Patricia Nassif Acton

Patricia Acton
Patricia Nassif Acton

Position: 

Clinical Professor of Law Emerita

Biographical Information

College of Law Faculty Profile

Professor Acton joined the Iowa law faculty in 1981. Before doing so, she practiced law for several years at Simmons, Perrine, Albright & Ellwood in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, and was a Bigelow Teaching Fellow and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School. She retired in 2011. 

At Iowa, she has taught Clinical Law, Commercial Transactions, Arts & Entertainment Law, Trusts and Estates, and the Legal History of Iowa. She also has taught as a Visiting Professor at the University of Florida School of Law. For a number of years while at Iowa Professor Acton served as the on-site director of the London Law Consortium, a study abroad program for students from seven American law schools. When in London, she taught Arts and Entertainment Law from a comparative perspective. She has also regularly taught the British Legal Methods Clinical Program.

Publications

Books

Patricia Acton, Entertainment Law: Legal Concepts and Business Practices, 3rd ed., with Thomas D. Selz, Melvin Simensky, and Robert Lind. St. Paul, MN: Thomson-West, 2006- , 5 vols.
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Patricia Acton, To Go Free: A Treasury of Iowa’s Legal Heritage, with Richard, Lord Acton. Ames, IA: Iowa State University Press, 1995, 336 pages.
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Patricia Acton, Entertainment Law: Legal Concepts and Business Practices, 2nd ed., with Thomas D. Selz, Melvin Simensky, and Robert Lind. 5 vols, 1992- ; Supplements, 1993-1999.
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Patricia Acton, vol. 2A Entertainment Law: Legal Concepts and Business Practices, with Thomas D. Selz and Melvin Simensky. Colorado Springs, CO: Shepard’s/McGraw-Hill, 1991; Supplements 1986-1991 to Entertainment Law: Legal Concepts and Business Practices, by Thomas D. Selz and Melvin Simensky. Colorado Springs, CO: Shepard’s/McGraw-Hill, 3 vols, 1983.
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Patricia Acton, Invasion of Privacy: The Cross Creek Trial of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. Gainesville, FL: University Presses of Florida, University of Florida Press, 1988, 175 pages.
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Book Chapters

Patricia Acton, “From Cuspidors to the Law Commons: The College of Law 1910-1935,” and “The Founding of the Iowa Law School and the Old Capitol Years: 1865-1910,” with Richard, Lord Acton, in The History of the Iowa Law School, 1865-2010, edited by N. William Hines. Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Law School, 2011, at 51, 39 pages.
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Patricia Acton, “A Legal History of African-Americans from the Iowa Territory to the State Sesquicentennial,” with Richard, Lord Acton, in Outside In: African-American History in Iowa, 1838-2000, edited by Bill Silag. Des Moines, IA: State Historical Society of Iowa, 2001, at 60, 30 pages.
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Articles

Patricia Acton, “The Effect of the ‘Cross Creek’ Trial on the Writings of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings,” II The Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings Journal of Florida Literature 57 (1989-1990), 15 pages.
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Patricia Acton, “The Author in the Courtroom: The ‘Cross Creek’ Trial of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings,” I The Rawlings Journal 29 (1988), 12 pages.
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Patricia Acton, “The Purchase Money Security Interest and the Federal Tax Lien: A Proposal for Legislative Change,” 36 Hastings Law Journal 873 (1985), 44 pages.
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Patricia Acton, “The Corporate Defamation Plaintiff as First Amendment ‘Public Figure’: Nailing the Jellyfish,” 68 Iowa Law Review 35 (1982), 52 pages.
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Book Reviews

Patricia Acton, Review of The Struggle for Student Rights: Tinker v. Des Moines and the 1960's, by John W. Johnson. 42 American Journal of Legal History 411 (1998), 2 pages.
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