Judge, Arbitrator, Mediator, Attorney, Adjunct Professor of Law, Chief Justice Michigan Supreme Court (Retired)

Arbitrator/Mediator, 2018 - Present; General Counsel Michigan State University, 2018-2019; Of Counsel, Dickinson Wright PLLC, 2017-2018; Judge, Michigan Court of Appeals, Justice and Chief Justice, of the Michigan Supreme Court, 1995-2017; General Counsel, Corporate Secretary, Michigan American Automobile Association, 1992-1995; Associate, Partner, Dickinson Wright, 1978-1992; Harvard College Admissions Officer, 1977-1978.

Most recently, served as General Counsel of Michigan State University and was responsible for managing and resolving the University's governance and all of its legal affairs including, intellectual property questions, mass tort litigation, general commercial agreements and disputes, and contract, tort, and Title IX matters among others. Negotiated the settlement of the Nassar litigation.<br/><br/>Served 22 years in Michigan's appellate judiciary, the last 18 years as a Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court, and, until retirement in 2017, six years as its Chief Justice administratively responsible for the entire Michigan judiciary. As an appellate judge, decided the most complex legal matters in Michigan, including a wide range of commercial litigation disputes, contract, and tort claims as well as state and federal statutory claims. Apart from unique federal matters such as bankruptcy, it is hard to identify a litigation, commercial transaction, or statutory construction dispute that was not decided by the Michigan Supreme Court. Illustratively, the following kinds of legal disputes were decided by the Michigan Supreme Court during tenure:<br/><br/>Contract disputes, including claims for specific performance and rescission, professional, life, auto and casualty insurance coverage;<br/><br/>Tort disputes involving medical malpractice, fraud, tortious interference, infliction of emotional distress, product liability, class actions;<br/><br/>Property disputes, including trespass, conversion, lease disputes, restrictive covenants, slip and fall liability, construction, farming/land rights;<br/><br/>Statutory construction, such as governmental immunity, corporate governance, shareholder liability, Michigan No-Fault coverage, environmental, healthcare, civil rights and employment, voting rights;<br/><br/>Constitutional adjudication, state and federal.<br/><br/>Served as General Counsel and Corporate Secretary of American Automobile Association and in that capacity addressed a wide array of governance, corporate, commercial, and insurance matters. As General Counsel also headed the American Automobile Association's 60 lawyer in-house law firm.<br/><br/>Experienced in general business/corporate, commercial litigation, contract and tort disputes, employment law including counseling on the creation of protective personnel practices and workforce reduction plans, employment litigation and labor.<br/><br/>Served as a Michigan Civil Service Commissioner and was responsible for creating rules for Michigan's Civil Servants (all of Michigan's state employees) and adjudicating disputes within the Civil Service Department.<br/><br/>Served as a member of the Michigan Supreme Court's Board of Law Examiners preparing and grading Bar Exams and adjudicating character and fitness cases.<br/><br/>For more than two decades, served as an adjunct professor of law (Pretrial Advocacy) at Wayne State University Law School and later at Michigan State University College of Law.

All mediation experience is practical – from negotiating as Chief Justice with the Michigan Legislature, Governor and local governments over a wide range of policy issues and disputes to, more recently, mediating commercial disputes referred by Michigan Business Court judges.

The Michigan Business Court mediations have involved real estate transactions, insurance, business dissolution and property disputes. Some of these Business Court mediations have involved multiple parties.

Figure out what the parties need.<br/><br/>As a practicing lawyer who tried many cases, it became apparent that ligation was one of the least effective processes for resolving disputes because it was expensive, time consuming and tended to exacerbate, rather than mitigate, antagonisms between the parties. That perspective was only enhanced by my two decades of judicial experience.<br/><br/>My clients were among the largest companies in Michigan and several adopted my non-union in-house mediation/arbitration provisions. They were Michigan early adopters of ADR. These ADR provisions provided them with immediate relief from employment ligation that saw a spike in the 1980s. The remarkable thing is that aggrieved employees were happier with the outcomes in these in-house ADR programs for a couple of reasons. First, they got to tell their story to a neutral. Second, they could prosecute their grievance without the expense of hiring an attorney if they chose not to.<br/><br/>My mediation philosophy is derived from those experiences: The parties are always the focus. The most important thing is for the neutral actively to listen each party’s story. Second, the neutral must try to disentangle the historical sources of the antipathy that led to the dispute and attempt to get the parties to identify their actual (non-retributive) settlement objectives. Third, the neutral must try to persuade the parties that, while there might not be an ideal outcome that satisfies everyone, a compromise is better than the risks associated with what might be an all or nothing outcome in expensive, aggravating litigation. <br/><br/>Helping the parties to see an alternative to combat requires creativity. Getting the parties to disinvest in litigation just takes time.

Harvard Law School (JD - 1977); Harvard College (AB - 1974).

Admitted to the Bar: Michigan (1978); US District Court: Eastern and Western Federal District Courts; US Supreme Court.

Michigan Bar Association; Wolverine Bar Association; National Bar Association; Michigan Black Judges Association.

As a Justice and later Chief Justice of the Michigan Supreme Court, presented frequently to civic, judicial, and lawyer groups on the state of the Michigan judiciary and the importance of judicial philosophy.<br/><br/>Representative publications: Young, “Active Liberty and the Problem of Judicial Oligarchy,” in The Supreme Court and the Idea of Constitutionalism (Kautz, Melzer, Weinberger & Zinman, Eds., University of Pennsylvania Press 2009); Lang, Young & Beckering, Eds., Michigan Civil Procedure, (Michigan Institute of Continuing Legal Education, 2d Ed. 2021).

Wayne, Oakland, and Macomb Counties, Michigan.

$750 Per Hour

English

United States of America

Grosse Pointe, MI