Jonathan Lipson holds the Harold E. Kohn Chair and is a Professor of Law at Temple University Beasley School of Law. He teaches (or has taught) Contracts, Bankruptcy, Corporations, Commercial Law, Lawyering for Entrepreneurship, Advising the Multinational Company, and a variety of other business law courses. In addition to Temple, he has taught at the law schools of the University of Wisconsin (where he held the Foley & Lardner Chair), the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Baltimore. Professor Lipson is a member of the American Law Institute and a Regent of the American College of Commercial Finance Lawyers, and has held various leadership positions in the Business Law Section of the American Bar Association, where he is currently the Assistant Reporter for the Model Business Corporation Act, promulgated by the Corporate Laws Committee and enacted in over 30 States.
His research focuses on corporate governance, reorganization, and contracting practices, with an emphasis on the role that information-forcing rules and norms play in private ordering. He has published in some of the nation’s top law reviews, including those of the Stanford, University of Texas, UCLA, Boston University, Notre Dame, and Southern California law schools. His work is frequently cited, including by the United States Supreme Court and U.S. Courts of Appeals, as well as leading business courts such as the Delaware Supreme Court. He is a coauthor (with Macaulay et al.) of Contracts: Law in Action, a leading casebook taking a realist approach to contract law.
An occasional empiricist, Professor Lipson has published two articles on the use of “examiners” in chapter 11 bankruptcies, the second of which won the Editors’ Prize as the best paper published in the American Bankruptcy Law Journal in 2016. His study of employment at the Trump Casinos in connection with their bankruptcies received widespread attention, and was noted in Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. His case study of the FTX bankruptcy, FTX’d: Conflicting Public and Private Interests in Chapter 11 (w/ David Skeel) has been downloaded over 2000 times, and was profiled on Michael Lewis’s podcast, Against the Rules and in The Financial Times.
He remains active as an advocate. He has been counsel of record to amici law professors in several significant appellate bankruptcy decisions, including Harrington v. Purdue Pharma (U.S. Sup. Ct. 2024) (supporting successful petitioner); In re FTX Trading Ltd. (3d Cir. 2024) (supporting successful appellant); Czyzewski v. Jevic Holding Corp. (U.S. Sup. Ct. 2017) (supporting successful petitioners); and Off. Comm. of Unsecured Creditors of Cybergenics Corp. ex rel. Cybergenics Corp. v. Chinery (3d Cir. 2003) (supporting successful appellants).
He was also pro bono counsel to an opioid activist and survivor in the Purdue Pharma bankruptcy, where he objected to controversial third-party “releases” sought by the Sackler family. When that objection was overruled, he obtained the appointment of a bankruptcy examiner over fierce resistance, which is detailed in Beth Macy’s book, Raising Lazarus: Hope, Justice, and the Future of America’s Overdose Crisis (2022). After the Bankruptcy Court in Purdue Pharma approved the Sackler “release,” Professor Lipson was counsel (with Pamela Foohey) to a group of 9 law professors who submitted an amicus brief supporting the successful challenge of those releases before the United States Supreme Court.
In addition to these activities, Professor Lipson is the two-time, undefeated Iron Chef of the University of Pennsylvania Law School (a fact conspicuously missing from Penn’s marketing materials) and plays drums with the Philly indie band, The Indestructible Water Bear.
Education
Research & Teaching Areas
Areas of Expertise
Selected Publications
Publications and Media Appearances SSRNLeadership
- American Bar Association: Vice Chair, Publications Board ($2.2 million publications program), 2004-present
- American Bar Association: Co-Chair, Business Law Education Committee. 2003-2007
- American Bar Association: Co-Chair, Law School Initiative, 2003-present
- American Bar Association: Chair, Task Force on Forms Under Revised Article 9 of the UCC, 2001-2004
- American Law Institute: Member, elected 2005
- Association of American Law Schools: Chair, Section on Commercial and Related Consumer Law, 2003-2004