R. Burke McLemore, Jr.

Chair Emeritus of the firm’s Workers’ Compensation Section, Burke’s practice encompasses trial and appellate representation of employers and carriers throughout Pennsylvania. Burke’s significant cases include Leon E. Wintermyer v. WCAB, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decision that rewrote the standards for review of administrative agency decisions.

Burke provides risk reduction and management advice to clients facing workers’ compensation and employment law claims. He applies his nearly five decades of defense experience to complex cases bridging employment torts, insurance coverage, workers’ compensation, and subrogation. For the last twenty years Burke has been named as a Pennsylvania Super Lawyer, and he has been recognized annually  in Best Lawyers in America every year since 1995.  In 2021 he was named Best Lawyer’s “Lawyer of the Year” in the field of workers’ compensation.

He is the author of Heart Attacks and the Pennsylvania Workman’s Compensation Act, and has been an invited speaker at both national and international workers’ compensation conferences. Burke regularly contributes to Pennsylvania Bar Institute presentations, having served on the Board of Directors and as an officer of the Institute. He is a  founding member of the William W. Lipsitt Inn of Court  Burke is former Chair of the Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Council; is a past President of the Dauphin County Bar Association, and for 20 years served in  PBA’s House of Delegates. From 2020 to 2024 he Chaired the PBA/Supreme Court Review & Certifying Board, He was appointed by the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania to the Court’s Disciplinary Board in 2012. In 2014 the Court appointed him Chairman of the Board.

Burke formerly served as President of the Dickinson School of Law Alumni Association, and is the recipient of the school’s Distinguished Service and Outstanding Alumni Awards. He was elected to three terms on Camp Hill Borough Council, the final term as Council President. He served as statewide Chairman of the Centennial Committee of the Pennsylvania Workers’ Compensation Act, receiving the 2016 PBA Special Achievement Award for those efforts. Burke was the 2014 recipient of the Irvin Stander Memorial Award for professionalism and dedication to the practice of workers’ compensation law. In 2016 Burke was elected a Fellow of The College of Workers’ Compensation Lawyers. He served as an adjunct faculty member of the Dickinson School of Law of the Pennsylvania State University, where he taught workers’ compensation law. In 2017 he became a certified federal mediator for the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania.