New York Law School Professor Seth Harris Named Deputy Secretary of the United States Department of Labor

New York, NY (June 18, 2009)—New York Law School Professor Seth Harris, an expert on labor and employment law, has been appointed the Deputy Secretary of the Department of Labor.

Professor Harris served as the Chair of Obama for America’s Labor, Employment, and Workplace Policy Committee and as Co-Chair of its Disability Policy Committee. He was also a member of the Obama-Biden Transition Project’s Agency Review Working Group, responsible for the labor, education, and transportation agencies.

Professor Harris is on a leave of absence from his duties at New York Law School, where he is the Director of the Labor & Employment Law Program and organizer of the annual Tony Coelho Lecture in Disability Employment Law & Policy. Professor Harris joined the Law School in 2000. His scholarship focuses on the economics of labor and employment law, with a particular emphasis on the employment provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act. He has also written about the National Labor Relations Act, the Fair Labor Standards Act, worker organizing, and employment discrimination laws in general.

Prior to joining the Law School, Professor Harris worked closely with the White House and members of Congress during the Clinton Administration. For nearly seven years, he served two U.S. secretaries of labor as senior advisor on policy, legal, management, and strategy issues, among other policy-advising positions. Before joining the administration, he was a law clerk to Judge William Canby of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit and Judge Gene Carter of the U.S. District Court for the District of Maine. He was Editor in Chief of the Review of Law & Social Change at the New York University School of Law.

About New York Law School
Founded in 1891, New York Law School is an independent law school located in lower Manhattan near the city’s centers of law, government, and finance. New York Law School’s renowned faculty of prolific scholars has built the School’s strength in such areas as constitutional law, civil and human rights, labor and employment law, media and information law, urban legal studies, international and comparative law, and a number of interdisciplinary fields. The School is noted for its eight academic centers: Center on Business Law & Policy, Center on Financial Services Law, Center for International Law, Center for New York City Law, Center for Professional Values and Practice, Center for Real Estate Studies, Institute for Information Law & Policy, and Justice Action Center. New York Law School has more than 13,000 graduates and enrolls some 1,500 students in its full- and part-time J.D. program and its Master of Laws (LL.M.) in Taxation program. www.nyls.edu  

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