Rory Leishman was born and raised in Indian Point, Burlington, Ontario. He holds an Honours BA in Political Studies and Economics from Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario. He did graduate work in political studies at Queen's and for a year in the Graduate College at Princeton University in Princeton, New Jersey.

In 1970, Leishman joined the Department of Political Science at the University of Western Ontario, where he taught courses on Canadian federalism, Quebec politics and introductory political theory. From time to time, he also conducted a seminar on development reporting in the university's Graduate School of Journalism.

From 1975 to 1995, Leishman served as an editorial writer and national affairs columnist for The London Free Press. Now employed as a freelancer, he continues to write a bimonthly column on national affairs for paper and is a frequent contributor to Catholic Insight magazine and The Interim. Over the years, he has had articles published in a number of other newspapers and magazines, including the National Post, the Ottawa Citizen, the Vancouver Sun, the Presbyterian Record and The Next City magazine.

Leishman is a member and director of Civitas, a non-partisan, national association of conservative academics, journalists and political activists. In June, 1997, Alliance for Life conferred upon Leishman the greatest honour of his career -- the William Kurelek Award, "in recognition of an outstanding contribution to the development of respect and appreciation for the dignity and worth of human life." And in May, 2000, he was delighted to receive the Furedy Academic Freedom Award from the Society for Academic Freedom and Scholarship in honour of his contributions as a journalist to academic freedom in Canada.

Leishman is happily married to Caroline (Plomp) Leishman. They reside in London, Ontario, Canada.