Gerald Moran, Esq.

This morning I was saddened to learn of Jerry’s passing from your website. He was an important part of the development of many young legal minds in our Ohio community for many years. Jerry was an enigma. As a tax law professor he guided his students through the Internal Revenue Code, complex and often contradictory public guidance with case studies that made it human. He often explained tax, and people’s motivation to avoid paying it, as a basic human force of nature on the level of money, power and the impulse to procreate. In a profession of order, structure and rigor, like an abstract artist he made sense of it by pointing out its chaos. The metaphysics of tax. Students expecting a course on tax law to be instruction on how to calculate their tax liability soon discovered its reality as a melting pot of social engineering imposed by competing and contradictory political theories layered one on another. For the bright mind one could find rationalization and supporting precedent appealing to their base human nature. For others, not so much, causing some students to flee to another professor, perhaps another course. Jerry carried it off in a joyful, playful way. I met Jerry on my first day as a student at the University of Toledo College of law. He approached me to be his research assistant, apparently having combed through the law school applications in advance. During the next 3 years he was my mentor although we worked side by side more as collaborators, exploring this fascinating area of law over which we shared the same passion. And we published. Like others, he encouraged me to get a LLM degree in taxation from NYU, and when I returned from New York we picked up where we had left off. For decades we presented continuing education programs for lawyers and business on topics of the day, always adding humor to the bitter reality of how the government was trying to “pluck the most feathers with the least amount of squawking.” We were referred to as “The Jerry & Gary Show.” At one presentation, the topic was domestic relations tax issues, and I worked through methods of creatively allocating business income to minimize tax and maximize combined wealth. Something easier done on a spreadsheet than in human interaction. Jerry followed by conducting a seance and interviewing the recently deceased Jerry Garcia about his marriages. For a while we practiced together in the same firm, collaborating on client strategy until he found the opportunity at Florida Coastal Law School to be compelling. We continued our dialogue by phone and by visiting a few times. Each new discussion was like a continuation of the last one regardless of the time and distance between us. I am saddened that new students and practitioners will be deprived of the experience, the intellect and joy of this unique and compelling person. I choose to remember Jerry sitting in the Ottawa Tavern after class at the end of the week, with students, discussing life and throwing popcorn.