Mr. Hughes, a resident of Aspen, Colorado, is the author of Family Wealth: Keeping It in the Family, and of Family – The Compact Among Generations, both published by Bloomberg Press, and is the co-author with Susan Massenzio and Keith Whitaker of The Cycle of the Gift: Family Wealth and Wisdom, The Voice of the Rising Generation, and Complete Family Wealth, all published by John Wiley & Sons and is a co-author with Hartley Goldstone and Keith Whitaker of Family Trusts: A Guide to Trustees, Beneficiaries, Advisors and Protectors. In addition, he has written numerous articles on family governance and wealth preservation and a series of Reflections which can be found on his website jamesehughes.com and his foundation, jehjf.org.

Jay was the founder of a law partnership in New York City specializing in the representation of private clients throughout the world and is now retired from the active practice of law. Mr. Hughes was a partner of the law firms of Coudert Brothers and Jones Day. He is a current active Fellow of Wise Counsel Research Foundation a Boston based think tank providing qualitative advice to families who seek to avoid the shirt sleeves proverb and to help their families flourish.

He is a member of the Advisory Board of Arlington Partners, the Chair Emeritus and  Chair of Distribution and Beneficiary Life Enhancement Committee of Lineage Trust Company, mentor to the members of the Matter Family Office, a Fellow of the Family Firm Institute, a member of the Society of Trusts and Estates Practitioners, Founding Member of the Collaboration for Family Flourishing, a Laureate of the Purposeful Planning Institute, Director of the Learning Courage Foundation, former director of the Rocky Mountain Institute, former member of the Standing Committee of the HS2 Foundation, Emeritus Trustee of The Far Brook School, Emeritus Trustee of Prescott College, former Trustee of the Albert and Mary Lasker Foundation, Board Member of the Hemera Foundation, and Board Member of the Robert H N Ho Family Foundation, and member of The Committee on Capital Gifts of Princeton University.

He has spoken frequently at numerous international and domestic symposia on the avoidance of the “shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves” proverb and on the dynamic growth of families’ human, intellectual, social, spiritual, and financial capitals toward their families’ flourishing.

Mr. Hughes has been cited in The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and various professional journals. He is a member of boards of various private trust companies, an advisor to numerous investment institutions, and a member of a number of private philanthropic boards.  In recent years he has participated in multiple podcasts and Zoom teachings.

In 2022, Mr. Hughes created a continuing legal education course, Qualitative Estate Planning, through Law Practice CLE.

Jay is a graduate of the Far Brook School (Class of 1956) which teaches through the Arts, The Pingry School (Class of 1960), Princeton University degree in history cum laude (Class of 1964)  Columbia School of Law (Class of 1967). He is a counselor to the Family Office Exchange and recipient of its Founder’s Award, the recipient of the Private Asset Management Lifetime Achievement Award, the Ackerman Institute Family Partner Award and the Family Wealth Report Lifetime Achievement Award.

In 2021, The James E. Hughes, Jr. Foundation (JEHJF) was founded, in Jay’s honor and as a gift to him, to advance the field of family wealth as individual and generational well-being.  Rooted in Jay’s landmark Five Capitals research, the JEHJF is designed to spread the spirit of Jay to as many individuals that have this desire.