)
• Thomas Rogers, President and CEO Tivo
• Thomas Rothman (1980), co-chair of Fox Filmed Entertainment
• Herb Sandler, founder of Golden West Financial (1963), philanthropist, member of Forbes 400 (from 2003)
• Robert B. Shapiro (1962), CEO of Monsanto
• Robert Shaye (1964), founder, chairman/co-chairman and CEO/co-CEO of New Line Cinema (since 1967, incumbent as of 2006)
• Sid Sheinberg, president and COO of MCA
• Richard D. Simmons, president of the Washington Post Co. (1981-1991)
• David Stern (1966), commissioner of the National Basketball Association (since 1984, incumbent as of 2006)
• Franklin A. Thomas, president of the Ford Foundation (1979-1996)
• S. Robson Walton (1969), chairman of Wal-mart (1992, incumbent as of 2006) and member of the Forbes 400 (since 1992)
• Mark Weldon (1997), CEO of New Zealand Stock Exchange (since 2002, incumbent as of 2008)

[edit] Journalism

• Henry Demarest Lloyd, muckraking journalist
• Cynthia McFadden, ABC news anchor

[edit] Private legal practice

• George B. Case (1897), founder of New York law firm White & Case.
• Paul Drennan Cravath (1886), name partner of New York law firm Cravath, Swaine & Moore (awarded first Municipal Law prize, and prize tutorship).
• William Nelson Cromwell (1878), founder of New York law firm Sullivan & Cromwell.
• Walter J. Fried 1928, name partner of New York law firm Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson.
• Ed Hayes (1972), defense attorney and Court TV anchor; basis for the character Tommy Killian in the Tom Wolfe novel The Bonfire of the Vanities.
• Caroline Kennedy (1988), daughter of President John F. Kennedy
• William Kunstler (1948), civil rights activist, self-described "radical lawyer," and popular author.
• Daniel A. Neff (1977), Chairman of Wachtell Lipton Rosen & Katz.
• Gary P. Naftalis (1967), co-chairman of the New York law firm Kramer, Levin, Naftalis & Frankel.
• Robert G. Morvillo, (1962), defense lawyer for Martha Stewart
• Charles F.C. Ruff (1963), Washington attorney who represented Anita Hill and President Bill Clinton
• Joseph Meyer Proskauer (1899), founder of New York law firm Proskauer Rose.
• Whitney North Seymour (1923), president of the ABA; chairman of Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
• John Woodruff Simpson (1873), founder of New York law firm Simpson Thacher & Bartlett.
• David Sive (1948), pioneer in environmental law; founding partner, Sive, Paget & Riesel, PC.
• John H. Slate, Jr. (1938), name partner of New York law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom.
• John William Sterling (1893)³, founder of the New York law firm Shearman & Sterling; major donor to his undergraduate alma mater, Yale University; namesake of Yale's library, law building, and its most prestigious endowed chair.
• Francis L. Stetson (1869), early leader of New York law firm Davis Polk & Wardwell.
• Frank Polk, name partner of Davis Polk & Wardwell
• Louis Weiss, Simon Rifkind, and John Wharton, name partners of New York law firm Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison.
• Frank Weil, Sylvan Gotshal, and Horace Manges, founders of New York law firm Weil, Gotshal & Manges.

[edit] Activism

• Robert L. Carter (1941), civil rights activist, NAACP general counsel, in which capacity he argued Brown v. Board of Education II (1955); judge of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York
• Li Lu (1996), leader of the Tiananmen Square Protests (1989), first student at Columbia to simultaneously receive B.A., M.B.A., and J.D. degrees
• Constance Baker Motley (1946), attorney for the NAACP (1945-64); Manhattan Borough president (1964-66); first African American woman appointed to the federal bench (1966-86)
• Paul Rapoport (1965), co-founder of New York City Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Community Services Center and Gay Men's Health Crisis
• Paul Robeson (1923), All-American athlete, actor, singer, and civil rights activist
• Charles Ruthenberg (1909), founder of the Communist Party of America (1919)
• Martin Heiss (1979), Advocate of Chinese Socialism

[edit] Athletics

• Mark Attanasio (1982), investment banker and owner of the Milwaukee Brewers (since 2004, incumbent as of 2006)
• Moe Berg (1930), light-hitting catcher for the Brooklyn Robins (1923), Chicago White Sox (1926-1930), Cleveland Indians (1931, 1934), Washington Senators (1932-34) and Boston Red Sox (1935-39); able to speak twelve languages; spy for the OSS; according to Casey Stengel, "the strangest man ever to play Major League Baseball"
• Roland W. Betts (1978), investor, film producer, lead owner in George W. Bush’s Texas Rangers partnership (1989-1998), and developer and owner of Chelsea Piers (since 1989, incumbent as of 2006)
• Alan N. Cohen (1954), chairman and CEO of the Madison Square Garden Corporation (1974-77), principal owner of the New Jersey Nets, and principal owner of the Boston Celtics (1983-2004)
• John Montgomery Ward (1883), played baseball for the Providence Greys (1878-82), New York Giants (1883-1889, 1893-94), Brooklyn's Ward Wonders (1890) and Brooklyn Grooms (1890-91); president of the Boston Braves (1911-1912); advocate for player's rights; member of the Baseball Hall of Fame (1964)
• Mark Weldon (1997), member of the New Zealand men's swim team at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona

[edit] Notes

¹ Studied law at Columbia University prior to the founding of the Law School.

² Failed to complete the law degree.

³ Received the LL.D.

[edit] References