Biography

Saul Levmore was born in 1953. He earned his bachelor’s degree at Columbia University in 1973. Levmore then enrolled at Yale University, from which he received a Ph.D. in economics in 1978 and well as a J.D. in 1980. That same year, Levmore joined the faculty at the University of Virginia School of Law as an assistant professor. Four years later, he was promoted to full professor and in 1994 he was named the Brokaw Professor of Corporate Law. While a faculty member at the University of Virginia, Levmore held visiting professorships at Yale, Harvard, Chicago, Michigan, and Northwestern.

In 1998, Levmore joined the University of Chicago Law School faculty as the William B. Graham Professor of Law. From 2001-2009, Levmore served as the twelfth dean of the Law School. In 2010, his title changed to the William B. Graham Distinguished Service Professor of Law, which he holds to the present day.

In 1998, Levmore joined the editorial board of Foundation Press, a leading publisher of law school textbooks, and has served as its Directing Editor since 2018. From 2005-2008, he served as a trustee of the Skadden Foundation, a program that provides fellowships to recent law graduates to pursue public interest law. Levmore formerly served as the president of the American Law Deans Association (2005-2006) as well as a past trustee of the Law School Admissions Council (2009-2011). From 2019-2020, Levmore was the president of the American Law and Economics Association. Since 2021, Levmore has been the Resident Dean of the Granville-Grossman West Residence at the University of Chicago.

In 1995, Levmore received an honorary doctorate from the Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago-Kent College of Law and he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2000. Levmore’s talents as a teacher and strong rapport with his students has led to recognition, including winning the University of Chicago Law School Graduating Students Award for Teaching Excellence twice and the Graduating Students Class Award three times.

Levmore is married to tax scholar and fellow Law School professor Julie Roin, and the couple has two sons.