Leslie Book

The John H. Buhsmer Esq. '84 Endowed Professor of Law

Biography

Leslie Book is Villanova Law's inaugural John H. Buhsmer Esq. '84 Endowed Professor of Law. While at Villanova, he has served as director of the Federal Tax Clinic, director of the Graduate Tax Program and director of the Online Graduate Tax Program. He also served as a Professor in Residence with the IRS, Taxpayer Advocate Service in 2019.

Book is a national authority on tax procedure and tax administration.  He is the successor author for the Thomson Reuters treatise IRS Practice and Procedure and the cofounder and one of the primary bloggers at Procedurally Taxing. He has written numerous law review articles and three research reports submitted to Congress on behalf of the Taxpayer Advocate Service, including a 2019 report containing a series of proposals to improve the administration and delivery of refundable credits.

Book has testified before Congress on the fair administration of our nation’s tax laws and on the future of tax administration.  In 2007 he won the ABA Tax Section Janet Spragens Pro Bono Award, and Book continues to directly assist low income and underrepresented taxpayers through pro bono litigation. In 2018 he was the inaugural winner of the Diane Ambler Award for faculty curricular innovation for his work in creating the Villanova Online Graduate Tax Program with his colleague Joy Mullane. In 2021, Book won the Diane Ambler Faculty Scholarship Impact Award for scholarship that has had a significant impact on the law, the academy, the legal profession or policy debates

Book is a fellow of the American College of Tax Counsel, a member of the governing Council of the American Bar Association Section of Taxation, and a founding Board Member at the Center for Taxpayer Rights

Book received his BA from Franklin & Marshall College (magna cum laude), his JD from Stanford University School of Law, and his LLM (Taxation) from New York University School of Law.  At Stanford Law School, he was a founding editor of the Stanford Law & Policy Review, and at New York University School of Law he was a student-editor at the Tax Law Review. 

Practice Experience

• Member of Pennsylvania Bar
• Davis Polk & Wardwell, Associate, London and New York
• Baker & McKenzie, Associate, New York