The Honorable Joan Zeldon

Judge Joan Zeldon was appointed to the Superior Court of the District of Columbia in 1990 by President George H.W. Bush.

Judge Zeldon, daughter of Bess Cahn and J. Louis Zeldon, was raised in the District of Columbia and graduated from Ben Murch Elementary School, Alice Deal Junior High, and Woodrow Wilson High School. She earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from Smith College, graduating magna cum laude. She was elected to Phi Beta Kappa during her junior year and won the Dawes Prize for outstanding work at the end of her senior year. After attending graduate school at Harvard University for one semester, Judge Zeldon attended George Washington University Law School, where she served on the law review. She received her law degree, however, from New York University Law School.

Upon graduation from New York University Law School, Judge Zeldon worked for the Columbia University Legislative Drafting Research Fund, where she helped draft a Housing Maintenance Code for New York City. Next, she worked as an Assistant Corporation Counsel for the City of New York, where she handled a wide variety of municipal issues, with particular emphasis on litigation and labor law.

Judge Zeldon also was a member of the Labor Department of Proskauer, Rose, Goetz & Mendelsohn, first in New York City and later in Washington D.C.. At Proskauer, she handled numerous cases, including Schumacher v. Aldridge, 665 F.Supp. 41 (D.D.C. 1988), which ordered the United States government to grant veteran’s status to American Merchant Seamen who served this Nation in World War II. As a result of this case, over 70,000 merchant seamen received honorable military discharges.

Judge Zeldon has received numerous awards, including honorary status as a United States Merchant Marine Veteran (awarded by the Federal Maritime Administration); a Certificate of Appreciation from the New York Society of Marine Port Engineers; an award from the American Merchant Marine Veterans, headquartered in Florida; a Friendship award for outstanding and unselfish service from the Edna Gladney Center in Ft. Worth, Texas; and an award for making an outstanding contribution to society from the National Committee For Adoption. She has also been recognized as a Fellow of the ABA.

She has published numerous articles on a wide variety of subjects, including attorneys’ fees in civil rights litigation, substance abuse in the workplace, public sector collective bargaining and the Americans With Disabilities Act. Her articles have appeared in the Columbia Law Review, the New York Law Journal, and other publications that are widely circulated.