Robert A. Levy
Encyclopedia
Robert A. Levy is the chairman of the libertarian
Cato Institute
and the organizer and financier behind District of Columbia v. Heller
, the Supreme Court
Case that established the Second Amendment
as affirming an individual right to gun ownership. He is a Cato senior fellow and an author and pundit. Before becoming a lawyer, he was the founder and CEO of CDA Investment Technologies
.
in the Petworth neighborhood in Washington, DC. His parents ran a small hardware store. He attended college at American University
and went on to earn a Ph.D.
in Business there in 1966.
, Chicago
, San Francisco, Tokyo
and London
. It was particularly well known for its rankings of how mutual funds performed. Their quarterly release of rankings would prompt articles in The New York Times
and The Wall Street Journal
.
Levy sold the company in 1986 to Dutch
publishing firm Elsevier
for an undisclosed amount. In 1987 Elsevier sold CDA to The Thomson Corporation for a profit. Levy stayed on as CEO through both sales, retiring from his position in 1991 to attend law school.
. He graduated as class valedictorian
. After graduation he clerked first for Judge Royce C. Lamberth
on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia
and then for Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg
on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
.
Levy sponsored the Robert A. Levy Fellowship in Law and Liberty at George Mason Law School. It provides full tuition and a yearly $22,000 stipend for three years to students beginning Law School who already have a Ph.D. in Economics, Finance, Political Science or a related field. A minimum of two fellowships are granted for each incoming class.
. At this point Levy began writing extensively, and the following years saw him publishing articles and Op-Ed
pieces in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today
, The Washington Post
, National Review
, Reason
and many other publications. He also began making television and radio appearances, and has appeared on cable and network shows including Nightline, Crossfire
, The O'Reilly Factor
, Hardball with Chris Matthews
, and The Today Show.
Levy co-authored The Dirty Dozen (book)
: How Twelve Supreme Court Cases Radically Expanded Government and Eroded Freedom with William Mellor
. Although never a bestseller, The Dirty Dozen was excerpted by Forbes
, reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, and enjoyed a generally positive critical reception.
In 2004, Levy retired from his position at Georgetown and moved down to Naples, Florida
. He remains a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. He was named to the institute's board of directors in 2007, and became chairman in 2008. He also sits on the boards of the Institute for Justice
, the Federalist Society
, and the George Mason University School of Law.
s for a planned Second Amendment lawsuit against the District of Columbia. Although Levy has never owned a gun himself, he was interested in the issue as a constitutional scholar and believer in individual rights. He teamed up with Clark M. Neily III of the Institute for Justice and began finding and vetting District residents who had a legitimate and appealing reason for wanting a gun for self defense at home. They eventually settled on six residents: Shelly Parker, Tom Palmer
, Gillian St. Lawrence, Tracey Ambeau, George Lyon and Dick Heller. They tried to select a diverse group, and ended with men and women, black and white, and a variety of income levels. Levy only knew Palmer, a colleague at Cato, and none of the six knew each other before the case.
The lawsuit was initially filed in 2003 as Parker v. District of Columbia. After several reversals and appeals, the case was heard by the Supreme Court on March 18, 2008. The court affirmed that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to gun ownership. Levy released a statement saying "Heller is merely the opening salvo in a series of litigations that will ultimately resolve what weapons and persons can be regulated and what restrictions are permissible. But because of Thursday’s decision, the prospects for reviving the original meaning of the Second Amendment are now substantially brighter."
Levy financed the lawsuit and served as a co-counsel. As a result of his involvement in the case, Levy has been profiled by The New York Times and The Washington Post.
Libertarianism
Libertarianism, in the strictest sense, is the political philosophy that holds individual liberty as the basic moral principle of society. In the broadest sense, it is any political philosophy which approximates this view...
Cato Institute
Cato Institute
The Cato Institute is a libertarian think tank headquartered in Washington, D.C. It was founded in 1977 by Edward H. Crane, who remains president and CEO, and Charles Koch, chairman of the board and chief executive officer of the conglomerate Koch Industries, Inc., the largest privately held...
and the organizer and financier behind District of Columbia v. Heller
District of Columbia v. Heller
District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 , was a landmark case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution protects an individual's right to possess a firearm for traditionally lawful purposes in federal enclaves, such as...
, the Supreme Court
Supreme court
A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of many legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, instance court, judgment court, high court, or apex court...
Case that established the Second Amendment
Second Amendment to the United States Constitution
The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution is the part of the United States Bill of Rights that protects the right of the people to keep and bear arms. It was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the rest of the Bill of Rights.In 2008 and 2010, the Supreme Court issued two Second...
as affirming an individual right to gun ownership. He is a Cato senior fellow and an author and pundit. Before becoming a lawyer, he was the founder and CEO of CDA Investment Technologies
CDA Investment Technologies
CDA Investment Technologies was a Maryland based financial research firm founded by Robert A. Levy. It was a pioneer in early financial databases, but was best known for its mutual fund rankings, whose quarterly release would attract national attention in the 1980s and 1990s...
.
Early life
Levy was born and grew up working classWorking class
Working class is a term used in the social sciences and in ordinary conversation to describe those employed in lower tier jobs , often extending to those in unemployment or otherwise possessing below-average incomes...
in the Petworth neighborhood in Washington, DC. His parents ran a small hardware store. He attended college at American University
American University
American University is a private, Methodist, liberal arts, and research university in Washington, D.C. The university was chartered by an Act of Congress on December 5, 1892 as "The American University", which was approved by President Benjamin Harrison on February 24, 1893...
and went on to earn a Ph.D.
Ph.D.
A Ph.D. is a Doctor of Philosophy, an academic degree.Ph.D. may also refer to:* Ph.D. , a 1980s British group*Piled Higher and Deeper, a web comic strip*PhD: Phantasy Degree, a Korean comic series* PhD Docbook renderer, an XML renderer...
in Business there in 1966.
Financial career
After graduating he moved to Silver Spring, MD and founded CDA Investment Technologies. CDA was a provider of financial information and software. The company became a success and grew to have offices in Rockville, MD, New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, San Francisco, Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
and London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. It was particularly well known for its rankings of how mutual funds performed. Their quarterly release of rankings would prompt articles in The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
and The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal
The Wall Street Journal is an American English-language international daily newspaper. It is published in New York City by Dow Jones & Company, a division of News Corporation, along with the Asian and European editions of the Journal....
.
Levy sold the company in 1986 to Dutch
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
publishing firm Elsevier
Elsevier
Elsevier is a publishing company which publishes medical and scientific literature. It is a part of the Reed Elsevier group. Based in Amsterdam, the company has operations in the United Kingdom, USA and elsewhere....
for an undisclosed amount. In 1987 Elsevier sold CDA to The Thomson Corporation for a profit. Levy stayed on as CEO through both sales, retiring from his position in 1991 to attend law school.
Shift to law
In 1991 Levy retired from CDA Investment Technologies and entered George Mason University School of LawGeorge Mason University School of Law
George Mason University School of Law is the law school of George Mason University, a state university in Virginia, United States...
. He graduated as class valedictorian
Valedictorian
Valedictorian is an academic title conferred upon the student who delivers the closing or farewell statement at a graduation ceremony. Usually, the valedictorian is the highest ranked student among those graduating from an educational institution...
. After graduation he clerked first for Judge Royce C. Lamberth
Royce C. Lamberth
Royce C. Lamberth is a federal judge in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, serving as its Chief Judge....
on the United States District Court for the District of Columbia
United States District Court for the District of Columbia
The United States District Court for the District of Columbia is a federal district court. Appeals from the District are taken to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit The United States District Court for the District of Columbia (in case citations, D.D.C.) is a...
and then for Judge Douglas H. Ginsburg
Douglas H. Ginsburg
Douglas Howard Ginsburg is a judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was appointed to this court in October 1986 by President Ronald Reagan. He served as its Chief Judge from July 16, 2001 until February 10, 2008...
on the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit known informally as the D.C. Circuit, is the federal appellate court for the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Appeals from the D.C. Circuit, as with all the U.S. Courts of Appeals, are heard on a...
.
Levy sponsored the Robert A. Levy Fellowship in Law and Liberty at George Mason Law School. It provides full tuition and a yearly $22,000 stipend for three years to students beginning Law School who already have a Ph.D. in Economics, Finance, Political Science or a related field. A minimum of two fellowships are granted for each incoming class.
Scholar, pundit, and author
In 1997 Levy became a Senior Fellow in Constitutional Studies at the Cato Institute and an Adjunct Professor of Law at Georgetown UniversityGeorgetown University
Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...
. At this point Levy began writing extensively, and the following years saw him publishing articles and Op-Ed
Op-ed
An op-ed, abbreviated from opposite the editorial page , is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a named writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper's editorial board...
pieces in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
, The Washington Post
The Washington Post
The Washington Post is Washington, D.C.'s largest newspaper and its oldest still-existing paper, founded in 1877. Located in the capital of the United States, The Post has a particular emphasis on national politics. D.C., Maryland, and Virginia editions are printed for daily circulation...
, National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
, Reason
Reason (magazine)
Reason is a libertarian monthly magazine published by the Reason Foundation. The magazine has a circulation of around 60,000 and was named one of the 50 best magazines in 2003 and 2004 by the Chicago Tribune.- History :...
and many other publications. He also began making television and radio appearances, and has appeared on cable and network shows including Nightline, Crossfire
Crossfire (TV series)
Crossfire was a current events debate television program that aired from 1982 to 2005 on CNN. Its format was designed to present and challenge the opinions of a politically liberal pundit and a conservative pundit.-Format:...
, The O'Reilly Factor
The O'Reilly Factor
The O'Reilly Factor, originally titled The O'Reilly Report from 1996 to 1998 and often called The Factor, is an American talk show on the Fox News Channel hosted by commentator Bill O'Reilly, who often discusses current controversial political issues with guests.The program was the most watched...
, Hardball with Chris Matthews
Hardball with Chris Matthews
Hardball with Chris Matthews is a talk show on MSNBC, broadcast weekdays at 5 and 7 PM hosted by Chris Matthews. It originally aired on now-defunct America's Talking and later CNBC. The current title was derived from a book Matthews wrote in 1988, Hardball: How Politics Is Played Told by One Who...
, and The Today Show.
Levy co-authored The Dirty Dozen (book)
The Dirty Dozen (book)
The Dirty Dozen is a Cato Institute book, written by Robert A. Levy and William Mellor and released in May 2008, about twelve U.S. Supreme Court decisions that were viewed as greatly undermining individual freedom by expanding the power of government. The book was the subject of many reviews and...
: How Twelve Supreme Court Cases Radically Expanded Government and Eroded Freedom with William Mellor
William Mellor
William Mellor was a left-wing British journalist.Mellor joined the Daily Herald in 1913 as a journalist, and was imprisoned during the First World War as a conscientious objector, returning to the Herald on his release. A Guild Socialist during the 1910s, he worked closely with G. D. H. Cole,...
. Although never a bestseller, The Dirty Dozen was excerpted by Forbes
Forbes
Forbes is an American publishing and media company. Its flagship publication, the Forbes magazine, is published biweekly. Its primary competitors in the national business magazine category are Fortune, which is also published biweekly, and Business Week...
, reviewed by The Wall Street Journal, and enjoyed a generally positive critical reception.
In 2004, Levy retired from his position at Georgetown and moved down to Naples, Florida
Naples, Florida
Naples is a city in Collier County, Florida, United States. As of July 1, 2007, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the city's population at 21,653. Naples is a principal city of the Naples–Marco Island Metropolitan Statistical Area, which had an estimated total population of 315,839 on July 1, 2007...
. He remains a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute. He was named to the institute's board of directors in 2007, and became chairman in 2008. He also sits on the boards of the Institute for Justice
Institute for Justice
The Institute for Justice is a 501 non-profit libertarian public interest law firm in the United States. Its mission is to provide pro bono legal advice and representation, litigating strategically to pursue its goal of a rule of law under which individuals can control their destinies as free and...
, the Federalist Society
Federalist Society
The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies, most frequently called simply the Federalist Society, is an organization of conservatives seeking reform of the current American legal system in accordance with a textualist and/or originalist interpretation of the U.S. Constitution...
, and the George Mason University School of Law.
District of Columbia v. Heller
In 2002, Levy began recruiting plaintiffPlaintiff
A plaintiff , also known as a claimant or complainant, is the term used in some jurisdictions for the party who initiates a lawsuit before a court...
s for a planned Second Amendment lawsuit against the District of Columbia. Although Levy has never owned a gun himself, he was interested in the issue as a constitutional scholar and believer in individual rights. He teamed up with Clark M. Neily III of the Institute for Justice and began finding and vetting District residents who had a legitimate and appealing reason for wanting a gun for self defense at home. They eventually settled on six residents: Shelly Parker, Tom Palmer
Tom G. Palmer
Tom Gordon Palmer is a Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, director of the Institute's educational division, , Vice President for International Programs at the Atlas Economic Research Foundation, and General Director of the -Professional life:Palmer earned his B.A. in liberal arts from St. John's...
, Gillian St. Lawrence, Tracey Ambeau, George Lyon and Dick Heller. They tried to select a diverse group, and ended with men and women, black and white, and a variety of income levels. Levy only knew Palmer, a colleague at Cato, and none of the six knew each other before the case.
The lawsuit was initially filed in 2003 as Parker v. District of Columbia. After several reversals and appeals, the case was heard by the Supreme Court on March 18, 2008. The court affirmed that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to gun ownership. Levy released a statement saying "Heller is merely the opening salvo in a series of litigations that will ultimately resolve what weapons and persons can be regulated and what restrictions are permissible. But because of Thursday’s decision, the prospects for reviving the original meaning of the Second Amendment are now substantially brighter."
Levy financed the lawsuit and served as a co-counsel. As a result of his involvement in the case, Levy has been profiled by The New York Times and The Washington Post.
External links and sources
- Robert A. Levy Biography, Cato Institute
- Carefully Plotted Course Propels Gun Case to Top, New York Times
- Lawyer Who Wiped Out D.C. Ban Says It's About Liberties, Not Guns, Washington Post
- Robert A. Levy Fellowships, George Mason University School of Law
- Judging the Judges, Wall Street Journal review of Dirty Dozen
- 'Supreme Court to hear challenge to DC gun law', by David G. Savage, Los Angeles Times, March 17, 2008
- Coverage of CDA Quarterly Rankings, New York Times
- Levy Statement on Heller Ruling, Cato Institute