Lee C. Bollinger is president of Columbia University in New York City and a member of the faculty of the Law School. He became the 19th president of Columbia University in 2002. He is a graduate of the University of Oregon and Columbia Law School, where he was an articles editor of the Law Review.

After serving as law clerk for Judge Wilfred Feinberg on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and the Chief Justice Warren Burger on the U.S. Supreme Court, he joined the faculty of the University of Michigan Law School in 1973. In 1987 he was named the dean of the University of Michigan Law School, a position he held for seven years.

Mr. Bollinger became provost of Dartmouth College and professor of government in July 1994 and was named the 12th president of the University of Michigan in November 1996. His primary teaching and scholarly interests are focused on free speech and First Amendment issues, and he has published numerous books, articles, and essays in scholarly journals on these and other subjects.

Three highly acclaimed contributions to First Amendment literature include Eternally Vigilant: Free Speech in the Modern Era, published by the University of Chicago Press in 2001; Images of a Free Press, published by the University of Chicago Press in 1991; and The Tolerant Society: Freedom of Speech and Extremist Speech in America, published by Oxford University Press in 1986.

Mr. Bollinger is a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a member of the American Philosophical Society. He is the recipient of numerous honorary degrees and is an honorary fellow of Clare Hall, Cambridge University. For his national leadership in defending affirmative action in higher education, he has received the National Humanitarian Award from the National Conference for Community and Justice and the National Equal Justice Award from the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. For his service to higher education, especially on matters of freedom of speech and diversity, he was given the Clark Kerr Award, the highest award conferred by the faculty of the University of California, Berkeley.

September 2007