For Todd D. Rakoff ’75, the Byrne Professor of Administrative Law, who is retiring this spring after 46 years on the faculty at Harvard Law School, time has always been of the essence. The author of “A Time for Every Purpose: Law and the Balance of Life,” Todd has made time a focus of his teaching, scholarship, and service, modeling for students and colleagues alike the importance of spending our time wisely.
A beloved and respected classroom teacher, Todd has taught a range of courses, including Contracts and Legislation and Regulation for first-year students, Administrative Law, and a seminar on statutes and justice. Former Massachusetts Gov. Deval L. Patrick ’82, who was a student in Todd’s first class in 1979, recalls his former teacher as “a model of how to take the subject matter, but not ourselves, too seriously. Lawyers and law professors sometimes leave the impression that justice has little to do with the law. Not Todd. Underneath his quiet demeanor and deep intellect runs a strong sense of justice, and a faith that in the end, law practice pursued with rigor and intellectual honesty will produce just that.”
Todd’s skill in the classroom derives in part from his having taught high school in Philadelphia after college and in part from the commitment to pedagogical innovation that has marked his career at Harvard Law School. A patient and generous mentor to younger teachers, Todd has emphasized planning class time — down to the minute — and making sure lessons prioritize what students will actually learn, rather than just what the teacher wishes to convey.
In the early 1980s, he collaborated with colleagues on an experimental integrated curriculum to break down the silos between first-year courses, and he helped lead the transition to smaller first-year sections in the late 1990s. As dean of the J.D. program, Todd expanded joint-degree opportunities and focused on students’ understanding of the legal profession as a whole.
With Professor Joseph Singer ’81, he created the Problem Solving Workshop, an experiential January term course that was the precursor to the current January Experiential Term. Singer recalls: “Todd not only created superb teaching materials but was key to creating the teaching methods we used in that class. … We worked especially hard on how lawyers can prevent problems from arising rather than just responding to them after the fact, as well as how not to make problems worse through our legal advice.” William F. Lee, the Eli Goldston Visiting Lecturer on Law and former managing partner at WilmerHale, who taught in the workshop, adds: “Todd was at the center of all we accomplished and consistently demonstrated a unique ability to innovate. And, of course, when the [workshop] was implemented and taught, he was brilliant.”
As a scholar, Todd has written on, among other things, administrative law, contracts, legal pedagogy, and time. He is one of the editors of “Gellhorn and Byse’s Administrative Law,” a leading casebook. One of his co-authors, David J. Barron ’94, Louis D. Brandeis Visiting Professor of Law and chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit, describes his former instructor and now colleague as a master teacher, adding: “It is no surprise that Todd’s scholarly writings are master classes. … And that is true whether they are comprehensively surveying a whole body of law, like his classic article on adhesion contracts, or snappily rethinking legal education in fewer pages than the introductions to some law review articles. … In all of it, the aim seems to me to be to teach rather than preach. And like his classes, [his writings] teach so effectively because they are the product of someone so eager to learn.”
Harvard Law students of the last 19 years perhaps know Todd best as leader of first-year Section 7. In addition to teaching the 80 members of that section each year, he has provided academic, career, and personal guidance as students begin to figure out their place in the law.
Juliette Kayyem ’95, Belfer Senior Lecturer at the Kennedy School and an expert in homeland security, who studied administrative law with Todd as a 1L, observes, “Todd helped guide me to a career in government and helped mentor me through the many careers since.” At his request, she has returned regularly to speak to his first-year students. “I found first year hard,” she recalls. “I didn’t really get how to take exams, and my grades reflected it. Todd knew that, and that is why he asked me to talk to his students; they get plenty of exposure to the ones who mastered 1L. I came to understand that my reflections on how I thought about my career were actually because of, not despite, the challenges I had 1L.”
The hallmark event of the Section 7 experience since 2014 has been the Rakoff Bake Off, an annual contest (rivaling the better-known British competition) in which students anonymously submit baked goods that are then taste-tested by section faculty. A verdict is announced by the judges, sometimes with a dissenting opinion, and the winning baker earns bragging rights and, even better, bread baked by Todd himself.
The time and effort that go into the student entries, and into Todd’s own sourdough (or focaccia, or rye … ), reflect the lessons he has taught about how to value what’s important. Martha Minow, University Professor and former law school dean, recalls: “Todd has coached generations of students to ‘think like a lawyer’ through classic (if gentle) Socratic instruction. … Todd’s patience, precision, and passion are matched only by his kindness and generosity: Not by accident, those are the same ingredients of a superb baker.”
Although I wasn’t lucky enough to be Todd’s student while in law school, I feel deeply fortunate to have learned from him over the last 15 years as a teacher in Section 7. I remember in particular an open office-hour session he held in Griswold, with students sitting on chairs, filing cabinets, and even the floor to hear his advice. Like the lawyer’s lawyer he is, he walked students through their concerns, gently asking follow-up questions, pointing to relevant legal rules, and reminding them to use their newly acquired legal skills to solve problems. He did so with his characteristic patience and deep humanity. Despite his demanding schedule, he has made me, and every person who walks into his office, feel as if he has infinite time for us.
Bob Clark ’72, professor emeritus and former dean, rightly notes, “It is hard for me to imagine an HLS faculty without Todd Rakoff.”
In his closing remarks to his first-year students each fall, Todd reminds them to reflect on how they should best spend their time in both their careers and their personal lives. It’s no surprise that the man who wrote the book on the law of time knows when to start a new chapter.
Susannah Barton Tobin ’04 is the Ezra Ripley Thayer Senior Lecturer on Law and the managing director of the Climenko Fellowship Program.