John Cross joined the Louisville faculty in 1987 after several years in private practice in Minneapolis. Since coming to Louisville, he has taught and published in a wide variety of areas, ranging from the first-year course in Civil Procedure to Native American Law. In recent years, however, he has increasingly focused his efforts in two broad areas: intellectual property law (both domestic and international), and adjectival law (Civil Procedure, Conflicts, Federal Jurisdiction, and Comparative Systems). Because of his exemplary work in the intellectual property field, John was named the Grosscurth Chair in Law in 2005.

John's teaching interests reflect this same focus. He currently oversees the intellectual property curriculum at Louisville, and teaches many of the courses in that curriculum, including the Intellectual Property Survey, Copyright Law, Competition Law, Authors' and Performers' Rights, International Intellectual Property Law, Law and Computers, and Design Protection Law. He also continues to teach courses in adjectival law, especially the first-year Civil Procedure Course and the capstone course in Federal Jurisdiction.

John's recent research parallels his teaching. This work has delved into various issues - both historic and contemporary - in intellectual property. For example, a 2007 article explores whether the growing legal protection for "moral rights" can be reconciled with the limits of the First Amendment's free speech clause. Another looks at the historic roots of federal power to regulate intellectual property, arguing that the Supreme Court has made a number of historic missteps in interpreting that power. John is also the lead author on a well-received casebook for the first year Civil Procedure course.

Because of the broad scope of John's research, his work has been recognized both in the United States and abroad. Most significantly, in 2006 he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Laws H.C. from the University of Turku in Finland, in recognition of his significant contributions to legal scholarship. He has also received two Fulbright awards (the maximum allowable), one in Finland (1995), the other in Ireland (2000). John has been invited to teach classes and/or give lectures in a number of foreign locales, including institutions in Argentina, Canada, Germany, England, Finland, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, and Sweden. In January of 2008, he was a visiting professor at the University of Western Ontario.