Sallyanne Payton, an L. Bates Lea Professor Emerita of Law at Michigan Law, retired in 2013. She came to Michigan in 1976 from Washington, DC, where she was chief counsel for the Urban Mass Transportation Administration of the United States Department of Transportation, earlier having been staff assistant to the president on the Domestic Council staff.

In the private practice of law, she was associated with Covington & Burling. Payton teaches Administrative Law and has served as a public member and senior fellow of the Administrative Conference of the United States and as chair of the Administrative Law Section of the Association of American Law Schools. Her industry specialty is health law; she has been active in the effort to reform federal health care financing and regulation. She is a fellow of the National Academy of Public Administration and a member of the National Academy of Social Insurance.