Jerry H. Goldfeder, special counsel, Stroock & Stroock & Lavan (Photo: David Handschuh/NYLJ)

The bench and bar know Jerry as a tenacious litigator, prolific author, bar association leader and national expert on election and campaign finance law. I know him as a teacher.

I met Jerry when I took his election law class at Fordham Law School. I had heard that he really knew his subject and was very warm and engaging—and pretty funny.

But he is more than that. Going further than most professors, Jerry is a genuine mentor, and someone who cares deeply about his students.

Drawing upon an unparalleled depth of knowledge in his field, he seeks at every turn to develop our self-confidence and skill as future lawyers—and to imbue within us the importance of political participation.

The fact that he asked a student to write this for the Law Journal speaks volumes as to who Jerry is. He has been a mentor and friend to me, and to many of my fellow students—and I believe that this trait defines Jerry more than most of his other qualities.

It's more than his teaching that makes him stand out. On his own time, Jerry organizes trips to Washington, D.C., for students to meet with Supreme Court Justices, U.S. Senators, and Members of Congress, and he participates with students in seminars and panel discussions on a variety of election-related topics.

It is no wonder, then, that Fordham Law School students voted him Adjunct Professor of the Year in 2015 and then again in 2019—and of course that he received this NYLJ Lifetime Achievement Award.

Over the course of Jerry's 40 years in practice, his name has become synonymous with New York election law. As many say, he literally wrote the book used by so many lawyers and judges—Goldfeder's Modern Election Law, now in its fifth edition. For the last dozen years as a special counsel at Stroock & Stroock & Lavan, he has become one of a handful of go-to practitioners, representing candidates for local and statewide office, U.S. Congress, and President of the United States.

Jerry is also a prolific writer for scholarly journals and the popular media. In fact, one of his articles for the Law Journal won him the prestigious Burton Award for outstanding legal writing this year. The subject? The unfairness of ousting Mohamed Albanna, a duly elected councilman in Lackawanna, N.Y., because of a decade-old crime—about which his voters were well aware when they elected him. In fact, Jerry consistently promotes the importance of expanding access to the electoral system to political outsiders—especially young people, women and people of color—and reforming ballot access and campaign finance laws that too often restrict participation. Toward that end, Jerry has for years written extensively and held free seminars to educate voters and potential candidates, and to train the next generation of voting rights lawyers.

At Fordham Law School, the Adjunct Professor of the Year speaks at graduation. This year Jerry spoke at mine. He conveyed two ideas: "take chances," and "save the Republic."

"If you plan your career or your life too carefully, you will miss out," Jerry said, urging us to be open to new opportunities and to think outside of the box.

His second message was particularly memorable for my classmates and me, and the thousand or so family members who attended: "As a teacher of election law I would be remiss not to say this. It is not partisan to acknowledge that the state of our nation is fraught. That the rule of law is being compromised. So whomever you may support in the presidential election, this graduating class has a solemn duty to be involved, to make certain that our constitutional democracy is preserved—to save our Republic."

As long as we have Jerry to emulate, I think we will be up to the task.

Ryan A. Partelow, an associate at Covington & Burling, graduated Fordham Law School in May 2019 and was senior articles editor of the Fordham Law Review.