Heather Gerken
Born
Heather Kristin Gerken

(1969-02-19) February 19, 1969
Bolton, Massachusetts, U.S.
SpouseDavid Simon
Academic background
EducationPrinceton University (BA)
University of Michigan (JD)
Influences
Academic work
DisciplineConstitutional law
Election law
InstitutionsHarvard University
Yale University

Heather Kristin Gerken (born February 19, 1969) is an American legal scholar who serves as the Sol & Lillian Goldman Professor of Law at Yale Law School,[1] where she teaches election law and runs the San Francisco Affirmative Litigation Project.[2] Since 2017, she has also served as the Dean of Yale Law School.

Biography

Early life and education

Gerken grew up in Bolton, Massachusetts.[3] Gerken graduated summa cum laude from Princeton University with an A.B. in history in 1991 after completing a 123-page long senior thesis titled "Stepping Out of the Bounds of Womanhood: An Analysis of the Popular Image of Women and Women's Experiences during World War II".[4] In 1994, she graduated from the University of Michigan Law School, summa cum laude, and Order of the Coif. As a student, she served as editor-in-chief of the Michigan Law Review.[5]

She clerked for Judge Stephen R. Reinhardt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, and then for Justice David Souter of the U.S. Supreme Court during the 1995 Term.[6][7]

She was an associate at Jenner & Block in Washington, D.C., from December 1996 to July 2000. From July 2000 to June 2006, she was a professor at Harvard Law School, where she was also a fellow at the Harvard University Center for Ethics and the Profession from September 2003 to July 2004. In 2006 Gerken joined Yale Law School and in 2008 she became the inaugural J. Skelly Wright Professor of Law.[8][9] In 2009, in her book The Democracy Index (Princeton University Press), she proposed an index that would rate and compare the performance of elections systems at the state and local levels, to evaluate and improve the U.S. elections system.[10] She became dean of Yale Law School in 2017, and in the same year she was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[11][12] In 2021, she was named to the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States, created by President Joe Biden in order to "provide an analysis of the principal arguments in the contemporary public debate for and against Supreme Court reform" in the context of evaluating the history and future of the court and its practices.[13]

In January 2022, Yale University President Peter Salovey announced that Gerken had been reappointed as Dean of Yale Law School for a second five-year term.[14]

Personal life

Gerken is married to David Simon.[15][16]

Bibliography

  • The Democracy Index: Why Our Election System is Failing and How to Fix It (Princeton University Press 2009) ISBN 9780691154374
  • "Slipping the Bonds of Federalism", 128 Harvard Law Review 85 (2014)
  • "The Political Safeguards of Horizontal Federalism", 113 Michigan Law Review 57 (2014) (with Ari Holtzblatt)
  • "The Real Problem with Citizens United: Campaign Finance, Dark Money, and Shadow Parties", 97 Marquette Law Review 904 (2014)
  • "Uncooperative Federalism", 118 Yale Law Journal 1256 (2009) (with Jessica Bulman-Pozen)

See also

References

  1. ↑ Heather Gerken biography, Yale Law School. Retrieved February 21, 2017.
  2. ↑ San Francisco Affirmative Litigation Project, Yale Law School. Retrieved February 21, 2017.
  3. ↑ Neyfakh, Leon (October 7, 2012). "How to fix America from below: A bold new vision for improving democracy has propelled a charismatic young professor into the legal firmament. She calls it 'federalism all the way down.'". Boston Globe. Retrieved February 19, 2017.
  4. ↑ Gerken, Heather Kristin. Princeton University. Department of History (ed.). "Stepping Out of the Bounds of Womanhood: An Analysis of the Popular Image of Women and Women's Experiences during World War II". {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  5. ↑ "Supreme Court Clerkships (1991-2017)". University of Michigan Law School. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
  6. ↑ "Obama chooses 1st young appeals court nominee". New Haven Register. Associated Press. March 14, 2010. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
  7. ↑ Gerken, Heather (March 31, 2016). "Lecture: The Loyal Opposition: Is it time for the nationalists to put up or shut up?" Program in Law and Public Affairs, Princeton University. Retrieved February 20, 2017.
  8. ↑ "Heather Gerken - Yale Law School". law.yale.edu. Retrieved 2018-04-23.
  9. ↑ O'Leary, Mary E. (June 28, 2012). "Supreme Court ruling on health care lauded by Connecticut advocates; others vow to keep fighting it". New Haven Register. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
  10. ↑ "Public policy engagement – Democracy index".
  11. ↑ "New Yale Law dean stresses standing up for rule of law". New Haven Register. February 23, 2017. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
  12. ↑ "Five professors elected to American Academy of Arts and Sciences". Yale News. 11 April 2017. Retrieved 2017-04-18.
  13. ↑ "President Biden to Sign Executive Order Creating the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States". The White House. 9 April 2021. Retrieved 2021-06-23.
  14. ↑ "Announcement - Reappointment of Dean Heather Gerken". Yale University. 18 January 2022. Retrieved February 2, 2022.
  15. ↑ Bhayani, Paras D. (April 18, 2006). "Con Law Prof Off to New Haven". Harvard Crimson. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
  16. ↑ "Faculty Bio-David Simon". Yale University Department of Political Science. Retrieved October 2, 2018.
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