Paula Monopoli

Sol & Carlyn Hubert Professor of Law

Office

431

Phone

(410) 706-4485

Fax

(410) 706-2184

Photo of Paula Monopoli

Education

  • BA, 1980, Yale University
  • JD, 1983, University of Virginia

Paula Monopoli is the Sol & Carlyn Hubert Professor of Law at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law where she founded its Women, Leadership & Equality Program. Professor Monopoli received her BA cum laude, from Yale College, and her JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. She teaches in the areas of Property, Trusts & Estates and Gender and the Law. Professor Monopoli has held several visiting appointments, most recently as a visiting scholar at the Møller Institute, Churchill College, University of Cambridge.

Professor Monopoli has published widely on the intersection of gender and constitutional design. She is the author of Constitutional Orphan: Gender Equality and the Nineteenth Amendment (Oxford University Press 2020) and three previous books, American Probate, Law and Leadership and Contemporary Trusts and Estates. Her articles include “Gender and Constitutional Design” in the Yale Law Journal, “Marriage, Property and [In]Equality” in the Yale Law Journal Online, “Gender and Justice: Parity and the United States Supreme Court” in The Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law, and “The Gendered State and Women’s Political Leadership” (with McDonagh) in Feminist Constitutionalism (Cambridge University Press). Professor Monopoli has presented her research at Oxford University, University College Dublin, Yale Law School, the University of Michigan Law School, the University of Texas Law School, Boston University School of Law, the Wake Forest University School of Law, the University of Virginia School of Law, among many others.

Professor Monopoli is an elected member of the American Law Institute and is an academic fellow of the American College of Trusts and Estates Counsel. She has received a number of teaching awards, including the University of Maryland, Baltimore Founders Week award, the law school’s Outstanding Professor of the Year award, and Maryland’s Top 25 Women Professors by StateStats.org. Professor Monopoli has also been selected as one of Maryland’s Top 100 Women by the Daily Record and she received the Baltimore Bar Foundation’s 2020 Fellows Award for exceptional contributions in furthering the understanding of the role of law in our democratic society.

Books

Contemporary Trusts and Estates (4th ed. 2022) (with Susan N. Gary, Jerome Borison, and Naomi R. Cahn). Read Full Text.

Constitutional Orphan: Gender Equality and the Nineteenth Amendment (2020). Read Full Text.

Contemporary Trusts and Estates (3d ed. 2017) (with Susan N. Gary, Jerome Borison & Naomi R. Cahn). Read Full Text.

Contemporary Trusts and Estates: An Experiential Approach (2d ed. 2014) (with others). Read Full Text.

Editor, Law and Leadership: Integrating Leadership Studies into the Law School Curriculum (2013) (with Susan McCarty). Read Full Text.

Contemporary Approaches to Trusts and Estates (2011) (with others). Read Full Text.

American Probate: Protecting the Public, Improving the Process (Northeastern Univ. Press 2003). Read Full Text.

Book Chapters

The Gendered State and Women's Political Leadership: Explaining the American Puzzle, in Feminist Constitutionalism 169 (Beverley Baines et al. eds., 2012) (with E. McDonagh).

Habeas Corpus Proceedings, in Child Custody & Visitation Law & Practice (James Gary McLeod ed., 1992).

Preparing Witnesses for Trial in a Will Contest, in Estate Planning & Administration (1990) (with R. Zielinski).

Articles

Feminist Legal History and Legal Pedagogy, 108 Virginia Law Review Online 91 (2022).

Gender, Voting Rights, and the Nineteenth Amendment, 20 Georgetown Journal of Law & Public Policy 91 (2022).

The Constitutional Development of the Nineteenth Amendment in the Decade Following Ratification, 11 ConLawNOW 61 (2020). Read Full Text.

Women, Democracy, and the Nineteenth Amendment, 100 Boston University Law Review 1727 (2020). Read Full Text.

Mother. Orator. Woman Suffrage Leader: The Feminist Legacy of Elizabeth Cady Stanton, 66 Journal of Legal Education 979 (2017) (reviewing Tracy A. Thomas, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the Feminist Foundations of Family Law (2016)). Read Full Text.

Inheritance Law and the Marital Presumption After Obergefell, 8 Estate Planning & Community Property Law Journal 437 (2016). Read Full Text.

The Market Myth and Pay Disparity in Legal Academia, 52 Idaho Law Review 867 (2016). Read Full Text.

Gender and the Structural Constitution, 76 Maryland Law Review Endnotes 17 (2016).

Contemporary Trusts and Estates—An Experiential Approach, 58 Saint Louis University Law Journal 727 (2014) (with others). Read Full Text.

Toward Equality: Nonmarital Children and the Probate Code, 45 University of Michigan Journal of Law Reform 995 (2012). Read Full Text.

Gender and the Crisis in Legal Education: Remaking the Academy in Our Image, 2012 Michigan State Law Review 1745. Read Full Text.

Why So Slow: A Comparative View of Women’s Political Leadership, 24 Maryland Journal of International Law 857 (2009). Read Full Text.

Marriage, Property and [In]Equality: Remedying ERISA's Disparate Impact on Spousal Wealth, 119 Yale Law Journal Online 61 (2009), reprinted as Remedying ERISA's Disparate Impact on Spousal Wealth, Journal of Pension Benefits, Spring 2010, at 36. Read Full Text.

In a Different Voice: Lessons from Ledbetter, 34 Journal of College & University Law 555 (2008). Read Full Text.

Nonmarital Children and Post-Death Parentage: A Different Path for Inheritance Law?, 48 Santa Clara Law Review 857 (2008). Read Full Text.

Gender and Justice: Parity and the United States Supreme Court, 8 Georgetown Journal of Gender and the Law 43 (2007). Read Full Text.

Gender and Constitutional Design, 115 Yale Law Journal 2643 (2006), reprinted in Gender in Constitutional Law (Catharine MacKinnon ed., 2018). Read Full Text.

Foreword: A Symposium Exploring the Role and Impact of Women in a Changing Corporate Environment, 65 Maryland Law Review 301 (2006). Read Full Text.

Foreword: the Global Advancement of Women: Barriers and Best Practices, 6 University of Maryland Law Journal of Race, Religion, Gender & Class 276 (2006). Read Full Text.

Drafting Attorneys as Fiduciaries: Fashioning an Optimal Ethical Rule for Conflicts of Interest, 66 University of Pittsburgh Law Review 411 (2005). Read Full Text.

Fiduciary Duty: A New Ethical Paradigm for Lawyer/Fiduciaries, 67 Missouri Law Review 309 (2002). Read Full Text.

Free Speech Rationales after September 11th: The First Amendment in Post-World Trade Center America, 13 Stanford Law & Policy Review 185 (2002) (with M. Scordato), reprinted in The First Amendment Law Handbook 2002-2003 (2003) Read Full Text.

Teaching Lawyers to Be More than Zealous Advocates, 2001 Wisconsin Law Review 1159. Read Full Text.

Legal Ethics & Practical Politics: Musings on the Public Perception of Lawyer Discipline, 10 Georgetown Journal of Legal Ethics 423 (1997). Read Full Text.

“Deadbeat Dads”: Should Support and Inheritance Be Linked?, 49 University of Miami Law Review 257 (1994). Read Full Text.

Allocating the Costs of Parental Free Exercise: Striking a New Balance Between Sincere Religious Belief and a Child's Right to Medical Treatment, 18 Pepperdine Law Review 319 (1991). Read Full Text.