Lewis & Clark Law Professor, Robert H. Klonoff, is the 2025 recipient of the Oregon State Bar (OSB) Award of Merit. The highest honor that the OSB can bestow, this award recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions to the legal profession and community, “embodying the highest standards of professionalism, integrity, and service.”
Klonoff’s legal expertise spans a number of areas including class action litigation, civil procedure, federal courts, appellate litigation, and criminal procedure. During his notable 40+-year career, Klonoff has become a leading expert on civil procedure and aggregate litigation, authoring casebooks and articles, lecturing worldwide, participating as co-counsel in high profile class action suits, serving on the board of the American Law Institute (and as a project reporter), and training thousands of future attorneys. He spent the majority of his career in Washington, D.C., with highlights including arguing eight cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, authoring more than 100 other Supreme Court filings, and serving both as an Assistant United States Attorney and as an Assistant to the Solicitor General of the United States. He also served as firmwide chair of pro bono as a partner at Jones Day. His recent cases (as an expert or representing plaintiffs) include NFL Concussion litigation, Deepwater Horizon, Volkswagen Clean Diesel, Opioids litigation, Equifax data breach, Parkland Shooting civil litigation, PFAS water district litigation, NCAA antitrust litigation, and representation of the family of Henrietta Lacks in claims of medical racism. (The tragic circumstances of Henrietta Lacks are chronicled in the book by Rebecca Skloot, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks.)
Before returning to his hometown of Portland, OR in 2007, Professor Klonoff taught at the University of Missouri, Kansas City School of Law, Georgetown University Law Center, and the University of San Diego School of Law. Professor Klonoff was enticed to serve as Dean of the Lewis & Clark Law School - a position he held for seven years, until 2014 - because of the school’s reputation and the fact that he would be returning to his home town. Upon stepping down as Dean, he elected to return to his love of teaching, remaining at Lewis & Clark, the school he had come to love. He is a sought after professor for his classes on Civil Procedure, Complex Litigation, Criminal Procedure, and Federal Courts. “Teaching is something I’m very passionate about,” he remarked. “It’s what I enjoy most about my professional life.”
With this honor from the Oregon State Bar, Professor Klonoff is adding to a long list of well-earned accolades. He’s proud to have, among other things, been appointed by Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr. to serve (for the maximum six-year term) as the sole academic member of the U.S. Judicial Conference Advisory Committee on Civil Rules, to have authored and co-authored a number of legal publications (including co-authoring three volumes of Wright & Miller’s Federal Practice and Procedure), and to have received numerous awards. These include the Lewis & Clark Law’s Leo Levensen Award for Excellence in Teaching, several teaching and service awards from UMKC, an award from the DC Bar for outstanding pro bono service, four special achievement awards from the U.S. Department of Justice, and an award from the Oregon Consular Corps for International Engagement. In reflecting on this new addition to his accomplishments, Klonoff explained that “this award is especially meaningful to me because I grew up in Oregon, and now, decades later, I am being honored by the Oregon Bar. Many of my Grant High School classmates (class of 1973) have reached out to me, which is really wonderful.”
