Julian Velasco

Professor of Law

Office: 2142 Eck Hall of Law
Phone: 574.631.4965
Email: jvelasco@nd.edu
Staff Assistant: Debbie Sumption
CV: View
SSRN: View

Julian Velasco teaches and researches in the areas of corporate law, corporate governance, and fiduciary law. He joined the faculty of the Notre Dame Law School in the fall of 2001 and earned tenure in 2007. He has served as a visiting professor at the University of Chicago Law School (2017) and is a member of the American Law Institute (ALI).

Prior to joining the Notre Dame Law School faculty, he served as an associate professor at the Hofstra University School of Law, practiced law as a corporate attorney with Sullivan & Cromwell in New York City, and served as a law clerk to the Honorable Ellsworth A. Van Graafeiland, United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit. Velasco received his J.D. from Columbia University School of Law, where he earned the honors of Kent Scholar and Stone Scholar and served as an editor of the Columbia Law Review. He earned a B.S. magna cum laude from Georgetown University School of Business Administration, where he majored in Finance and minored in Philosophy and in Theology.
 

Courses Taught

LAW60105, Contracts
LAW70101, Business Associations 
LAW70107, Securities Regulation 
LAW70123, Corporate Finance 
LAW70127, Mergers and Acquisitions 
LAW73125, Advanced Topics in Corporate Law (Seminar)

Scholarship

A Catholic Defense of Corporate Law and Practice, 38 Notre Dame J.L. Ethics & Pub. Pol’y ___ (forthcoming 2024)

Fiduciary Judgment Rules, 62 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 1397 (2021)

Shareholder Primacy in Benefit Corporations, in Arthur B. Laby & Jacob Hale Russell, eds., Fiduciary Obligations in Business (New York: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming 2020) 

Decision Theory and Allocating Decision Making in the Firm, in Stefan Grundmann and Philipp Hacker (eds.), Theories of Choice. The Law and Social Science of Decision Making (Oxford University Press, forthcoming 2020)

Fiduciary Principles in Corporate Law, in Oxford Handbook of Fiduciary Law (Evan Criddle, Paul Miller & Robert H. Sitkoff,, eds. 2019) (Oxford University Press) 

The Diminishing Duty of Loyalty, 75 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 1035 (2018)

Delimiting Fiduciary Status, in Research Handbook on Fiduciary Law (D. Gordon Smith & Andrew S. Gold, eds. 2017) (Elgar Publishing)

Empowering Courts in Corporate Law, 41 J. Corp. L. 767 (2017)

A Defense of the Corporate Law Duty of Care, 40 J. Corp. L. 647 (2015). 

Fiduciary Duties and Fiduciary Outs, 21 Geo. Mason L. Rev. 157 (2013). 

The Role of Aspiration in Corporate Fiduciary Duties, 54 Wm. & Mary L. Rev. 519 (2012). 

How Many Fiduciary Duties Are There in Corporate Law?, 83 S. Cal. L. Rev. 1231 (2010). 

Shareholder Ownership and Primacy, 2010 U. Ill. L. Rev. 897 (2010). 

Taking Shareholder Rights Seriously, 41 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 605 (2007). 

The Fundamental Rights of the Shareholder, 40 U.C. Davis L. Rev. 407 (2006). 

Structural Bias and the Need for Substantive Review, 82 Wash. U.L.Q. 821 (2004), reprinted in 47 Corp. Prac. Commentator 679 (2005). 

Just Do It: An Antidote to the Poison Pill, 52 Emory L.J. 849 (2003). 

The Enduring Illegitimacy of the Poison Pill, 27 J. Corp. L. 381 (2002). 

Congressional Control Over Federal Court Jurisdiction: A Defense of the Traditional View, 46 Cath. U. L. Rev. 671 (1997). 

Note, The Copyrightability of Nonliteral Elements of Computer Programs, 94 Colum. L. Rev. 242 (1994), reprinted in 27 Intell. Prop. L. Rev. 329 (1995).

Areas of Expertise

• Corporate Governance
• Corporate Law
• Fiduciary Law
• Mergers & Acquisitions