Northwestern Law > Faculty & Research > Adjuncts

Practitioner-in-Residence
Adjunct Professor of Law

JAMES J. HANKS, JR. is a partner in the 600-lawyer firm of Venable LLP, with offices in Baltimore, Los Angeles, New York and Washington, and is an Adjunct Professor of Law at Northwestern Law School. He received an A.B. degree from Princeton University; an LL.B. from the University of Maryland Law School, where he was an editor of the Maryland Law Review ; and an LL.M. degree from Harvard Law School. During the 1967-68 term, he served as law clerk to Judge Charles Fahy of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit.

In private practice, Professor Hanks represents publicly- and privately-held corporations and other entities in securities offerings and other financing transactions. Professor Hanks has advised buyers or sellers in more than 250 mergers or acquisitions, many valued at more than one billion dollars (U.S.) each, including the $40 billion sale of Equity Office Properties Trust in 2007, at that time the largest private equity buy-out in history. He has also represented parties in cross-border mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and other transactions. Professor Hanks frequently serves as independent counsel to the boards of directors and board committees of major U.S. corporations and as an expert witness in connection with major transactions, stockholder litigation, conflicts of interest and on corporate governance issues. He also advises governments on revision of their corporate and securities laws. Professor Hanks appears in the current edition of The Best Lawyers in America in three categories: Corporate Governance and Compliance Law, Corporate Law and Mergers and Acquisitions Law.

Professor Hanks is the author of the 600-page treatise Maryland Corporation Law and the co-author (with former Stanford Law School Dean Bayless Manning) of the third edition of Legal Capital . He is also the author of several law review articles and a frequent speaker on corporation law and governance. He has been actively involved in the revision of the Model Business Corporation Act, which has been adopted substantially in its entirety by approximately 25 American states, and is a member of The American Law Institute. Professor Hanks has also taught Corporate Law and Governance in the Northwestern Law School-Instituto de Empresa Executive LL.M. program in Madrid in 2006 and 2007. At Bucerius Law School, Professor Hanks was Commerzbank Visiting Professor of Law in the Fall, 2003 and Visiting Professor of Law in the Fall, 2005 and 2007.