Carol Chomsky

  • Professor of Law

Degrees

  • Brown University, B.S.
  • Georgetown University, J.D.

Expertise

  • American Legal History
  • Business Law
  • Contracts
  • Gay Rights
  • Judicial Selection
Show all

Professor Carol L. Chomsky is a recognized scholar of legal history and a leader in the field of teaching development. Her courses include contracts, sales, statutory interpretation, and American legal history, and she runs the year-round judicial externship program for the Law School. Her scholarly work has focused on the history of women lawyers, American Indian legal history, and late nineteenth century American legal history, and she is co-author of an innovative new contracts casebook. She helped establish and now co-directs the Law School's Structured Study Group Program, the academic support program for first year students. She is a long-time board member of the Society of American Law Teachers (SALT) and is SALT liaison to the American Bar Association Section on Legal Education and Admission to the Bar.

Professor Chomsky received a B.S. degree from Brown University and a J.D. degree, summa cum laude, from Georgetown University. In law school, she was Case and Note Editor of the Georgetown Law Journal and earned the Francis E. Lucey, S.J. Award for maintaining the highest academic average in her graduating class. After completing her J.D., she clerked for Judge Spottswood W. Robinson III of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit from 1979 to 1980. Following her clerkship, she worked for the law firm of Stefanson, Landberg & Alm in Moorhead, Minnesota. Professor Chomsky then served as an associate with Sharp, Green & Lankford in Washington, D.C., for four years, before joining the faculty of the University of Minnesota Law School in 1985.

Professor Chomsky served as co-president of the Society of American Law Teachers (2000-2002) and is a member of the American Law Institute. She served as Coordinator for the University of Minnesota's Early Career Teaching Program: Pursuing Excellence in Multicultural Education from 1999-2004, and as Co-Coordinator of the University's Multicultural Fellows Program from 2003-2008. She is an active member of Minnesota Women Lawyers and served as President in 1993-94. She also served on the Minnesota Women Lawyers Task Force on the Status of Women in the Legal Profession.

Legislation and Regulation


Structured Study Group Instructors


Books

Learning Sales Law (West Academic, 2016; 2d ed., 2022)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Jennifer S. Martin
and
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
)
Contracts: A Contemporary Approach (West Academic, 3d ed., 2018)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Jennifer S. Martin
and
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
)
Contracts: A Contemporary Approach (West, 2010; 2d ed., 2013)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
)
Sale of Goods: Reading and Applying the Code (West Group, 1st ed., 2002; Thomson West, 2d ed., 2004)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
)

Journal Articles

A Merritt-Orious Path for Lawyer Licensing, 82 Ohio State Law Journal 883 (2021)
(with
Andrea A. Curcio
and
Eileen Kaufman
)
Diploma Privilege and the Constitution, 73 SMU Law Review Forum 168 (2020)
(with
Claudia Angelos
,
Sara Berman
,
Mary Lu Bilek
,
Andrea A. Curcio
,
Marsha Griggs
,
Joan W. Howarth
,
Eileen Kaufman
,
Deborah Jones Merritt
,
Patricia E. Salkin
and
Judith Wegner
)
Casebooks and the Future of Contracts Pedagogy, 66 Hastings Law Journal 879 (2015)
Testing, Diversity, and Merit: A Reply to Dan Subotnik and Others, 9 University of Massachusetts Law Review 206 (2014)
(with
Andrea A. Curcio
and
Eileen Kaufman
)
Viewing September 11 through the Lens of History, 89 Minnesota Law Review 1437 (2005) (reviewing September 11 in History: A Watershed Moment? (Mary L. Dudziak, ed., Duke University Press, 2003)) (review essay)
Introducing Negotiation and Drafting into the Contracts Classroom, 44 St. Louis University Law Journal 1545 (2000)
(with
Unlocking the Mysteries of Holy Trinity: Spirit, Letter, and History in Statutory Interpretation, 100 Columbia Law Review 901 (2000)
Progressive Judges in a Progressive Age: Regulatory Legislation in the Minnesota Supreme Court, 1880-1925, 11 Law & History Review 383 (1993)
Voluntarism Triumphant: Forbath on Law and Labor, 18 Law & Social Inquiry 319 (1993) (reviewing William E. Forbath, Law and the Shaping of the American Labor Movement (Harvard University Press, 1991)) (review essay)
Of Spoil Pits and Swimming Pools: Reconsidering the Measure of Damages for Construction Contracts, 75 Minnesota Law Review 1445 (1991)
The United States-Dakota War Trials: A Study in Military Injustice, 43 Stanford Law Review 13 (1990)

Book Chapters

Behind the Scenes: Exploring the History of Law School Cases, in Teaching Legal History: Comparative Perspectives 112 (Robert M. Jarvis, ed., Wildy, Simmonds & Hill Publishing, 2014)
Military Commissions in Historical Perspective: Lessons from the United States - Dakota War Trials, in Guantanamo and Beyond: Exceptional Courts and Military Commissions in Comparative Perspective (Fionnuala Ni Aolain & Oren Gross, eds, Cambridge University Press, 2013)
The Story of Holy Trinity Church v. United States (1892): Spirit and History in Statutory Interpretation, in Statutory Interpretation Stories (William N. Eskridge, Jr., Philip P. Frickey & Elizabeth Garrett, eds., Foundation Press, 2011)
Teaching Students How to Read Statutes Critically, in Teaching the Law School Curriculum (Steven Friedland & Gerald F. Hess, eds., Carolina Academic Press, 2004)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
)

Book Reviews

Book Review, 20 Legal Studies Forum 159 (1996) (reviewing Jill Norgren, The Cherokee Cases: The Confrontation of Law and Politics (McGraw-Hill, 1996))
Book Review, 7 Women's Legal History 2 (1994) (reviewing Virginia Drachman, Sisters in Law: Women Lawyers and the Origins of Professional Identity in America (University of Michigan Press, 1993))
Book Review, 12 Law & History Review 395 (1994) (reviewing Edward Lazarus, Black Hills, White Justice: The Sioux Nation Versus the United States, 1775 to the Present (Harper Collins, 1991) and Petra T. Shattuck & Jill Norgren, Partial Justice: Federal Indian Law in a Liberal Constitutional System (Berg, 1991))

Other Publications

Selected Commercial Statutes for Payment Systems Courses (West Academic, rev. ed., 2023)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Anne Lawton
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Sales and Contracts Courses (West Academic, rev. ed., 2023)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Anne Lawton
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Secured Transactions Courses (West Academic, rev. ed., 2023) 
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Anne Lawton
)
Selected Commercial Statutes (West Academic, rev. ed., 2023)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Anne Lawton
)
The Bar Exam Considered, 79 Bench and Bar of Minnesota 12 (Sept. 2022)
(with
Dena M. Sonbol
and
Tyler Wessman-Conroy
)
Selected Commercial Statutes (West Academic, 2015) (Rev. eds. 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Charles Jordan Tabb
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Payment Systems Courses (West Academic, 2015) (Rev. eds. 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Charles Jordan Tabb
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Sales and Contracts Courses (West Academic, 2015) (Rev. eds. 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Charles Jordan Tabb
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Secured Transactions Courses (West Academic, 2015) (Rev. eds. 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
and
Charles Jordan Tabb
)
Licensing Lawyers in a Pandemic: Proving Competence, Harvard Law Review Blog (Apr. 7, 2020)
(with
others
)
The Bar Exam and the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Need for Immediate Action (Ohio State Public Law Working Paper No. 537) (2020) 
(with
others
)
INSIGHT: Lawyers Justice Corps—Public Service in a Time of Crisis, U.S. Law Week, June 19, 2020
(with
Joan W. Howarth
,
Eileen Kaufman
and
Deborah Jones Merritt
)
How to Build a Better Bar Exam, 90 New York State Bar Association Journal 37 (Sept. 2018)
(with
Andrea Curcio
and
Eileen Kaufman
)
Selected Commercial Statutes (Thomson West, 2005) (Rev. eds. 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014) (Advisory Panel member)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Linda J. Rusch
and
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Payment Systems Courses (Thomson West, 2006) (Rev. eds. 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014) (Advisory Panel member)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Linda J. Rusch
and
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Sales and Contracts Courses (Thomson West, 2006) (Rev. eds. 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014) (Advisory Panel member)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Linda J. Rusch
and
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
)
Selected Commercial Statutes for Secured Transactions Courses (Thomson West, 2006) (Rev. eds. 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014) (Advisory Panel member)
(with
Christina L. Kunz
,
Linda J. Rusch
and
Elizabeth R. Schiltz
)