Dan Farber is the Sho Sato Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley. He is also the Faculty Director of the Center for Law, Energy, and the Environment. Professor Farber is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a Life Member of the American Law Institute.
Professor Farber is a graduate of the University of Illinois, where he earned his B.A., M.A., and J.D. degrees. He graduated, summa cum laude, from the College of Law, where he was the class valedictorian and served as editor-in-chief of the University of Illinois Law Review. After law school, he was a law clerk for Judge Philip W. Tone of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit and then for Justice John Paul Stevens of the U.S. Supreme Court. Professor Farber practiced law with Sidley & Austin, where he primarily worked on energy issues, before returning to the University of Illinois as a faculty member in 1978. He taught at the University of Minnesota Law School faculty from 1981 to 2002, where he was the McKnight Presidential Professor of Public Law. He also has been a visiting professor at the Stanford Law School, Harvard Law School, and the University of Chicago Law School.
His most recent book is Contested Ground: How to Understand the Limits on Presidential Power (UC Press 2021). His earlier books include Research Handbook on Public Choice and Public Law (Elgar 2010) (with A. O’Connell); Judgment Calls: Politics and Principle in Constitutional Law (Oxford University Press 2008) (with S. Sherry); Retained by the People: The “Silent” Ninth Amendment and the Rights Americans Don’t Know They Have (Basic Books 2007); Lincoln’s Constitution (University of Chicago Press 2003); and Eco-Pragmatism: How to Make Sensible Environmental Decisions in an Uncertain World (University of Chicago Press 1999).
Education
B.A., University of Illinois (1971)
M.A., University of Illinois (1972)
J.D., University of Illinois (1975)
Daniel A. Farber is not teaching any Law courses in Fall 2023.
Courses During Other Semesters
| Semester | Course Num | Course Title |  Teaching Evaluations | Summer 2023 | 201S sec. 001 | Torts for LLMs | View Teaching Evaluation | 206.51S sec. 001 | Advanced Writing Project | View Teaching Evaluation | Spring 2023 | 270.72 sec. 001 | Pathways to Carbon Neutrality | View Teaching Evaluation | 272.3 sec. 001 | Climate Change and the Law | View Teaching Evaluation | Fall 2022 | 201 sec. 002 | Torts | View Teaching Evaluation | Summer 2022 | 201S sec. 001 | Torts | View Teaching Evaluation | 206.51S sec. 001 | Legal Research and Writing: Advanced Scholarship | View Teaching Evaluation | Spring 2022 | 274.7 sec. 001 | Environmental Law Colloquium | View Teaching Evaluation |
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Letters: Worries About Climate Change Should Spur Us to Action
“Yes, Mr. Biden could declare a climate emergency, ban fossil fuel exports, cancel oil leases and stop fossil fuel investing abroad,” writes Professor Daniel Farber in his letter to the editor. “After being immediately halted by conservative judges, those emergency actions would go down in flames on 6-to-3 votes in the Supreme Court.”
A Court Win in Montana Could Help Climate Litigation Everywhere Else
“This isn’t binding precedent, just a ruling by one trial judge in one state,” said Berkeley Law professor Daniel Farber. “But it will certainly encourage other litigation and give other judges a little more comfort about ruling this way.”
Latest Trump indictment raises concerns about 2024 election security
Legal expert Daniel Farber, a law professor at UC Berkeley, says, although the charges are in Georgia, they have broad implications nationwide.
Biden is campaigning as the most pro-climate president while his DOJ works to block a landmark climate trial
“It’s one thing for courts to review individual government actions, but [another] for courts to take on the general operation of the government and say, ‘no you’ve got to change your whole overall policy,’” Daniel Farber, a climate law expert and University of California Berkeley Law School professor, told CNN.
Hawaii’s youth-led climate change lawsuit is going to trial next summer
What’s significant about the Hawaii and Montana cases is how far they’ve gotten, said Dan Farber, a law professor and expert in climate litigation at the University of California at Berkeley. The Hawaii case would be only the second to see a trial.
LL.M. Programs in Environmental Law: Shaping a Sustainable Future
“More and more, we’re hearing from students wanting to play a positive role in the future wellbeing of our planet, as the impacts of climate change increase all over the world,” says Daniel Farber, Faculty Director of the Center for Law, Energy and the Environment at Berkeley.
What the Supreme Court affirmative action ruling means for California
Professor Daniel Farber writes about what the SCOTUS affirmative action ruling means for California.
California’s push to ban natural gas hit a snag. Could it derail the entire effort?
The court’s decision “is not obviously wrong,” said Dan Farber, an environmental law professor at UC Berkeley, who disagreed with the decision. “But I don’t think it’s crystal clear.”
What’s Next: Former President Donald Trump Charged in Hush Money Case
Berkeley Law Professor Daniel Farber, discusses the Trump indictment.
Trump has been charged with 34 felony counts. How strong is the Manhattan D.A.’s case?
Bragg “has fired a strong opening shot,” said Daniel Farber, a professor at the UC Berkeley Law School who studies presidential power. “But it’s only the beginning of the battle.”
Trump indictment: What charges mean — and what a potential defense will look like
“The prosecutor’s statement of facts tells a powerful story about a conspiracy to falsify business records for political gain,” said Daniel Farber, a UC Berkeley law professor. “But serious political misconduct doesn’t necessarily equate to a criminal offense, let alone a felony. The prosecutor’s challenge will be to prove fraudulent intent … and to connect this conduct to a separate crime.”
Pence subpoena could set up fight over executive privilege
“Other potential complicating factors include the fact that the episodes investigators presumably want to question Pence about — such as Trump’s efforts to influence the counting of the votes — don’t concern conventional presidential duties typically thought to be shielded by executive privilege,” said Daniel Farber, a presidential powers expert and UC Berkeley Law professor.
Exxon accurately predicted global warming from 1970s – but continued to cast doubt on climate science, new report finds
The report’s findings could potentially help support climate litigation against Exxon, Daniel Farber, professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley, told CNN. “The more we learn about industry deception, the stronger the legal claims will be.”
Timely Business-Related Offerings Among Berkeley Law’s Deep Reservoir of New Courses
A whopping 18 courses are available to Berkeley Law students for the first time this semester, including 3 focused on emerging areas in the corporate sector.
Biden Climate Rules Move Ahead Amid Wait for Final Carbon Metric
It’s “clear” that the cost of carbon emissions isn’t zero, according to University of California Berkeley law professor Dan Farber.
How US climate lawsuits could hold Big Oil accountable
“This will reinforce concerns that the banking industry already has, and also concerns that major investors have, about the fossil-fuel industry and whether it’s a good investment,” Berkeley Law professor Dan Farber told Al Jazeera. “So I think this definitely puts pressure on them, the longer these cases stick around.”
Highway carbon rule an early test of SCOTUS climate ruling
Ethan Elkind, director of the climate program at UC Berkeley’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment and Daniel Farber, law professor at the Center for Law, Energy and the Environment discuss a proposal by the Biden administration to require all states to track and reduce on-road vehicle greenhouse gas emissions.
Ecology Law Quarterly Celebrates 50 Years of Publication — and a Powerhouse Community
The student-run journal sits at the pinnacle of the academic landscape, publishing groundbreaking environmental law scholarship four times a year.
No Constitutional Right to Abortion? Some Observers Plead the Ninth
The authors of the Constitution “believed the Bill of Rights wasn’t creating rights but was recognizing rights that were already out there,” says Professor Daniel Farber, author of Retained by the People, a 2007 book about the Ninth Amendment. The current court’s majority “has basically ignored” that amendment, he says, most likely because “it looks like a wide-open invitation and it doesn’t really say anything about how you decide what’s covered.”
Berkeley Law Experts Say Climate Policy More Urgent Than Ever After Supreme Court Setback
The Center for Law, Energy & the Environment brought together three experts for a recent webinar to discuss the implications of the ruling for climate policy.