Rate My Professor Geoffrey Stone

Geoffrey R. Stone, Edward H. Levi Distinguished Service Professor of Law at the University of Chicago Law School since 2008, has shaped legal education and scholarship for over five decades. He earned a B.S. in 1968 from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Finance and Commerce and a J.D. cum laude in 1971 from the University of Chicago Law School, where he served as Editor-in-Chief of the University of Chicago Law Review and was elected to the Order of the Coif. After clerkships with Judge J. Skelly Wright of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (1971-1972) and Justice William J. Brennan, Jr., of the Supreme Court (1972-1973), Stone joined the Chicago faculty as Assistant Professor in 1973, becoming Associate Professor, then Professor by 1984. He chaired major committees in the 1980s, served as Dean (1987-1994)—prioritizing teaching and collegiality—Provost (1994-2002), Harry Kalven, Jr. Professor (1994-2007), and Interim Dean (2015). Stone designed the Law School's seminal seminar on constitutional decision-making, a model adopted by other institutions, and marked 50 years of teaching in 2024.

Professor Stone's academic interests lie in constitutional law, encompassing free speech, religion, sex, affirmative action, abortion rights, and national security. His prolific output includes books such as Roe v. Dobbs: The Past, Present, and Future of a Constitutional Right to Abortion (2024), A Legacy of Discrimination (2023), National Security, Leaks and Freedom of the Press (2021), Democracy and Equality: The Enduring Constitutional Vision of the Warren Court (2019), The Free Speech Century (2018), Sex and the Constitution (2017), The NSA Report (2014), Perilous Times: Free Speech in Wartime (2004)—which garnered the 2005 Los Angeles Times Book Prize, Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Book Prize, American Political Science Association Kammerer Award, and Scribes Book Award—Top Secret (2007), War and Liberty (2007), and Eternally Vigilant (2002). He is editor of the Supreme Court Review (co-edited eight volumes since 1991), chief editor of Oxford's 25-volume Inalienable Rights series, and co-author of casebooks Constitutional Law (9th ed. 2023) and The First Amendment (7th ed. 2024). Stone served on President Obama’s Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies (2013), filed amicus briefs in Supreme Court cases like Obergefell v. Hodges, Lawrence v. Texas, and Rasul v. Bush, and delivered keynotes including the 2024 UNC Law Symposium and 2016 Aims of Education Address. Awards include Fellowship in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1990), membership in the American Philosophical Society (2010) and American Law Institute (2003), University of Chicago Provost Award for Teaching (2006), John Mclean Award (2021), and ACS Legal Legend (2012).