Jacob Eisler
Jacob Eisler
Ph.D., Political Science, Harvard University, 2016
J.D., Harvard University, 2010
M.Phil., Political Thought and Intellectual History, Emmanuel College, University of Cambridge, 2006
B.A., Williams College, 2004
Jacob Eisler joined Florida State University College of Law in 2023 as the James Edmund and Margaret Elizabeth Hennessey Corry Professor. Professor Eisler researches in the areas of constitutional law, election law, criminal law (focused on anti-corruption law), legal theory, and law and technology. He applies moral and political theory to questions of judicial reasoning and institutional design, with a focus on the relationship between legal doctrine, democratic self-rule, and the conditions necessary for political liberty. He is the author of "The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy" (Cambridge University Press, 2023), and his scholarship is published or forthcoming in leading law reviews and peer-reviewed journals, including the Emory Law Journal, UC Davis Law Review, Pennsylvania Journal of Constitutional Law, and the Election Law Journal. He is regularly interviewed or quoted in leading national and international media outlets on matters related to law and politics. He is also a Research Associate at The Centre for Business Research at the Judge Business School, University of Cambridge.
At Florida State, Professor Eisler teaches Constitutional Law I (Structure), Constitutional Law II (Rights), and Criminal Law. He has past experience teaching subjects including tort law, jurisprudence, and EU law. Prior to joining Florida State, Professor Eisler taught at Jesus College, the University of Cambridge, as the Yates Glazebrook Fellow and college lecturer in Law, and the University of Southampton as an associate professor (Reader) in Public Law. He was the Mid-Career Fellow at the Baldy Center at the University of Buffalo for the Fall of 2024, a competitively selected residential fellowship. Before entering the legal academy, he clerked for the Honorable Gerard E. Lynch on the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York City and practiced as an international capital markets attorney in London with Allen & Overy and Herbert Smith Freehills. Professor Eisler is New York bar-qualified.
Awards
FSU College of Law Student Awarded, Open Door Faculty Award (2026)
Southampton University Student Awarded, Most Engaging Lecturer (2022)
Law School, Staff Achievement Award (Band 3) (2018-2019)
Interests
- Constitutional Law
- Election Law
- Criminal Law
- AI & the Constitution
- Equal Protection
- Injunction State Power
Scholarship
Books
The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy (Cambridge University Press 2023) - 2024 Winner of the Distinguished Scholarship Award from the AALS Election Law Section
Articles
Disparate (Algorithmic) Advantage (with Yunsieg Kim), 75 Stanford Law Review Online, Special Collection on Technology, AI, and the Future of Civil Rights (forthcoming 2026)
Racial Gateways, 78 Ala. L. Rev. (forthcoming 2026/2027)
The Circuit Court Interim Docket (with Jeffrey Paul DeSousa and Casey Witte), 80 U. Mia. L. Rev. 991 (2026)
Alignment, Autonomy, and Democratic Consent, 86 Ohio St. L.J. (forthcoming 2026) (invited symposium contribution)
Populist Primacy, 91 Brooklyn Law Review 1 (2025)
Algorithmic Lawmaking, Moral Judging, and Free Will, 75 Case W. Rsrv. L. Rev. 1209 (2025) (invited symposium contribution)
Towards Defensible Judge-Made Democratic Process, 99 S. Cal. L. Rev. Postscript 1 (2025)
Lessons from the Vieth Dissents: Partisan Gerrymandering, Party Construction, and the Challenge of Judicial Intervention, 104 Neb. L. Rev. 75 (2025)
Discrimination, Private Liberty, and Public Accommodations Law, 12 Texas A&M L. Rev. 479 (2025)
Public Accommodations, Private Expression, and the Many Institutional Faces of Rights, 32 Wm. & Mary Bill Rts. J. 909 (2024) (introduction to invited symposium)
Polarized Countermajoritarianism, 26 U. Pa. J. Const. L. 665 (2024)
Book Chapters
One Person, One Vote, in The Oxford Handbook of American Election Law (Eugene Mazo ed., Oxford University Press, 2024)
A. v. National Blood Authority: An Experiment in Radical Consumer-centric Strict Liability for Products, in Landmark Cases in Consumer Law (Hart, Jodi Gardner and Iain Ramsay, eds., 2024)
Popular Publications
What’s Behind the Gerrymandering Arms Race, Compact Magazine (May 6, 2026)
Toward Race-Blind Democracy, Compact Magazine (April 30, 2026)
The Pro-Democracy Supreme Court, National Review Online (March 7, 2026)
Progressive Complaints About the Supreme Court Are Getting Weird, City Journal (Jan. 8, 2026)
The Case for Electoral Integration, Compact Magazine (Dec. 31, 2025)
Gerrymandering Is Democratic, Compact Magazine (Oct. 1, 2025)
Media Features
Professor Jacob Eisler recently published in the University of Miami Law Review. His article titled “The Circuit Court Interim Docket” was co-authored with Jeffrey Paul DeSousa and Casey Witte from the Office of the Florida Attorney General. The piece can be read in Volume 80, Issue 4, 991 (2026).
Professor Jacob Eisler recently accepted publication of his article in Stanford Law Review Online, Special Collection on Technology, AI, and the Future of Civil Rights. His article titled “Disparate (Algorithmic) Advantage” was co-authored with Yunsieg Kim from Hofstra University Maurice A. Deane School of Law (forthcoming 2026).
Professor Jacob Eisler was featured in a Compact article titled “Toward Race-Blind Democracy.”
Professor Jacob Eisler was featured in The Economist in an article titled “Donald Trump and the Art of the Quid Pro Quo.”
Professor Jacob Eisler was featured in an article on The Economist titled “The president’s border czar was caught in a sting operation.”
Professor Jacob Eisler was featured on Compact Magazine for his recent article “Gerrymandering is Democratic.”
Conferences and Workshops
“Election Law Conference,” Florida State University College of Law (September 2025)
“Judicial Rights and Legislative Equality: The Future of Public Accommodations and the Polycentric Constitution after 303 Creative v. Elenis” (AALS, January 2024)
“Book Launch: The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy” (Florida State University College of Law, September 2023)
Presentations
Last month, FSU Law Professor Jacob Eisler attended and presented at the Washington University School of Law Election Law Conference. Professor Eisler presented his lecture, “Reconsidering the Legacy of Disjunctive Legal Change: Lessons of Baker v. Carr, alongside other experts in the field.
“Keynote Remarks: Public Opening – Generations: A Solo Exhibit by Julie Torres,” Gadsden Art Center and Museum, Quincy, Florida, May 2026
“The Supreme Court, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Moral Virtue,” Center for Law & the Human Person Spring Symposium, Catholic University of America, March 2026
“Election Law Unexceptionalism,” National Conference of Constitutional Law Scholars, University of Arizona, March 2026
“Racial Gateways,” Loyola Constitutional Law Colloquium, November 2025; Federalist Society Faculty Conference, January 2026; FSU-Ole Miss Law Faculty Exchange Presentation, February 2026
“The Unitary Executive in 2025,” Tallahassee Women Lawyers May General Meeting Keynote Address, May 2025
“Election Law in a Misaligned America,” Ohio State Law School Symposium, February 2025
“Protecting Public Accommodations,” AALS National Meeting Hot Topics Panel, January 2025
“Populist Primacy,” Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy at the University at Buffalo School of Law, September 2024; University of Alabama School of Law, Junior-Senior Conference, November 2024; Constitutional Law Colloquium at Florida State University School of Law, November 2024; Federalist Society Faculty Conference, January 2025; National Conference of Constitutional Law Scholars, University of Arizona, March 2025; Law and Society Annual Meeting, May 2025
“Artificial Intelligence, Lawmaking, and Democratic Self-Rule,” “Defending Tomorrow's Democracy: The Future of Elections in the Era of Advanced Technology,” symposium at Case Western Reserve University School of Law, September 2024
“Partisan Governance, Judicial Authority, and the Vieth Dissents,” “Democracy Without Trust?,” symposium at University of Nebraska College of Law, September 2024
“The Roberts Court and Populist Primacy,” Panel Presentation, Southeastern Association of Law Schools Conference, July 2024
“Reconsidering the Legacy of Disjunctive Legal Change: Lessons of Baker v. Carr,” Washington University Election Law Conference, March 2024
“Commercial Liberty, Public Accommodation, and the First Amendment,” National Conference of Constitutional Law Scholars, University of Arizona, February 2024
“Discrimination, Private Liberty, and Public Accommodations Law,” Invited Lecture Series, Texas A&M Law School, February 2024
“Democracy Demands Diversity,” American Association of Law Schools Conference, January 2024
“Campaign Finance and Heteronomy,” Loyola Constitutional Law Colloquium, November 2023
“The Law of Freedom: The Supreme Court and Democracy,” Southeastern Association of Law Schools Conference, July 2023
“The Law Review Article v. The Monograph,” Southeastern Association of Law Schools Conference, July 2023
“New Voices in Election Law,” American Association of Law Schools Conference, January 2023
Other Works
Books
Data-Driven Personalisation in Markets, Politics and Law (co-editor with Uta Kohl) (Cambridge University Press 2021)
Articles
Rethinking the Government Speech Doctrine, Post-Trump (with Michael Kang), 2022 U. Ill. L. Rev. 1943 (2022)
Conceptualising Corruption and the Rule of Law, 85 Modern L. Rev. 1072 (2022)
Constitutional Formalities, Power Realities, and Comparative Anglophone Responses to Foreign Campaign Meddling, 20 Election L. J. 32 (2021)
The Limits and Promise of Instrumental Legal Analysis, 47 J. Law & Soc’y 499 (2020)
Federal Oversight of State Primaries: The Troubling Drift from Equal Protection to Association, 71 Mercer L. Rev. 735 (2020)
Dissonant Referendum Design and Turmoil in Representation, Public Law 622 (2019)
Partisan Gerrymandering and the Constitutionalization of Statistics, 68 Emory L. J. 978 (2019)
Partisan Gerrymandering and the Illusion of Unfairness, 67 Cath. U. L. Rev. 229 (2018)
McDonnell and Anti-Corruption’s Last Stand, 50 UC Davis L. Rev. 1619 (2017)
The Deep Patterns of Campaign Finance Law, 49 Conn. L. Rev. 57 (2016)
The Unspoken Institutional Battle over Anti-Corruption: Citizens United, Honest Services, and the Legislative-Judicial Divide, 9 First Amend. L. Rev. 363 (2011)
Book Chapters
Campaign Speech and the Universal Dilemma in the Common Law of Elections: A Lesson from the Anglo-American Divide, in Comparative Election Law (Edward Elgar; Jim Gardner, ed., 2022)
Conclusion: Balancing Data-Driven Personalisation and Law as Social Systems, in Data-Driven Personalisation in Markets, Politics and Law (Cambridge University Press: Uta Kohl and Jacob Eisler, eds., 2021)
Conferences and Workshops
“Trends in Global Constitutionalism: Thoughts for ECR Scholars” (Icon-S Mundo, July 2021)
“Election Law and the Crisis of Mass Democracy” (Book Conference on Manuscript under revision with CUP) (Southampton, July 2019)
“Data-Driven Personalisation in Markets, Politics and Law Conference” (Southampton, June 2019) (with Uta Kohl and James Davey)
“Social Sciences and Law Interdisciplinary Conference” (Cambridge, March 2018) (with Simon Deakin)
Presentations
“Philosophy of Election Law,” Southeastern Association of Law Schools Conference, August 2022
Keynote Address, “Political Personalisation and the Adaptive Algorithm,” Society of Legal Scholars CyberLaw Section, Durham University, August 2021
“GlobCon Junior Scholars’ Workshop 2021: Diversity in Global Constitutionalism,” Commentator and Co-Organizer, July 2021
“Strangers in Strange Lands: Constitutional Formalities, Power Realities, and Comparative Anglophone Responses to Foreign Election Meddling,” Panel on Foreign Interference, Elections, and Democratic Speech: Comparative Approaches to a Global Challenge, Icon-S Mundo, July 2021
“Political Non-Domination and the Application of Constitutional Standards to State Speech,” University of Illinois Law Review 2022 Symposium “The Government’s Speech and the Constitution,” April 2021
“Popular Self-Rule and Data-Driven Personalisation: The New Frontier of Campaign Meddling,” American Branch of the International Law Association, University of Georgia Law School, April 2021
“The Law of Freedom,” American Association of Law School Annual Conference Panel on New Voices in Election Law, January 2021
“GlobCon Junior Scholars’ Workshop 2020: New Approaches to Global Constitutionalism,” Commentator and Co-Organizer, July 2020
“Algorithmic Identification of language patterns and case influence,” Artificial Intelligence and Dispute Resolution Workshop, Cambridge University Faculty of Law, December 2019
“From Equal Protection to Association: The Collectivist Turn in the Federal Oversight of State Primaries,” Mercer Law Review Symposium, “Contemporary Issues in Election Law,” Mercer Law School, September 2019
“Theorizing the Law of Democracy,” UGA Faculty Colloquium, University of Georgia School of Law, September 2019
“Election Law and the Crisis of Mass Democracy,” Discussion Group on New Directions in Election Law, Southeastern Association of Law Schools Conference, July 2019
“The Brexit Referendums and Electoral Design,” Post-Brexit Options for the UK: Legal Analysis, Cambridge University, November 2018
“Epistemic Assumptions and Democratic Design: Understanding the Impact of Judicial Interpretation of Speech and Voting Rights,” Roundtable on Systems Theory and Human Rights, Lancaster Law School, October 2018
“Favouring Choice over Protection in Product Liability Defect Analysis,” Centre for Private Law, Work in Progress Seminar, University of Cambridge, March 2018
“Thinking like a Lawyer in the Midst of Creative Disruption,” Social Science and Law Interdisciplinary Conference Keynote, University of Cambridge, March 2018
“The Pathologies of Mass Democracy in a Neoliberal Age,” Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities Work in Progress Seminar, University of Cambridge, January 2018
“Expectations, Lotteries, and Identification of Defect: Protection versus Choice Maximisation in Product Liability,” UK IVR Annual Conference: Law, Rationality and the Market, University of Sheffield School of Law, November 2017
“Blanket Primaries and the Equal Protection Clause,” Discussion Group on Reforming the Presidential Nomination Process, Southeastern Association of Law Schools Conference, August 2017
“American Regulation of International Capital Markets in Theory and Practice,” Texas A&M Global Law Program in Jersey, May 2017
“Disorder and Renewal in the Law of Product Liability: Consumer Autonomy and Moral Luck,” Centre for Private Law, Work in Progress Seminar, University of Cambridge, May 2017
“Democratic Legitimacy and the Liberal Whipsaw,” Faculty of Law, Chinese University of Hong Kong, March 2017
“Trump, Brexit, and the Crisis of Neoliberalism: Elections, Economic Slowdown and Class Anxiety,” Faculty of Law, Chinese University of Hong Kong, March 2017; Faculty of Philosophy, Yale-National University of Singapore, March 2017
“Partisan Gerrymandering and the Illusion of Unfairness,” Cambridge University Workshop in Political Philosophy, March 2017
“Donald Trump: What Happened, What Will Happen, and Where to Go from Here” (Chair), inaugural Director’s Discussion, Center for Intellectual Engagement, Jesus College, January 2017
“Democracy and Fellowship,” President’s Presentation to the Fellowship, Jesus College, October 2016
“Electoral systems and political elites: entrenchment as a challenge to the deliberative defense of partisanship,” MANCEPT Conference, Manchester Centre for Political Theory, September 2016
“Why Trump’s Candidacy Breaks Lessig’s ‘Dependence Corruption’ (and How Madison Would Fix It),” Harvard Political Theory Workshop, May 2016
“The Corruption of Campaign Finance Jurisprudence, the Deep Patterns of the Judicial Divide, and the Problem of Political Baselining,” Harvard Political Theory Workshop, September 2015
“The Processes that Shape Corruption Law,” Harvard Political Theory Workshop, March 2013
“Institutional Corruption and Universalizable Theory,” Cambridge Forum on Legal & Political Philosophy, December 2012
“Towards a Universalized Rigorous Definition of the Corrupt Act,” Harvard Political Theory Workshop, September 2011
“Property, Unity, and the Threat of the Private: Wealth and Corruption in Plato’s Politics,” Princeton Graduate Conference in Political Theory, April 2011
“A Struggle Visible but Unseen: Citizens United, Honest Services, and the Unspoken Institutional Conflict over Corruption,” Harvard Public Law Workshop, October 2010
“The Struggle to Identify Corrupt Acts: The Need for a Robust Statutory Solution,” Harvard Public Law Workshop, November 2009
“From Bribes to BCRA: Corruption and Democratic Representation in American Jurisprudence,” Harvard Political Theory Workshop, September 2009