David N. Schleicher

David Schleicher is the Walter E. Meyer Professor of Property and Urban Law at Yale Law School and is an expert in local government law, land use, federalism, state and local finance, and urban development. His work has been published widely in academic journals and popular outlets. He recently released a new book, "In a Bad State: Responding to State and Local Fiscal Crises¹," and has co-authored leading casebooks about local government² and property law³. Professor Schleicher is also the co-host of the hit podcast, “Digging a Hole: The Legal Theory Podcast⁴.”

Professor Schleicher has been called “the ideal legal scholar of cities”⁵ (Edward Glaeser, Harvard University), “the leading lawyer on state and city governments⁵” (Lt. Gov. Richard Ravitch ‘58), and “one of the most brilliant and far-ranging political thinkers of his generation⁵.” (Benjamin Wallace-Wells, The New Yorker).  In the press, he has been called “the most important thinker we have on the subject of local government⁶” and “ingenious⁷” by National Review and one of the “most interesting writers on land use⁸” by Washington Monthly. His work has been described as “great but old fashioned⁹” by Vox, “interesting¹⁰” by The Nation, “clever¹¹” by The Economist, “neat¹²” by Slate, “startling¹³” by City Observatory, “excellent¹⁴” by Forbes, and discussed extensively in The New¹⁵ York¹⁶ Times¹⁷, The New¹⁸ Yorker¹⁹, The²⁰ Atlantic²¹, National Affairs²² and Reuters²³, among a number of other places. 

Schleicher was previously an Associate Professor of Law at George Mason University School of Law, where he won the university’s Teaching Excellence Award. He has also taught at Georgetown, Harvard, and New York University. He is a 2004 graduate of Harvard Law School. He also holds an MSc in Economics from the London School of Economics and an AB in Economics and Government from Dartmouth College.