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Nicholas Stephanopoulos is an American legal scholar who is the Kirkland & Ellis Professor of Law at
Harvard Law School Harvard Law School (Harvard Law or HLS) is the law school of Harvard University, a private research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1817, it is the oldest continuously operating law school in the United States. Each class ...
. His scholarship primarily focuses on election law, constitutional law, and the interplay between law and democracy. Recognized as a leading expert in election law, his work has been cited numerous times by the United States Supreme Court. He has contributed significantly to the study of partisan gerrymandering and is a co-founder of PlanScore, a platform for evaluating district plans. He co-invented the efficiency gap, a metric used to measure potential gerrymandering in electoral systems, which quantifies the fairness of districting by calculating wasted votes. In October 2022, Stephanopoulos was elected to the
American Law Institute The American Law Institute (ALI) is a research and advocacy group of judges, lawyers, and legal scholars established in 1923 to promote the clarification and simplification of United States common law and its adaptation to changing social needs. ...
.


Early life and education

Stephanopoulos earned his AB in Government from Harvard College, graduating ''summa cum laude''. He then obtained an M.Phil. in European Studies from University of Cambridge, followed by a JD from Yale Law School, where he was the Editor-in-Chief of the Yale Journal of International Law.


Legal career

Before his current position at Harvard, Stephanopoulos was a professor of law at the University of Chicago Law School. He has also been an Associate-in-Law at Columbia Law School and worked as an associate in the Washington, D.C., office of Jenner & Block LLP. Early in his career, he clerked for Judge
Raymond C. Fisher Raymond Corley Fisher (July 12, 1939 – February 29, 2020) was a United States circuit judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Education and legal training Fisher attended University High School, earned his Bachelor o ...
of the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Stephanopoulos has contributed to the New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, The Atlantic, The New Republic,
Slate Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. It is the finest grained foliated metamorphic rock. ...
, and Vox. He has played a significant role in several high-profile litigation efforts, including the Supreme Court case Gill v. Whitford. In the 2023 case
Allen v. Milligan ''Allen v. Milligan'' (Dockets 21–1086, 21–1087) is a pending United States Supreme Court case related to redistricting under the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Background Alabama's congressional districts have had roughly the same configurat ...
, the Supreme Court's decision heavily relied on an amicus brief submitted by the Election Law Clinic, representing Stephanopoulos and other scholars. This brief was cited several times in the Court's opinion. It provided empirical evidence about the effectiveness of Section 2 of the VRA and highlighted the potential consequences of undermining this provision, which aims to protect the electoral opportunities for communities of color.


Selected publications

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References


External links


Faculty Profile at Harvard Law School

PlanScore Profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Stephanopoulos, Nicholas Living people American legal scholars Harvard College alumni Alumni of the University of Cambridge Yale Law School alumni Harvard Law School faculty University of Chicago Law School faculty Year of birth missing (living people) NIH Director's New Innovator Award recipients