Trending
Richard Posner, a prodigious legal scholar and outspoken former federal appeals court judge who pioneered the use of economic theory to resolve legal questions, has died. He was 87.
Posner's opinions have been cited extensively in textbooks that have educated generations of lawyers.
The University of Chicago Law School, where he served as a senior lecturer and one of his sons, Eric Posner, is a professor, said Posner died Tuesday.
Over a nearly 40-year career on the Chicago-based 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, Posner developed a reputation as a strong and clear writer and tough questioner. He eschewed legal jargon. His opinions could be acerbic.
In a 2014 decision striking down same-sex marriage bans in Wisconsin and Indiana, he blasted Wisconsin's appeal to tradition, noting such historically "bad traditions" as "cannibalism, foot-binding, and suttee." He also took aim at the argument that opposite-sex couples need inducements to marry for the sake of their children.
"Heterosexuals get drunk and pregnant, producing unwanted children; their reward is to be allowed to marry. Homosexual couples do not produce unwanted children; their reward is to be denied the right to marry," he wrote. "Go figure."
Posner was a leading figure in the use of economic theory to analyze legal rules and institutions. His 1973 textbook, Economic Analysis of Law, was foundational and remains in print today.
His economic focus could prove awkward, however, like when he proposed allowing biological mothers to sell their parental rights at market prices as a way of eliminating adoption shortages, reducing illegal transactions and channeling money to those who need it.
Such provocative ideas dampened his prospects for a Supreme Court nomination.
Unlike many federal judges, he wrote his own opinions -- thousands of them -- instead of relying on law clerks. He was also known to conduct his own internet research about a case, rather than relying solely on the court record.
Though he was appointed to the bench in 1981 by Republican President Ronald Reagan, he was no rubber stamp for legal outcomes favored by conservatives. Instead, he described his approach to judging as pragmatic.
Posner was in the majority in a seminal 2017 ruling that found the 1964 Civil Rights Act also barred discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender workers.
"I don't see why firing a lesbian because she is in the subset of women who are lesbian should be thought any less a form of sex discrimination than firing a woman because she's a woman," Posner wrote.