SKILLMAN, N.J. – Gerald Rosen graduated from Kalamazoo College in 1973 on the Dean’s List after receiving honors for his senior thesis. He played varsity collegiate tennis for three years and credits his college experience for providing an important foundation for his professional career. Judge Rosen continues to support collegiate tennis players by providing an internship in his Chambers each year for college tennis players who plan to pursue a career in law. Past interns have included ITA, NCAA and Rolex tournament champions.
In 1989, Judge Gerald Rosen was nominated by President George Bush to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. He was invested in 1990. At the time, he was one of the youngest federal judges in the nation.
Judge Rosen began his professional career in Washington, D.C., as a Legislative Assistant to U.S. Senator Robert Griffin of Michigan. Judge Rosen served on Senator Griffin’s staff for five years (1974-79), during which time he was intimately involved in some of the most significant and challenging issues of the period. During this time, Rosen also attended George Washington University Law School at night, graduating in 1979. (He now serves on the Law School’s Board of Advisors). In 1982, he was a candidate for the U.S. Congress.
Prior to taking the Bench, Judge Rosen was a Senior Partner in the oldest and one of the largest law firms in the state of Michigan – Miller, Canfield, Paddock and Stone. While at the firm, Judge Rosen was a trial lawyer, specializing in commercial, labor and constitutional litigation. From 1983-88, he co-chaired the Judicial Selection Committee for the Eastern District of Michigan Federal Court.
In his years on the federal bench, Judge Rosen has addressed some of the most controversial and significant issues to come before the federal courts. For example, Judge Rosen held that there was no right to physician-assisted suicide inherent in the Due Process or Equal Protection Clauses of the Constitution; an opinion cited by the Supreme Court in its landmark decision ruling the same way. Judge Rosen also struck down Michigan’s Partial Birth Abortion statute, finding it unconstitutionally vague and overbroad under existing Supreme Court precedent. While sitting (by designation) with the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals (which he has been invited to do each year since taking the Bench), Judge Rosen has authored a number of important decisions, including an opinion defining the scope of the federal perjury laws which was cited on numerous occasions during the recent impeachment hearings and Senate trial, and was the subject of widespread media and editorial comment. Most recently, in a highly controversial case of great importance in Michigan, Judge Rosen refused to enjoin the state’s casino gaming and licensing process.
Rosen has written and published articles for professional journals and the popular press on issues including judicial independence, civil procedure, evidence, due process, criminal law, labor law, and legal advertising. He is a co-author of “Federal Civil Trials and Evidence” and “Michigan Civil Trials and Evidence”, books on federal and state civil trial practice, and is the Senior Editor of West Publishing Company’s Michigan Practice Guide series.
For 10 years, Judge Rosen has been an Adjunct Professor of Law, teaching Evidence at both Wayne State University Law School and at the University of Detroit-Mercy Law School. Judge Rosen also frequently lectures at continuing legal education seminars for both lawyers and state and federal judges. He has also lectured at several international conferences and represented the U.S. government as part of the U.S. State Department’s Rule of Law program in Moscow, Russia, and T’ Bilsi, Georgia – consulting with legal scholars and judges from those nations on the draft of their constitutions and organization of their legal system. Most recently, Rosen lectured on American criminal law and procedure to high-ranking Chinese judges at the Supreme People’s Court in Beijing, China. He also represented the U.S. Federal Judiciary at the International Association of Judges meeting in Brazil in September 2000.
In 1995, Rosen was appointed by Chief Justice Rehnquist to the U.S. Judicial Conference’s Committee on Criminal Law. As a member of the Committee, he is actively involved in developing sentencing and criminal law and procedure policy for the Judicial Branch of our Government. Judge Rosen was also selected by his colleagues to serve on the Board of Directors of the Federal Judges Association, on which he has served since 1996.
Beyond his professional work, Rosen is involved with several charitable and community organizations – most notably, serving on the Board of Directors for Focus Hope. The largest nonprofit civil rights organization of its kind in the U.S., and the largest overall in Michigan, Focus Hope provides food to women and infants, as well as machinist and advanced technology training programs which provides education and 100 % job placement for its 500 yearly graduates.
Judge Rosen has been registered in Who’s Who in America and Who’s Who in American Law since 1991. He is married to Laurie DeMond Rosen and they have one child, Jacob. They reside in Franklin, Mich.
