Deborah Merritt

Professor Deborah Jones Merritt is a professor and faculty emeritus principle investigator. She is also a Distinguished University Professor and the John Deaver Drinko/Baker & Hostetler Chair in Law Emerita at the Moritz College of Law. From 2000-2005 she directed the John Glenn Institute and laid the groundwork for the Institute to become a School. Professor Merritt has written extensively on law and policy issues, including those related to constitutional law, law and technology, legal education, and the legal profession. At Ohio State, she has been recognized as a University Distinguished Lecturer (1999), University Distinguished Scholar (2002), University Commencement Speaker (Autumn 2004), and Distinguished Teacher (2009). She has also won university-wide awards for Distinguished Diversity Enhancement (2004) and Distinguished Faculty Service (2013). In 2019, the Board of Trustees capped these awards by naming her a Distinguished University Professor. Professor Merritt graduated summa cum laude from Harvard College and obtained her JD from Columbia Law School. She clerked for then Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit and then for Justice Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court of the United States. She also practiced law in Atlanta, Georgia, before beginning her career in academia.