Erwin Chemerinsky

Erwin Chemerinsky (born May 14, 1953) is an American legal scholar known for his studies of constitutional law and federal civil procedure.

Chemerinsky was born in 1953 in Chicago, Illinois.

He grew up in a working-class Jewish family in the South Side of Chicago and attended the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools for high school.

He studied communications at Northwestern University, where he competed on the debate team.

He graduated in 1975 with a Bachelor of Science, summa cum laude.

Chemerinsky then attended Harvard Law School, where he was a member of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau.

He graduated with a Juris Doctor, cum laude, in 1978.

After law school, Chemerinsky worked as an honors attorney in the U.S. Department of Justice's Civil Division from 1978 to 1979, then entered private practice at the Washington, D.C., law firm Dobrovir, Oakes & Gebhardt.

In 1980, Chemerinsky was hired as an assistant professor of law at DePaul University College of Law.

He moved to the Gould School of Law at the University of Southern California (USC) in 1983.

Chemerinsky taught at USC from 1983 to 2004, then joined the faculty of Duke University School of Law.

Previously, he also served as the inaugural dean of the University of California, Irvine School of Law from 2008 to 2017.

In 2008, Chemerinsky was named the inaugural dean of the newly established University of California, Irvine School of Law.

In 2010, students who were protesting against UCI's invitation of Israeli Ambassador Michael Oren interrupted his speech several times.

Chemerinsky, referring to the heckler's veto, asserted that their protest was a form of punishable civil disobedience and not protected by the First Amendment.

In 2011, National Jurist magazine described Chemerinsky one of the "23 Law Profs to Take Before You Die".

Other notable work includes:

Chemerinsky supports gun control and disagreed with the decision in District of Columbia v. Heller.

He thinks that even if an individual's right to bear arms exists, the District of Columbia was justified in restricting that right because it believed that the law would lessen violence.

George Will specifically mentioned and responded to Chemerinsky's argument in a column that ran four days later.

Chemerinsky believes that Roe v. Wade was correctly decided.

He says, "Judicial activism is the label for the decision that people don't like."

He also believed that gay marriage should be legal many years prior to the decision in Obergefell v. Hodges.

Chemerinsky also represents a client held at the Guantanamo Bay detention center.

He supports affirmative action.

Chemerinsky was named a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2016.

Since 2017, Chemerinsky has been the dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law.

The National Jurist magazine named him the most influential person in legal education in the United States in 2017.

In 2021 Chemerinsky was named President-elect of the Association of American Law Schools.

In 2017, he became dean of the UC Berkeley School of Law, where he is also the Jesse H. Choper Distinguished Professor of Law.

Chemerinsky has published eleven books (three of which have been printed in multiple editions) and over 200 law review articles.

He also writes a regular column for the Sacramento Bee and a monthly column for the ABA Journal and Los Angeles Daily Journal, and frequently pens op-eds for prominent newspapers across the country.

Chemerinsky has also argued several cases at the United States Supreme Court, including United States v. Apel, Scheidler v. National Organization for Women.

Lockyer v. Andrade.

and Van Orden v. Perry, and has written numerous amicus briefs.

In January 2017, Chemerinsky, along with other high-profile lawyers, sued President Donald Trump for refusing to "divest from his businesses".

In an opinion piece following the 2020 presidential election, Chemerinsky wrote that "the Electoral College makes no sense as a way for a democracy to choose a president."

He writes that it was intentionally designed to be anti-democratic and came about as part of "compromises concerning slavery that were at the core of the Constitution's drafting and ratification."

In a New York Times op-ed in August 2021, Chemerinsky argued that California's recall process is unconstitutional.

Chemerinsky wrote, "[The court] could simply add Mr. Newsom’s name on the ballot to the list of those running to replace him. That simple change would treat his supporters equally to others and ensure that if he gets more votes than any other candidate, he will stay in office".