Judith Resnik

Judith Resnik is the Arthur Liman Professor of Law at Yale Law School and the founding director of the Arthur Liman Center for Public Interest Law since 1997. She holds a B.A. cum laude from Bryn Mawr College (1972) and a J.D. cum laude from New York University School of Law (1975). Her academic career includes a clerkship with Judge Charles E. Stewart of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York (1975-1976), instructor at NYU School of Law (1976-1977), lecturer and supervising attorney at Yale Law School (1977-1979), acting director of the Daniel and Florence Guggenheim Program in Criminal Justice at Yale (1979-1980), and positions at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law from assistant professor (1980-1982) to associate professor (1982-1985), professor (1985-1989), and Orrin B. Evans Professor of Law (1989-1997). She has held visiting professorships at institutions including Harvard, Chicago, NYU, Toronto, Sydney, and University College London, where she is an honorary visiting professor (2009-2027).

Resnik teaches courses on federalism, procedure, courts, prisons, equality, and citizenship. Her research explores democratic values in relation to government services such as courts, prisons, and post offices; collective redress and class actions; privatization; relationships between states, citizens, and non-citizens; federal, state, and tribal courts; punishment practices; and equality and gender. Key publications include “Impermissible Punishments: How Prison Became a Problem for Democracy” (University of Chicago Press, 2025); “Representing Justice: Invention, Controversy, and Rights in City-States and Democratic Courtrooms” (with Dennis Curtis, Yale University Press, 2011); “Federal Courts Stories” (co-edited with Vicki C. Jackson, Foundation Press, 2010); and “Managerial Judges” (Harvard Law Review, 1982). She has received the Andrew Carnegie Fellowship (2018), Honorary Doctorate of Laws from University College London (2018), Order of the Coif Biennial Book Award (2014), PROSE Awards for Excellence in Social Sciences and Law & Legal Studies (2012), AALS Federal Courts Section Meltzer Award (2024 with Vicki Jackson), and election as a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2001). Resnik has chaired sections of the Association of American Law Schools on Procedure, Federal Courts, Women in Legal Education, and Law and the Humanities; co-chaired Yale’s Women Faculty Forum; argued U.S. Supreme Court cases such as Mohawk Industries, Inc. v. Carpenter (2009); and testified before Congress and judicial committees. Through the Liman Center, she has supported over 210 public interest fellowships as of 2025.

Professional Email: judith.resnik@yale.edu