About the Director

Professor Samuel J. Levine joined the Touro Law Center faculty in 2010 as Professor of Law and Director of the Jewish Law Institute. He previously served as Professor of Law at Pepperdine University School of Law, and he has served as the Beznos Distinguished Professor at Michigan State University College of Law. He has published two books and more than sixty law review articles and book chapters, and he has lectured throughout the United States and has delivered online presentations on webinars hosted in countries around the world.

Professor Levine has been described in the pages of the Notre Dame Law Review as “one of the leading legal-ethics and professional-responsibility scholars of his generation,” and in 2016, he received the Sanford D. Levy Award from the New York State Bar Association's Committee on Professional Ethics, in recognition of his contributions to the field of legal ethics. He has been described by the Detroit Legal News as “one of the world’s foremost experts on the interplay of Jewish and American law.” In 2021, he received the Presidential Faculty Excellence in Scholarship Award from the Touro College and University System, and in 2023 he was inducted into the Touro Law Center Builders Society.

He is the author of Jewish Law and American Law: A Comparative Study (Two Volumes), and Was Yosef on the Spectrum? Understanding Joseph Through Torah, Midrash, and Classical Jewish Sources.

Professor Levine received a J.D. from Fordham Law School, graduating cum laude and Order of the Coif, an LL.M. from Columbia Law School, graduating with Highest Honors as a James Kent Scholar, and Rabbinical Ordination from Yeshiva University. He has served as an appellate prosecutor in the Brooklyn District Attorney’s Office, as a law clerk to United States District Court Judges Loretta A. Preska and David N. Edelstein in the Southern District of New York, and as an adjunct professor at Fordham Law School. He has also taught at St. John’s University School of Law and Bar-Ilan University Law School. He has appeared before a number of courts, including the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the Supreme Court of the State of New York.

Professor Levine’s articles have been published in numerous law reviews, including, among many others, Chicago-Kent Law Review, Duke Journal of Constitutional Law and Public Policy, Fordham Law Review, Houston Law Review, Maryland Law Review, Northwestern University Law Review Colloquy, Notre Dame Law Review, Notre Dame Law Review Online, Pepperdine Law Review, San Diego Law Review, Tulane Law Review, University of Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law, Utah Law Review, and Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities (forthcoming), as well as peer-reviewed journals, such as Air Force Law Review, American Journal of Legal History, Constitutional Commentary, Dublin University Law Journal (Trinity College Dublin), Journal of Law and Religion, Journal of the Professional Lawyer (American Bar Association), and Ohio State Journal of Criminal Law.

Professor Levine’s articles have been cited in judicial opinions in the United States and New Zealand, and in appellate briefs submitted to federal and state courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States. His scholarship has appeared in textbooks and anthologies, has been included in course adoptions in the United States, Israel, and Denmark, and has been cited in more than six hundred articles and books by scholars in the United States, Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, Croatia, Cyprus, Denmark, England, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Kenya, Malaysia, Netherlands, Pakistan, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Scotland, Singapore, Slovakia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Thailand, and United Arab Emirates.

His books have been reviewed in scholarly journals and periodicals around the world, including, among others: American Journal of Comparative Law; Canadian Journal of Disability Studies; Global Journal of Comparative Law; Israel Journal of Psychiatry; Jewish Telegraph (England); Jewish Week (New York); Jotwell; Journal of Disability and Religion; Journal of Law and Religion; and Touro Law Review.

Professor Levine has delivered a number of public and endowed lectures, including: the inaugural Yale L. Rosenberg Memorial Lecture at the University of Houston Law Center; the inaugural Beznos Family Lectures at Michigan State University College of Law; the inaugural lecture in Trinity College Law Review’s Distinguished Speaker Series at Trinity College Dublin; the second annual Holocaust Remembrance Lecture at Washington University School of Law; the David S. Stone Foundation Jewish Law Lecture in Toledo, Ohio; a public lecture as part of the University of Tulsa’s Jewish Law Lecture Series; the keynote address at the Disability Day of Mourning at Syracuse University; a public lecture as part of Chabad of Wyoming’s Distinguished Speaker Series; a plenary address at the inaugural Conference on Religious Legal Theory at Seton Hall School of Law; the Jewish Law, Thought and Identity Lunch Talk at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law; a series of public lectures at Chabad of Malibu; and public lectures at the University of Toledo Law School, Wayne State Law School, and Loyola University Maryland.

Professor Levine was the organizer of several national conferences, including: the Conference of Religiously Affiliated Law Schools (twice); the Conference on Religious Legal Theory; Louis D. Brandeis: An Interdisciplinary Retrospective; Benjamin N. Cardozo: Judge, Justice Scholar; The Life and Work of Robert M. Cover; Jewish Law and American Law: A Comparative Study; Jewish Law in Comparative Context; and Billy Joel and the Law, all hosted at Touro Law Center. He was co-organizer of a number of additional conferences, including: The Law: Business or Profession?; Bob Dylan and the Law; and the Legal Ethics Shmooze, all hosted at Fordham Law School. He has also been co-organizer of the annual Criminal Justice Ethics Schmooze. He has organized many other programs and panels, including the Emerging Scholars’ Plenary Session at the Jewish Law Association Conference at Yale Law School. He has also organized a number of special law review issues, including the Symposium: Current Issues in Disability Rights Law, in Touro Law Review.

Professor Levine has made CLE presentations at a number of leading law firms, including: Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP; Polsinelli PC.; Proskauer Rose LLP; Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP; and Weil, Gotshal & Manges LLP.

Professor Levine has served as Chair of the American Association of Law Schools Section on Professional Responsibility, three times as Chair of the AALS Section on Jewish Law, as Co-Chair of the AALS Section on Law and Religion, and on the Executive Committee of the AALS Section on Criminal Justice and the AALS Section on Criminal Procedure. He is Chair of the annual Fred C. Zacharias Memorial Prize for Scholarship in Professional Responsibility, and he has served on the New York State Bar Association Committee on Professional Ethics, the Executive Committee of the Association of Religiously Affiliated Law Schools, the International Advisory Board of the Journal of Law and Religion, and the U.S/Canada Committee of the Jewish Law Association. He has also served as a peer reviewer for several academic publishers and universities, and as a Pro Bono Ethics Consultant for the National Disability Rights Network.