Drake Law Dean Jerry Anderson elected to the prestigious American Law Institute

Drake University Law School is pleased to announce that Jerry L. Anderson, Dean and Richard M. and Anita Calkins Distinguished Professor of Law, has been elected to the prestigious American Law Institute.

The Institute’s members consist of judges, professors, and lawyers, who are elected based on their “outstanding achievement in the legal profession.” The Institute’s mission is “to promote the clarification and simplification of the law and its better adaptation to social needs, to secure the better administration of justice, and to encourage and carry on scholarly and scientific legal work.” Most attorneys are familiar with the Institute’s influential Restatements of the Law and uniform codes (such as the Uniform Commercial Code).

The ALI selected Dean Anderson based on his expertise in Property, Administrative, and Environmental Law. He is the co-author of two books, Property Law: Practice, Problems, and Perspectives (Wolters Kluwer 2d ed. 2018), and Environmental Law Practice (Carolina Academic Press 4th ed. 2019), in addition to numerous law review articles. His latest comment on structural barriers to achieving environmental justice was just published in the Yale Journal of Regulation’s symposium on racism in administrative law.

“I am deeply honored by this selection, which for any legal scholar is gratifying recognition of their life’s work,” Dean Anderson commented. “I strongly support the Institute’s mission to improve the quality of justice in our country and look forward to being actively involved in that important work.”

Dean Anderson is on the editorial board of an international peer-reviewed journal, Environmental Law Review (Sage Publishing), and is a Fellow in the American College of Environmental Lawyers. An honors graduate of Stanford Law School, Anderson has taught on Drake University Law School’s faculty since 1991 and has served as dean since 2016.


About Drake University Law School
For over 150 years, Drake Law School has helped launch successful careers, providing a legal education that emphasizes experiential learning backed by a solid foundation in legal theory. As the only law school in the capital city of Des Moines, students gain unparalleled access to internships, externships, and clerkships. Drake Law graduates leverage the experience gained from hands-on learning and are ready to put the law in action from day one, joining an alumni network of 6,000+ who use their law degree in all 50 states and across the globe—in every facet of the legal profession. Learn more about a legal education at Drake.

For more information about The American Law Institute, visit www.ali.org.