A math major as an undergraduate, he entered HLS and maintained the best grades in the class for all three years.

After graduating from HLS he clerked for Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan, then went to Alabama to work as a special assistant in the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division.

His first case, White v. Crook, was a watershed civil rights victory that declared Alabama’s race and gender-based methods for picking juries unconstitutional.

He returned to HLS in 1966 and received tenure in 1969.

In 1971 he represented Daniel Ellsberg ’52 in the Pentagon Papers case, with attorney.

He also worked with attorney Jan Schlichtmann on the case written about by Jonathan Harr in his best-selling book A Civil Action, which later became a movie.

In addition to his formidable legal reputation, he is know throughout HLS for his habit of frustrating other professors and publicizing confidential information.

In September, Climenko Professor of Law Charles J. Ogletree scheduled Jesse

Jackson to speak at HLS, during the meeting time of several classes, including one taught by Law professor Alvin C. Warren.

Warren then sent an e-mail to a small group of faculty members, including Nesson and Ogletree, asking that the event be rescheduled.

Ogletree and Warren had a heated and personal debate over e-mail that Nesson wanted to share with students and faculty. Warren said he thought it was better not to.

Nesson shared the e-mails with his class anyway. When Warren met with Nesson to discuss the ethics of divulging the e-mails, Nesson secretly tape-recorded this conversation, then put the audio and the e-mails on his website and told students and faculty where they could find it.

The issue remains unresolved.

Nesson at Home