ALBANY, NY (01/29/2016)(readMedia)-- The New York State Bar Association will honor Evan A. Davis with its highest honor, the Gold Medal Award, during its Annual Meeting in New York City January 30.
"Evan Davis is widely considered one of New York's premier experts on matters of state law and professional ethics," said State Bar President David P. Miranda (Heslin Rothenberg Farley & Mesiti P.C.). "He is a most deserving recipient, and we are proud to recognize his accomplishments in the legal profession as well as his commitment to public service."
Davis currently is a senior counsel at Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and also provides alternative dispute resolution, expert witness and adjudicatory services through his firm, Evan A. Davis, in New York City.
"I am awed by being part of the great list of names," said Davis, who joins U.S. Supreme Court justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg, Sandra Day O'Connor and Potter Stewart-for whom Davis clerked-as Gold Medal recipients.
Davis was Governor Mario Cuomo's lead counsel from 1985 to 1991 and he served on the House Judiciary Committee's Impeachment Inquiry staff, investigating President Richard Nixon's Watergate cover-up.
He was president of the Association of the Bar of the City of New York from May 2000–May 2002, where, in the aftermath of the 9/11 tragedy, he worked with the State Bar Association to coordinate pro bono assistance to victims and their families. He was also a member of the State Bar's Committee on Standards of Attorney Conduct when it drafted the new Rules of Professional Conduct.
Davis served as vice chair of The Trustees of Columbia University, was a director of the Center for Family Representation and a trustee of The Spence School. He is a director of Episcopal Charities, a member of the Advisory Council of New York Common Cause, the Advisory Board of Disability Rights Advocates and the chancellor (and former warden) of Trinity Church Wall Street. He chaired the American Bar Association's Standing Committee on Public Education and its Commission on Youth Education for Citizenship.
Davis received his J.D. magna cum laude from Columbia Law School, where he was editor-in-chief of the Columbia Law Review, and his undergraduate degree cum laude, from Harvard College.
The 74,000-member New York State Bar Association is the largest voluntary state bar association in the nation. It was founded in 1876.
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