Columbus School of Law

Harris Weinstein

Distinguished Lecturer

Harris Weinstein joined the Columbus School of Law Faculty in January 2007. He will be teaching Agency and Regulated Industries during the fall 2008 semester. He has previously taught Banking Law and the Law of Not-for-Profit Organizations. He has also lectured on professional responsibility and the responsibilities of corporate fiduciaries at a number of law schools, including the University of Virginia and the University of Michigan.

Weinstein joined Covington & Burling LLP in 1962 and has practiced law there for 40 of the past 45 years. He retired from the partnership in 2004 and is now a senior counsel of the firm. His practice has focused on complex civil litigation covering a broad range of subject matters. He has appeared in federal district courts throughout the country and has argued appeals in a majority of the United States Courts of Appeals. He has also argued nine cases in the U.S. Supreme Court.

From 1990 to 1992, Weinstein served as chief counsel of the Office of Thrift Supervision in the U.S. Department of the Treasury. From 1967 to 1969, he was an assistant to the Solicitor General, U.S. Department of Justice. In 1961-1962, he was law clerk to Judge William H. Hastie of the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit.

His tenure at the Treasury Dept. was during the "clean-up" period of the savings and loan crisis of the early 1990s. Under his leadership, the legal staff of the agency obtained over 1500 civil enforcement orders against fiduciaries and professionals of failed institutions.

His published articles include: "Regulatory Child Support: Capital Maintenance Requirements in the United States," 14 J. Int'l Banking L. 18 (1999) (with E. Jason Albert); "Lawyer Liability Under the Securities Laws: Recent Developments," 28 RICO L. Rep. 362 (1998) (with Karen D. Coombs and Wendy L. Feng); "Client Confidences and The Rules of Professional Responsibility: Too Little Consensus and Too Much Confusion," 35 S. Texas L. Rev. 1001 (1994); "Advising Corporate Directors After the Savings and Loan Disaster," 48 Business Lawyers 1499 (1993); "Attorney Liability in the Savings and Loan Crisis," 1993 Ill. L. Rev. 53; "Partisan Gerrymandering: The Next Hurdle in the Political Thicket?" I J.L. & Pol., 357 (1984). He also was among the authors of ABA Antitrust Section Monograph No. 10, "Interlocking Directorates Under Section 8 of the Clayton Act" (1984).

Weinstein received his S.B. and S.M. degrees in mathematics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and earned an LL.B. from Columbia University, where he was Editor-in-Chief of the Columbia Law Review.