Cooper's hometown is
Detroit, Michigan. Cooper's first teaching job was as an
adjunct professor at
Wayne State University in Detroit. Following this, he was associate professor at the
University of Minnesota Law School for five years before joining the Michigan Law school faculty in 1972. He was named the Thomas M. Cooley Professor of Law in 1988. His predecessor in the chair was
John W. Reed. At Michigan, Cooper teaches civil procedure and
jurisdiction and
choice of law, and other courses. In the past, he also taught
antitrust. Cooper is the co-author, with
Charles Alan Wright and
Arthur R. Miller, of the first, second, and third editions of
Federal Practice & Procedure, the leading
legal treatise on federal jurisdiction and
procedure. The first version of the treatise was published in 1975. Cooper served as a member of the
Advisory Committee on Civil Rules of the
Judicial Conference of the United States from 1991 to 1992, and has been
reporter for that committee since 1992. Cooper has been a member of the Council of the
American Law Institute since 1988 and has served as adviser to the ALI Federal Judicial Code, International Jurisdiction and Judgments, and Transnational Procedure projects. Cooper is married, and he and his wife have two children and three grandchildren. ==Notes==