Michael Baylson

Michael Morris Baylson (born 1939) is a senior federal judge on the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.

Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Baylson attended Cheltenham High School in neighboring Cheltenham Township and graduated in 1957. He received a B.S. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1961 and received his LL.B. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School in 1964. Baylson was a law clerk for Joseph Sloane in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas in 1965. He was an assistant district attorney in Philadelphia from 1966 to 1970. From 1970 to 1988 Judge Baylson was in private practice in Philadelphia.

In 1988 he was appointed by President Ronald Reagan as the United States Attorney for the Eastern District, a position he held until 1993. He returned to private practice as a partner with Duane Morris until 2002, when he was nominated on January 23 by President George W. Bush to a seat on the Eastern District Court that had been vacated by Robert F. Kelly. He was confirmed by the United States Senate on April 30, 2002, and received his commission on June 19. He assumed senior status on July 13, 2012.

Judge Baylson was a founder, and later counsel, to Gaudenzia, Inc., the largest non-profit provider of drug, alcohol and mental health rehabilitation services in Pennsylvania.

Judge Baylson is a member of the Advisory Committee on Civil Rules of the Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure of the Judicial Conference of the United States, and is also Adjunct Professor at the University of Pennsylvania Law School and Temple University Beasley School of Law.