David Oedel

Professor

Involvement:
Bar Memberships: Supreme Court of the United States, State Bar of Georgia, State Bar of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Court of Appeals for the First Circuit of the United States, United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts. Other Professional Associations: American Bar Association; Association of American Law Schools; Macon, Georgia Bar Association.

Publications:
Various publications on public infrastructure funding, private banking regulation, transportation law and politics, and the practice of law (ncluding counsel between lawyer and client).

Honors:
Editor-in-Chief, Annual Review of Banking Law. G. Joseph Tauro Scholar; Paul J. Liacos Scholar; Edward F. Hennessey Distinguished Scholar.

Teaches:
Contracts, Intellectual Property, Constitutional Law, Transportation Law and Politics, Client Counseling.

Resume:
Education J.D., 1987, magna cum laude, Boston University School of Law; Editor-in-Chief, Annual Review of Banking Law; G. Joseph Tauro Scholar; Paul J. Liacos Scholar; Edward F. Hennessey Distinguished Scholar. B.A., 1979, Haverford College, Anthropology and Sociology; Chairman, Haverford College Committee on Investments and Social Responsibility, 1978-79; Student Representative on Faculty Committee on Student Standings & Programs, 1976-79; Captain, Varsity Sailing; NCAA East Coast All-Star; lacrosse team member; Outing Club president. Employment 1990-present Professor of Law, Mercer University Law School, since 1997. Visiting Professor, Emory University Law School, Spring and Fall semesters, 1997. Associate Professor of Law, Mercer University Law School, 1993-1997. Assistant Professor of Law, Mercer Law School, 1990-1993. Current courses: Contracts, Constitutional Law, Intellectual Property, Transportation Law and Politics, Introduction to Counseling course administrator for program experienced by every Mercer law student). 1987-1990 Associate, Gaston & Snow (large old firm, now defunct), Boston, Massachusetts, complex constitutional, intellectual property, and business litigation in cases at all levels, including the U.S. Supreme Court, U.S. Circuit Courts of Appeal, and state and federal trial courts. 1985 Clerk-intern to the Honorable Joseph L. Tauro, United States District Court, Massachusetts 1980-1984 Personnel Manager, Spir-it, Inc., Wakefield, Massachusetts (plastics manufacturer) 1979 Field Researcher, National Science Foundation (mapped remote region of British Columbia) Professional Service Positions 2004 Coach of the Southeast Region Winners of the American Bar Association’s Client Counseling Competition 2003 Founder of the Madison Cascades Association, a voluntary association of members of the public seeking to vindicate the public’s interests in the Madison, New Hampshire, Cascades and Cascades Forest; filed suit on Association's behalf and prevailed in preserving the forest, which as a result of the litigation is now formally owned by the public. 2003 Counsel to Governor Sonny Perdue, State of Georgia, in the case of Perdue v. Baker, at trial and appellate levels, on the question of whether the Governor or the Attorney General directs litigation in the name of the State of Georgia 2003 Coach of the 11th Circuit Region Winners of the American Bar Association’s Client Counseling Competition, and of the sixth-place team nationally 2002 Senior Advisor to the Honorable James Marshall, Democratic candidate for and winner of race for a seat in the United States House of Representatives from the Third District of Georgia 2001 Coach of the 11th Circuit Region Winners of the American Bar Association’s Client Counseling Competition, and of the fourth-place team nationally 2001 Counsel to Amici in the case of State Farm v. Mabry and related cases (involving “diminished value” of repaired vehicles under insurance contracts in the state of Georgia) 2000 Senior Advisor to the Honorable James Marshall, candidate for the United States House of Representatives from the Third District of Georgia 2000 Senior Advisor to the Honorable C. Jack Ellis, candidate for and winner of the election for Mayor of Macon, Georgia 1996-7 As General Counsel for the NAACP, Macon, Georgia Branch, intervened in the W.T. Anderson will contest (reported on the front page of the Wall Street Journal in that year) 1996 Senior Advisor to the Honorable James Marshall, candidate for and winner of the election for Mayor of Macon, Georgia 1996 Coach of the 11th Circuit Region Winners of the American Bar Association’s Client Counseling Competition, and of the fourth-place team nationally 1995-2000 Chair, Vice-Chair, Secretary, and Executive Committee Member, Financial Institutions and Consumer Financial Services Section of the American Association of Law Schools 1995-7 Member, Environmental Justice Subcommittee of Transportation Research Board 1995 Coach of the 11th Circuit Region Winners of the American Bar Association’s Client Counseling Competition, and of the sixth-place team nationally 1992-2002 Reporter, Advisory Group on Civil Justice Reform for the Middle District of Georgia pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 ("the Biden bill") 1994-1999 Member, Georgia Chief Justice's Commission on Professionalism 1994-1997 Executive Board Member, NAACP, Macon, Georgia; Chairman, Legal Redress Committee; General Counsel 1993-2002 With the Legal Defense Fund and Georgia Legal Services, counsel for a class of low-income African-American residents and disabled residents of Macon, Georgia, who complained about the lavish public funding of transportation projects in Macon that primarily served people with cars, in contrast to the minimal funding of projects that serve poor African-Americans without cars. (Macon doggedly refused to accept federal funding for public transit that Congress allotted, but accepted large federal allotments for roads, streets and highways.) 1992 Senior Advisor to C. Jack Ellis, Candidate for State Senate seat from District 26 in Georgia 1991-present Commentator on legal issues within areas of expertise for television and print media locally and nationally, including CNN 1988 Issues Analyst for the Campaign for U.S. President by Michael Dukakis Authorship 2003 “Talking Things Over: A Lawyer’s Companion to the First Minutes with the Client” (short book in progress; draft complete for use in 2003 Introduction to Counseling program for all second-year students at Mercer University Law School) 2003 Amicus Curaie Brief Author in the Georgia Supreme Court in the Case of Perdue v. Baker, in which the governor sued the attorney general over which party has the authority to direct litigation in the name of the state of Georgia 2002 Collaborator on the U.S. D.O.T.’s Atlanta, Georgia Study on Environmental Justice in Transportation in the Atlanta metro region (national test study for civil rights analysis of transportation decision-making) 2001 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 2000 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 1999 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 1998 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 1997 “Why Regulate Cybermoney?” 46 American University Law Review 1075 (1997). 1997 “The Legacy of Jim Crow in Macon, Georgia, Chapter in Just Transportation: Dismantling Race & Class Barriers to Mobility, editors Robert D. Bullard and Glenn S. Johnson (1997) 1997 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (discovering that prisoner litigation has begun to overwhelm the docket in this district -- one of every three civil cases was filed by a prisoner in 1994 -- and recommending significant changes in the handling of prisoner petitions) 1996 “Report on the Study of Systemic Problems with Public Transportation in Macon, Bibb County, Georgia,” Environmental Justice and Transportation: Building Model Partnerships Conference Proceedings 1996 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (discovering that prisoner litigation has begun to overwhelm the docket in this district -- one of every three civil cases was filed by a prisoner in 1994 -- and recommending significant changes in the handling of prisoner petitions) 1996 ASHTO Regional Meeting Presenter, San Diego, California, “Environmental Justice in Transportation: A Case Study” 1995 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (discovering that prisoner litigation has begun to overwhelm the docket in this district -- one of every three civil cases was filed by a prisoner in 1994 -- and recommending significant changes in the handling of prisoner petitions) 1995 "Puzzling Banking Law -- Its Practical Effects and Supposed Purposes" (manuscript in progress evaluating the causes of the late crisis in banking, and evaluating longstanding rationales for bank regulation) 1995 "Deming, TQM, and the Emerging Managerial Critique of Law Practice," Arizona L. Rev. (Dec. 1995) (overview of a managerial approach to conceptualizing legal practice and its problems) 1995 "Time To Pension Off the Glass-Steagall Act," National Law Journal, March 20, 1995, at p. A19, col. 3 (reviewing the deep history of populist antagonism to banking concentrations, but arguing that interbank alliances are not presently a threat to the public interest, and that Glass-Steagall warrants repeal). Glass-Steagall was in fact repealed in 2000. 1994 Annual Report of the Advisory Group to the United States District Court For the Middle District of Georgia Pursuant to the Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (discovering that prisoner litigation has begun to overwhelm the docket in this district -- one of every three civil cases was filed by a prisoner in 1994 -- and recommending significant changes in the handling of prisoner petitions) 1993 "Private Interbank Discipline," 16 Harv. J. of Law & Pub. Pol. 327 (1993) (reviewing the demonstrated vitality and potential efficacy of voluntary alternatives to command-and-control regulation of banks and banking) 1993 Report of the Middle District of Georgia Advisory Group on Civil Justice Reform (evaluating conditions of civil justice delivery in the Middle District of Georgia, and proposing reforms in keeping with role as Reporter under the Biden bill) 1993 Director, "Perspectives on Lawyer Professionalism," nine videotape documentaries capturing the thoughts of bar leaders in law firms of all sizes, focusing on these nine topics: Deciding to Become a Lawyer, Public Perceptions of Lawyers, Law as Business, Clients, Service, Discovery, Civility, Quality of Life, Gender. For use in law schools and CLE programs. Includes authorship of companion "Teaching Notes." 1993 "An Independent Study of Public Transit in the City of Macon and Bibb County, Georgia" (analyzing the quality of bus service in Macon, exploring the reasons for its poor quality, and discussing the legal implications of the situation) 1993 "The Nature and Status of the Proposed Changes to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure" (CLE program materials) 1993 with Hon. Wilbur D. Owens, Jr., "Plan to Minimize Cost and Delay of Civil Litigation in the Middle District of Georgia As Adopted by the United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia" 1992 "Statistics Detailing the Speed and Extent of Civil Litigation in the Middle District of Georgia" 1992 "Survey of Opinions Among Attorneys and Litigants About the Conduct of Civil Actions in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Georgia" 1992 "Ethical Billing and Professional Survival," Institute of Continuing Legal Education (Georgia) 1991 "The Failure of Gaston & Snow -- Post-Mortem on the Death of a Respected Firm," National Law Journal November 24, 1991 1987 "Interest Rate Swaps," paper presented at the ABA's Annual Conference in San Francisco, first-place winner, Business Law Section's writing competition 1987 "Civil Liability for the Concealment of Bank Trouble," 6 Ann. Rev. Banking L. 443 (1987) (detailing the civil liabilities that are incurred by those concealing bank trouble, and urging that injured parties and regulators use the civil justice system to impose discipline on bank officers and directors) 1977 "Atnakuna Motifs on Egyptian Figurines," Occasional Publications of the Epigraphic Society 1976 Drawings and various other contributions in H.B. Fell, America BC (New York Times Publishing) Bar Memberships United States Supreme Court First Circuit Court of the United States United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts Commonwealth of Massachusetts State of Georgia (pending) Personal Born July 30, 1957 in Salem, Massachusetts Married to Kerry S. Oedel Father of eight children (including four step-children) Soccer coach for nine seasons Baseball coach for two seasons Chess coach for four seasons Member, St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Atlanta, Georgia