THE HONORABLE JAY C. WALDMAN, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, passed away last May. He was 58.

Judge Waldman had a varied and impressive career. After graduating from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1969, he clerked for the Honorable Gwilym A. Price, Jr. Following a brief stint in private practice, Judge Waldman spent several years as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Pittsburgh, where he met Richard Thornburgh, who at the time was the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Pennsylvania. Judge Waldman later served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General to Thornburgh, who was then Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division at the U.S. Justice Department.

After successfully managing Thornburgh’s 1978 campaign for Governor of Pennsylvania, Judge Waldman was appointed as the Governor’s general counsel, a position he held for the next eight years. Those who had the good fortune to know and work with Judge Waldman during these years, witnessed the workings of a brilliant political mind.

After being nominated to U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in 1988, only a few years later Judge Waldman was nominated to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit. The nomination never came for a confirmation vote. Shortly before his death in 2003, Judge Waldman was once again nominated to the Court of Appeals.