He was the face of the law school. For nearly a quarter-century, if you saw a Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) professor testifying before Congress or breaking down a Supreme Court ruling on the evening news, it was almost certainly Jonathan Adler.
Then, in 2025, the news dropped: Adler was leaving Cleveland for William & Mary Law School. It was a massive shift for the Northeast Ohio legal community.
Honestly, it’s hard to overstate how much Jonathan Adler Case Western was a unified brand. He wasn't just a teacher; he was the engine behind the school’s highest-profile wins in the world of environmental and administrative law. But why did he matter so much, and what actually happened during those two decades at CWRU?
The Scholar Who Built the Burke Center
Adler didn't just teach classes; he built institutions. In 2019, he became the founding director of the Coleman P. Burke Center for Environmental Law. This wasn’t just some dusty office with a fancy name. Under Adler’s leadership, the center pulled in a $10 million endowment—the kind of money that turns a regional law program into a national powerhouse.
Because of him, CWRU consistently pulled an "A" ranking from preLaw magazine for environmental law. He had this knack for making "boring" stuff like regulatory preemption or the Commerce Clause feel like a high-stakes chess match.
Ranking Among the Giants
If you look at the "Leiter Rankings"—which is basically the legal world’s version of the Billboard charts—Adler was a consistent top-ten hit.
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- 2024: Ranked 7th most-cited legal academic in administrative and environmental law.
- 2016: Ranked as the most-cited scholar in those fields under the age of 50.
- 2021: Snagged the 5th spot for citations between 2016 and 2020.
Numbers like that don't happen by accident. They happen because you're writing the papers that judges actually read.
The King v. Burwell Controversy
You can't talk about Jonathan Adler Case Western without mentioning the Affordable Care Act (ACA). This is where things get spicy. Adler, along with Michael Cannon, developed the legal theory that nearly toppled a core part of Obamacare.
The argument was technical—basically focusing on whether federal exchanges could offer tax credits like state-run exchanges. It sounds like pedantic wordplay until you realize it ended up in the Supreme Court as King v. Burwell.
He took a ton of heat for it. Critics called it "lawfare," while supporters saw it as a brilliant defense of the rule of law. Regardless of where you stand, it put CWRU on the map in a way few other professors ever have. He showed that a professor in Cleveland could effectively change the national conversation from a laptop in the law school’s faculty lounge.
Why People Actually Liked His Classes
Usually, a "conservative legal commentator" has a certain vibe. But at Case, Adler was known for being genuinely fair. In 2007, he won the Distinguished Teacher Award from the Law Alumni Association.
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He didn't just lecture at you. He pushed students to understand why a judge might see the world differently. He’d bring in guest speakers like Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch—back before they were household names on the Supreme Court—giving students a direct line to the people actually shaping American life.
Beyond the Ivory Tower
Adler was everywhere. You’d see him on:
- PBS Newshour
- NPR’s Talk of the Nation
- The Volokh Conspiracy (the legendary legal blog)
- Even Entertainment Tonight (though that was a weird one-off)
He had this "media-ready" energy that most academics lack. He worked at the Competitive Enterprise Institute before becoming a professor, so he knew how to boil down a 50-page ruling into a 30-second soundbite without losing the nuance.
What Really Happened With the Move?
People in Cleveland were surprised when he announced the move to William & Mary in 2025. He’d been the Johan Verheij Memorial Professor of Law at Case since 2011. He was "tenured-tenured," as some might say.
But the move to Virginia made sense. William & Mary is the oldest law school in the country, and they offered him the Tazewell Taylor Professorship. It was a "prestige" move, but also a homecoming of sorts to the D.C./Virginia orbit where he started his career.
Case Western hasn't fallen apart, obviously, but there’s a noticeable "Adler-shaped" hole in their environmental law program. They’ve had to scramble to maintain the momentum of the Burke Center, which was so deeply tied to his personal reputation and networking.
Actionable Insights for Law Students and Pros
If you’re looking at the Jonathan Adler Case Western legacy as a blueprint for your own career or studies, here’s how to actually use what he did:
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- Specialization is King: Adler didn't just do "law." He owned the intersection of environmental law and federalism. Don't be a generalist; find the weird niche where the Constitution hits the real world.
- Publish Everywhere: Don't just write for law reviews that only three people read. Adler wrote for The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post. If you want impact, you have to go where the people are.
- Cross the Aisle: Even if you have strong leanings, be the person who can explain the other side's argument better than they can. That's why Adler was respected even by his ideological opponents at CWRU.
- Watch the Supreme Court Docket: Adler’s most impactful work came from spotting "glitches" in how laws were being implemented (like the ACA). If you want to rank on Google or in the legal world, start looking at the fine print of federal regulations.
The era of Jonathan Adler Case Western might be over, but the work he did there—specifically on "Climate Liberalism" and the "Major Questions Doctrine"—is going to be cited in courtrooms for the next thirty years. He proved that you don't need to be at Harvard or Yale to be the most influential voice in the room. You just need to be right, and you need to be loud about it.