Biography
David Mayer was Professor Emeritus of Law and History at Capital University in Columbus, Ohio, where he taught courses in American constitutional history, English and American legal history, and intellectual property (copyright and unfair trade practices law), as well as a seminar in Libertarianism and the Law. Before teaching at Capital, Professor Mayer taught at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law in Chicago, Illinois; held a postdoctoral fellowship at the Institute for Humane Studies, George Mason University, in Fairfax, Virginia; and was an attorney with the firm of Pierson Semmes and Finley in Washington, D.C. He has received degrees from the University of Virginia (Ph.D. in History, 1988, and M.A. in History, 1982) and the University of Michigan (J.D. in 1980 and A.B. in 1977). He has written The Constitutional Thought of Thomas Jefferson (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1994, paperback 1995), Liberty of Contract: Rediscovering a Lost Constitutional Right (Washington, D.C.: Cato Institute, 2011), and several articles in law reviews, history and political science journals.
A former Salvatori Fellow of the Heritage Foundation, Professor Mayer served on the board of directors of the 1851 Center for Constitutional Law (in Columbus, Ohio), was a member of the editorial board of the Cato Supreme Court Review and a member of the fellowships Academic Review Committee for the Institute for Humane Studies. He was also a member of the advisory board of The Atlas Society and was a frequent speaker at Atlas Society conferences, including the summer seminars. He served as faculty advisor to Capital University Law School's chapter of the Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies and to the Intellectual Property Law Society.
Professor Mayer retired from Capital University Law School in 2014. He passed away on November 23, 2019 at the age of 63, after a lengthy illness