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Fascinated with government and politics since he was a teenager, Professor Joel Gora knew he wanted to practice law in those areas and always envisioned himself teaching someday. Now, after 48 years on the Ó£ÌÒÊÓƵ faculty, he is retiring from a career that has checked all the boxes and is replete with memories of wonderful colleagues, students, and alumni. 

"If I had asked myself, 'What do I want to do, and how do I want to do it?' I could not have designed it any better," Gora said. "I’ve always been so happy and grateful that this has been my professional home." 

As part one of his dream career, Gora spent 10 years as an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) attorney working on more than 100 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court and getting a front-row look at historic decisions. "I was convinced that whatever I wanted to do, whatever kind of law I practiced, I wanted to be involved in government and politics," Gora said. "Secondly, I was very fond of some of my college professors and mentors and thought I would eventually consider teaching because I admired my own teachers so much." 

Now a popular professor himself, Gora is proud to have taught Constitutional Law, Civil Procedure and other related courses to more than 10,000 law students over the years and is especially pleased to stay in touch with many of those who went on to become attorneys at firms of all sizes, or into the judiciary or public service law. He enjoys mentoring alumni, seeing them at school events and professional gatherings, and even attending their weddings. He unexpectedly but happily took on another profession when he was certified as an officiant to perform the marriage of two former students. "They asked me, and it just floored me," Gora said. "I was so delighted to be part of their celebration." 

Early Career in Public Interest Law 

³Ò´Ç°ù²¹â€™s career narrative began on the West Coast. Although he was born in Brooklyn, he and his family moved to Los Angeles when he was a little boy. His political appetite sharpened when he was elected student body president of his high school. While attending Pomona College, he embraced the era’s social and political activism by observing the Supreme Court in action during a semester in Washington, D.C., taking summer internships with the Democratic Party in Southern California, and joining the 1960 presidential campaign of President John F. Kennedy.  

After moving to New York in 1963 and attending Columbia Law School, Gora interned one summer at the Manhattan national headquarters of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and another summer at the national legal department of the ACLU. He loved the way the work combined law and politics, and after law school, headed straight into public service. First, he was a pro se law clerk for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit working on constitutional rights cases. He then became a full-time attorney at the ACLU. In the latter role, Gora witnessed a whirlwind of historic events, including the Civil Rights Movement, the Vietnam War, and the Watergate scandal that resulted in the resignation of President Richard Nixon. It was exhilarating, and over the course of his ACLU career, he worked on a wide variety of civil liberties cases.  

"We were involved in 15 to 20 Supreme Court cases a year, and since I was in the national legal department, half of them ran past me," Gora said. "I was dealing with government and politics all through the constitutional law prism, and it was everything I always wanted to do. Even just to be a small part of something very important was so exciting and satisfying." 

Expertise in Campaign Finance, First Amendment Cases 

One of the most significant cases that Gora served as co-counsel on and which earned him a reputation as a campaign finance law expert was Buckley v. Valeo, a 1976 landmark campaign finance case that struck down spending limits on political campaigns as unconstitutional because they limit free speech. He was one of the lawyers who argued that case before the high court. 

Earlier, he submitted the ACLU briefs in two major cases related to media, which were especially interesting since his wife, Ann Ray Martin, was a journalist at one of the major news magazines, Newsweek, covering the news media.  

The first case, in 1971, was New York Times Co. v. United States, also known as the "Pentagon Papers Case," in which the court ruled that the Nixon administration's efforts to prevent the publication of what it termed "classified information" violated the First Amendment. He also was co-counsel in Branzburg v. Hayes, where the court ruled in 1972 that a reporter cannot claim First Amendment protection in withholding confidentially received information from a grand jury.  

Based on these experiences, Gora wrote a book for journalists called  as part of a "know your rights" series of ACLU paperbacks. It was warmly received, including by a well-known First Amendment and media lawyer, Robert Corn-Revere, who read it in college and is the subject of one of ³Ò´Ç°ù²¹â€™s favorite stories. "When I first met Bob, I knew he was a big First Amendment lawyer, and he said: '³Û´Ç³Ü’r±ð Joel Gora? ³Û´Ç³Ü’r±ð the reason I am a lawyer today defending the First Amendment. I realized after reading your book in college that the best way to defend freedom of the press was to become a lawyer.'"  

After a decade on staff at the ACLU, Gora and his wife welcomed a daughter, Susannah. The demanding ACLU attorney travel schedule prompted his decision to pursue that longtime goal of becoming a professor.  

Joining the BLS Community 

Gora learned about a Ó£ÌÒÊÓƵ opening through a BLS friend. The dean at the time of his hire was Hon. I. Leo Glasser ’48, who is currently U.S. District Court Judge of the Eastern District of New York, and whose deanship was followed by the late Hon. David G. Trager, also of the EDNY. Gora deeply admired both men as friends and mentors. He helped to recruit great younger colleagues like Professor Susan Herman (the Ruth Bader Ginsburg Professor of Law and former ACLU president), Professor Maryellen Fullerton (the Suzanne J. and Norman Miles Professor of Law), and Professor Neil B. Cohen (the 1901 Distinguished Research Professor of Law), and while working with other new professors, Gora sought to increase the profile of faculty scholarship and involvement with outside legal organizations like the ACLU.  

To do his part, Gora did a lot of writing, collaborated with the ACLU on one or two cases a year, and even testified before the U.S. Congress as they weighed different bills to protect freedom of speech and of the press.  

"There was this good synergy between the work I did with the ACLU and what I was teaching in the classroom," Gora said. He also served for nine years as the school’s academic dean, working under Dean and President Emerita Joan G. Wexler. This entailed late-night, long hours handling the administrative issues and, in one comical instance, filling in for Wexler at a dinner for college pre-law advisors from Ivy League and top-20 undergraduate schools. The Law School was showing off its new building, and for three days, the group was treated to extravagant meals, culminating with a dinner at the landmark restaurant Gage & Tollner. Tasked with giving a toast in Wexler’s absence, Gora lifted a glass and quipped, "Now you know why Ó£ÌÒÊÓƵ’s motto is a good place to study but a great place to eat." Attendees burst out laughing.  

Evolving Subject Matter 

Over the years, teaching constitutional law has changed constantly. "In terms of teaching, it becomes more interesting because cases become unsettled," Gora said. "°Â±ð’v±ð had a turning of the wheel. We had Roe v. Wade for all those years, and the court said, 'No, that was a mistake.' But they also vowed to protect other things like family rights and gay rights though not abortion rights."  

The Supreme Court has shifted right on many issues, and the political leanings of students have shifted left compared to 30 or 40 years ago, which makes for interesting classroom discussions. He tells students who are troubled by the latest Supreme Court rulings to have patience because the pendulum swings both ways, and he urges them to see both sides of arguments. "They don’t have to accept both sides, but they should be aware of each," Gora said.  

The longtime professor takes pride in seeing former students go on to become wonderful lawyers at firms and in public service. Gora has attended swearing-in ceremonies for former students who became judges on the bench in local, state, and federal courts and some have told him, "I would never have become a judge except I learned civil procedure and understood it when I took your class." A former federal prosecutor who he saw at a recent event told Gora that he was her favorite professor, and "I think about what you taught me all the time."  

That, in the end, is the most meaningful part of teaching at Ó£ÌÒÊÓƵ, and why leaving is bittersweet. "I do see many of my former students who went on to great careers, using the tools that other faculty members and I gave them," Gora said.  

With his long, successful tenure at the Law School drawing to an end, Gora summed up his reflections: "To be retiring along with four colleagues, each of whom has made extraordinary contributions to the betterment of Ó£ÌÒÊÓƵ, the cause of legal education more generally, and, indeed, to the law itself, is an honor that I will always cherish. At the end of the day, I am so grateful for the career I have had at Ó£ÌÒÊÓƵ. I have been able to work on and teach about the constitutional issues which are at the heart of our government system and our democracy. I have had wonderful colleagues, mentors, and friends on the faculty. And most importantly I have had the privilege of enabling countless BLS students over these 48 years to fulfill their dreams of graduating from law school and having careers as lawyers. It does not get any better than that!"