Dan Kornstein is a skilled, experienced, and successful trial lawyer and appellate advocate, with an exciting and varied civil litigation practice. He has conducted over 100 trial-type proceedings (including 20 jury trials) and argued more than 80 appeals. To each case he brings a creative, energetic, and aggressive approach. Mr. Kornstein’s clients range from individuals (including Pulitzer Prize-winning authors, Academy Award winning actors, publishing executives, and rising entrepreneurs) to large corporations and financial institutions. He has litigated several notable First Amendment cases, as well as substantial antitrust, securities, commercial, employment, product liability, family law, and international matters.

“Mr. Kornstein is a man of high principle, great compassion and profound intelligence who has elevated the practice of law to the level of moral statement. He has the personal integrity to stand up for people, books and causes he believes in, even when others do not.” Joe McGinniss, Acknowledgment in Blind Faith (1989).

Mr. Kornstein was selected as a New York Super Lawyer for the past eight years and named in “The Top 100” in the 2010 New York Super Lawyers Metro Edition. For 29 consecutive years, Mr. Kornstein has been listed in the Best Lawyers in America in the Business Litigation category, and for 2018 is listed in four litigation practice areas: Commercial Litigation, Banking & Finance, Securities, and Trusts & Estates. He was the subject of a feature article (“Dan’s Law”) in the New York Metro 2012 Super Lawyers Magazine.

Before joining the firm in 2015, Mr. Kornstein was a founding partner of what the New York Law Journal referred to as the “prominent” “powerhouse” litigation boutique Kornstein Veisz Wexler & Pollard, LLP, where he practiced for 35 years.

“Dan is a complete lawyer, a lawyer not only as a master of technique, but also a lawyer as philosopher, as historian, as humanist.” Jack Fuller, Pulitzer Prize winner and former editor-in-chief and president of the Chicago Tribune(Super Lawyers Magazine New York Metro 2012).

A past president of the Law & Humanities Institute, Mr. Kornstein has coupled a busy law practice with frequent writing and speaking about the law. He has published nine non-fiction law-related books, eighteen law review articles, and hundreds of essays and book reviews (many in the New York Law Journal). His work has also appeared in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Chicago Tribune, Baltimore Sun, and Boston Globe, and has been cited by a number of courts, including the U.S. Supreme Court. Dan’s most recent book — The Second Greatest American — was published in June 2017 and is a study of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

In 2015, Mr. Kornstein gave a keynote address on “Creative Lawyering” – one of his signature topics – to the Federation of Defense and Corporate Counsel. In 2012, the New York Court of Appeals invited Mr. Kornstein to deliver a public lecture at the Court on “Shakespeare and the Law.” In 2002, Mr. Kornstein received the Prix du Palais Littéraire from the Law & Literature Society of France.

Drafted into the Army after one year of law school during the Vietnam era, Mr. Kornstein served on active duty for two years (1969-71) in the First Armored Division and the First Cavalry Division. He was a legal clerk on the prosecution team in the 1970 My Lai Massacre court-martial of one of Lt. Calley’s platoon sergeants. Mr. Kornstein was awarded the Army Commendation Medal for “exceptionally meritorious service.”