George Mason law school to be renamed the Antonin Scalia School of Law

[Eugene]

Source: Washington Post

The George Mason School of Law will be renamed in honor of the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, who died earlier this year, the university announced Thursday afternoon.

The school announced $30 million in combined gifts to the George Mason Foundation to support the law school, the largest gift in the university’s history. The donations make possible three new scholarship programs. Twenty million dollars came from an anonymous donor, and $10 million from the Charles Koch Foundation, which has given millions of dollars to colleges in the U.S. The family is well known for its support of conservative political groups, sometimes stirring controversy.

The Board of Visitors approved the renaming of the school to The Antonin Scalia School of Law at George Mason University. “This is a milestone moment for the university,” Ángel Cabrera, the university’s president, said in a statement. “These gifts will create opportunities to attract and retain the best and brightest students, deliver on our mission of inclusive excellence, and continue our goal to make Mason one of the preeminent law schools in the country.”

Leonard A. Leo, a member of the Federalist Society who was close with Scalia and his family, was approached by a donor who asked that the university name the law school in honor of the late Justice, and offered a $20 million donation.

[font size=1]-snip-[/font]


Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/grade-point/wp/2016/03/31/george-mason-law-school-to-be-renamed-the-antonin-scalia-school-of-law/

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By Susan Svrluga March 31 at 4:12 PM

[Herman4747]

1. Incredible!!! Well, it is a private school. n/t

[FSogol]

2. No, it is a State School. BTW, Bork taught there too after the Democrats

blocked his nomination to SCOTUS.

[newthinking]

36. This is a good illustration of the POWER of money.

Money can BUY "change" in many ways. Even with non profit or traditional trusted NGO's.

The effect of big money on institutions has not even been covered in our press.

[Justice]

63. If a state school, does the state government need to approve?

[FSogol]

65. Doubtful. The school would have a board. The State legistlaure could get involved,

but they would probably approve.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

69. From the WaPo article:

George Mason law school to be renamed the Antonin Scalia School of Law

The State Council of Higher Education for Virginia must give final approval for the law school’s new name.

State Council of Higher Education for Virginia (SCHEV)

About Mason

George Mason: Patriotism Personified.

George Mason, for whom our university is named, was one of the greatest of the founding fathers of the United States. Mason drafted the Virginia Declaration of Rights, which became a model for the first 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution, known as the Bill of Rights.

Not anymore.

Virginia Declaration of Rights

The Virginia Declaration of Rights is a document drafted in 1776 to proclaim the inherent rights of men, including the right to reform or abolish "inadequate" government. It influenced a number of later documents, including the United States Declaration of Independence (1776), the United States Bill of Rights (1789), and the French Revolution's Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (1789).

[FSogol]

3. Puke

[FarPoint]

13. Double that puke for me!

Yuck...

[Human101948]

22. There's no precedent for this! Just like most of his rulings!

Scalia was in the 5-4 majority in Bush v. Gore, which ended the 2000 presidential election recount and sent George W. Bush to the White House. He also voted with the majority in striking down campaign finance laws as a restriction on free speech.

Scalia shaped landmark majority decisions, like the Second Amendment case that enshrined the right of individuals to own a gun for self-defense...

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/what-legacy-did-justice-scalia-leave-on-the-supreme-court/

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

4. I sure wouldn't want that name on my J.D. diploma.

[Hoyt]

6. No joke. Might as well have a diploma form Liberty University Law School.

[47of74]

16. Me neither

I'm going to one this fall up in Minnesota and I sure as hell would not be happy if they renamed the school after Scalia or some other reich wing bleepstick.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

20. Which one? I went to law school in Minnesota

and I don't expect any of the three to rename themselves after that dickwad (even the one at St. Thomas).

[47of74]

28. Mitchell-Hamline

Yeah I'm not thinking any of them would either. Especially Mitchell-Hamline given that they just merged this year.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

31. My alma mater.

But many years ago (Mitchell). Some of the faculty I knew are still there - good folks.

[47of74]

32. Cool

I really liked what I saw when I visited so I was happy to be accepted there.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

34. It's changed a lot since I graduated,

especially the facilities (the library is much nicer now than it was), but I had a good experience there. Good luck. That first year is kind of daunting. Try to get Steenson for torts.

[47of74]

5. That makes me sick.

I wonder how some students there now will like being associated with Scalia's name for the rest of their lives? I can't imagine the entire student body or incoming students are all pleased with that move.

I suppose a bunch of other places will be falling over themselves renaming themselves after Scalia.

[anigbrowl]

47. It would not bother most students

GWU school of law is well known as the locus of libertarian/Federalist society attitudes about the appropriate between government, industry, and the public. They also have pretty rigorous academic standards. So pretty much anyone who chooses to go there would be well-informed about the sort of school they were going to and would likely be somewhat sympathetically inclined toward Scalia in the first place, just as people on the left would be more likely to gravitate towards Harvard or Columbia.

Of course this is a giant over-simplification for a DU comment, as opposed to a rigorous examination of the school's history, demographics, etc. etc.. I'm just saying that if you are planning to study law at GMU chances are you're a libertarian already.

[nitpicker]

50. +1

It's also located conveniently close to big corporate law firms and lobbyists (access to internship opportunities of that kind).

[RussBLib]

7. Great! Now racists and Neanderthals will have a place to go! n/t

[nichomachus]

9. Stop it!

Leave Neanderthals out of this. Neanderthals were nice people. They lived communally, cared for their sick and elderly, and got along fairly well with their neighbors. It was Homo Sapiens who ruined things. Sapiens was, and still are, violent, greedy, and xenophobic. That's why they were able to edge out Neanderthals.

[valerief]

23. Hey! Don't lump Neanderthals with racists! We're not the least bit racist. In fact, we even bred

with those germy homo sapiens.

I can say this, because, within 23and me, I have more Neanderthal variants than 92% of the 23andme population. Okay, no one today really has any more than 4% Neanderthal variants in them, but since I'm closer to 4% than 1%, I feel the need to proclaim:

[font size="4"]I'm ancient
But no screwball
I'm a proud Neanderthal!

I have a bigger brain
And eyeball
I'm a proud Neanderthal!

I observe
Social protocol
I'm a proud Neanderthal!
[/font]

Goddamit, somebody stop me. I'll keep going on and on with this nonsense.

[LynneSin]

8. Great - that'll pair nicely with the George Bush Center for Intelligence

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Bush_Center_for_Intelligence

Was named after the Dad not the son but still....

[47of74]

26. God.

[nichomachus]

10. I wonder if people will be able to get their money back nt

[YOHABLO]

11. I'm still fuming over their naming the airport after Reagan.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

21. I know a number of air traffic controllers who won't refer to DCA

as "Reagan." They still call it National.

[BlueMTexpat]

35. +1!

I still refuse to call it by that name. I only and always refer to it as "DC National."

It's an insult to Washington, DC - a city that absolutely hated Raygun.

[tabasco]

37. Yeah, George Washington wasn't great enough

for imbecile republicans. They had to name the airport after a two-bit actor.

[LuckyLib]

44. I hear ya. I refer to it as National as well. Friends who are commercial airline pilots

do the same.

That rename was part of the work Nancy did promoting her hubby wherever and whenever she could. Disgusting.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

14. The law school has always skewed to the right.

The rest of the school too, what with Wendy Gramm and the Mercatus Center.

I wasn't aware that the BoV could up and name it just like that, with no input from higher up.

Now signs on I-66 will have to be changed to reflect the name change.

I used to live within walking distance of GMU Law. No one in Arlington will call it anything other than George Mason. It will be just like the airport, which is always referred to as National Airport.

Full disclosure: I spent one semester, one summer school session, and one year taking undergraduate courses at George Mason.

And to help those people who are asking "who was George Mason?":

Happy 290th Birthday, George Mason. Founding Founder, He Conceived the Bill of Rights.

George Mason

George Mason (sometimes referred to as George Mason IV) (December 11, 1725 – October 7, 1792) was a Virginia planter, politician, and a delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention of 1787, one of three men who refused to sign. His writings, including substantial portions of the Fairfax Resolves of 1774, the Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776, and his Objections to this Constitution of Government (1787) in opposition to ratification of the constitution, have been a significant influence on political thought and events. The Virginia Declaration of Rights served as a basis for the United States Bill of Rights, of which he has been deemed the father.

I'm not sure why that says his birth year is 1726. I thought it might be that Gregorian calendar - Julian calendar thing, but that would account for only 11 days. I'll see what I can find.

Adoption of the Gregorian calendar in Protestant countries

Through enactment of the Calendar (New Style) Act 1750, Britain and the British Empire (including the eastern part of what is now the United States) adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1752, by which time it was necessary to correct by 11 days. Wednesday, 2 September 1752, was followed by Thursday, 14 September 1752. Claims that rioters demanded "Give us our eleven days" grew out of a misinterpretation of a painting by William Hogarth. After 1753, the British tax year in Britain continued to operate on the Julian calendar and began on 5 April, which was the "Old Style" new tax year of 25 March. A 12th skipped Julian leap day in 1800 changed its start to 6 April. It was not changed when a 13th Julian leap day was skipped in 1900, so the tax year in the United Kingdom still begins on 6 April.

What this country needs is a good 18-cent Mason:

George Mason: Forgotten Founder, He Conceived the Bill of Rights

This wise Virginian was a friend to four future presidents, yet he refused to sign the Constitution

By Stephan A. Schwartz
Smithsonian Magazine
@SmithsonianMag

April 30, 2000

The air was cool and fresh on that Monday morning in September 1787 as the delegates to the Constitutional Convention gathered at the State House (now Independence Hall) in Philadelphia to sign the new Constitution. Only three present refused to add their names. One of them was the Virginian George Mason. Because the Constitution created a federal government he felt might be too powerful, and because it did not end the slave trade and did not contain a bill of rights, he withheld his support from the document he had played so large a role in crafting.

In 1776, Mason, then 51, had been appointed to a committee charged with drafting a "Declaration of Rights" for Virginia. From the writings of English Enlightenment philosopher John Locke (1632-1704), Mason had come to a then-radical insight: that a republic had to begin with the formal, legally binding commitment that individuals had inalienable rights that were superior to any government.

One other committee member did play a significant role: Mason's young friend James Madison, who kept his (and Mason's) friend Thomas Jefferson apprised of Mason's progress in drafting the declaration. Mason's work began, "That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights...namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety." Jefferson's U.S. Declaration of Independence included the immortal words of what may be the most famous political statement in history: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

In 1787, toward the end of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Mason proposed that a bill of rights preface the Constitution, but his proposal was defeated. When he refused to sign the new Constitution, his decision baffled some and alienated others, including his old friend, George Washington. Mason's stand nonetheless had its effect. At the first session of the first Congress, Madison introduced a Bill of Rights that paralleled Mason's Declaration of Rights of 1776.

[treestar]

42. That makes it all the more disgusting

to replace him with Scalia! Good grief! SMH.

[happyslug]

59. In the 1700s many families used baptism date not birth date.

Thus he was born on December 11, 1725. Given Christmas was just 14 days later, his parents may have weighted till Christmas to baptist him.

Remember the only record of his birth would have been in the family bible and in local church records. Virginia's establised church was the Church of England, thus all birth records were maintained by that church not the colonial givernment. Other religions existed in Virginia, and kept such records of their members.

On the hand even after Virginia dis-established the Church of England in the 1790s, the government of Virginia did not keep records of birth and dearhs. Such records were not generally kept by the states till the mid 1800s, and then at the county level (even today many African-Americans do not have records of they birth in any state record).

State level records of birth and deaths generally were not adopted till after 1900. When Social Security was adopted in the 1930s, this lack of records of birth was acknowledged by Social Security by saying you could use records of baptism and even family bibles as proof as to your date of birth. Such records were still being accepted by Social Security as late as the 1980s (Social Security may still be accepting those records, but given illegal immigration regulations I have not heard of them since the 1980s but given the problems some elderly African-Americans have had using such records I suspect the rules have changed).

Thus when Britain adopted the Gregorian calender his birth date moved to December 22, 1725, but if he was baptised on Christmas day 1725, Julian calender, that became January 5, 1726 Gregorian calendar. Even in England today some towns hold events on "Old Christmas Day" so the change over was not total, many older dates were kept for long periods of time after the switchover.

Thus the two different years may reflect the actual records of his birth, but the only record may be the date of baptism not of birth.

[mahatmakanejeeves]

60. What a great explanation. Thank you so much for that. NT

[erpowers]

15. This is Wrong

It is not wrong because Justice Antonin Scalia was a conservative justice. It is wrong because someone should not be able to buy the name of a school. I know this happens all the time. A school is named after a family after the family gives a large amount of money. A kid is admitted to a school after a family has given money to set up scholarships and rename a library. However, it is still sad that someone can get a school's name changed just by giving a few million dollars. I wish the school would have turned down the donation with the statement, "While we are not against renaming the school after Justice Scalia, we believe it would be wrong to name the school after him in order to get money."

[47of74]

24. Or the corporatization of higher ed...

Now we've got companies getting in on the game too, donate a few million and get a building or part of a building named after your company. For example Rebecca Schuman wrote in Slate that she used to work and her husband continued to work at a place that had a building called Express Scripts Hall. (She didn't name it but I believe it was University of Missouri - St. Louis).

[24601]

49. That would knock out Leland Stanford Junior University (the official name), more commonly

known as "Stanford".

At 15, he really hadn't done all that much.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leland_Stanford,_Jr.

[erpowers]

58. A Little Different

That is a little different. If you create a university you can give it any name you please. My problem is when a person can pay money to have a school name changed. I would not have had a problem if the donor had paid $20 million to start a law school and then name it The Antonin Scalia School of Law.

[Gregorian]

17. Thanks for the reminder. He's still dead.

[LibDemAlways]

18. Those kinds of donations talk. I'm sure if the

Kochs and the other donor asked them to name it the Richard "I am not a crook" Nixon Disgraced President Law School, they'd have been ok with that request too.

[turbinetree]

19. They should have re-named it the...................................

MERCATUS--------------------------which the Koch, set up a class program in this University and or presently doing this this at the University Florida, and then having one of these right wingers on the boards of these institution, because they are funding a class to -----------------------really------------- and in the back ground , how they corrupt the education for an right wing agenda, what are they going to name the University of Florida, MERCATUS II, its all in the book by ..................................
Jane Mayer--------------------"Dark Money"

It is amazing how these two individuals that got there money from regimes from afar, by daddy, that there house maid was a Nazi and went back to Germany, and were totalitarian despots in nature, and they now go around and want to get professors unto and into the educational system, to spew and teach there libertarian concept of AYN RAND, and that the collective as a whole is to blame if the collective doesn't think like them-----------------amazing

George Mason University is a public University-----------------and now they want to re-name it for someone that attacked voting rights, wages, privacy issues, for example, and then the same dead justice going to hoop tee doos, with the same Koch's right wing hypocrites---------------this is amazing.

Just like Washington National Airport be re-named after a president (Reagan) that started his campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi with racist remarks------------------so to honor him they put his name on a airport paid for by the taxpayers--------------amazing

If they take over the entire country are they going to remane--------------REDMAP------------and yes, this is a plan, by one of there right wing cronies by the name of Ed Gillespie to take over every state and turn them red.

Ed Gillespie
Former Counselor to the President
Edward Walter "Ed" Gillespie is an American Republican political strategist who served as the 61st Chairman of the Republican National Committee and Counselor to the President in the George W. Bush administration. Gillespie, along with Democrat Jack Quinn, founded Quinn Gillespie & Associates, a bipartisan lobbying firm. Gillespi…


Timeline
1996: In 1996, he became Director of Communications and Congressional Affairs for the Republican National Committee under Haley Barbour.
1999: From 1999–2008, Gillespie served as a political strategist to several American politicians.
2000: In 2000, Gillespie served as senior communications advisor for the presidential campaign of George W. Bush, organizing the party convention program in Philadelphia for Bush's nomination and Bush's inauguration ceremony.
2007: In late June 2007, President Bush brought Gillespie into the White House on a full-time basis, to replace the departing Counselor to the President Dan Bartlett with the mandate to help raise Bush's flagging popularity ratings.
2009: In February 2009, Virginia Attorney General Bob McDonnell announced that Gillespie would serve as General Chairman of his campaign for Governor.
2010: In January 2010, Gillespie was announced in as the national chairman of the Republican State Leadership Committee (RSLC), which helps elect state attorneys general, lieutenant governors, secretaries of state and state house and senate candidates.



Honk--------------------for a political revolution Bernie 2016

[houston16revival]

25. They live in an alternative universe

It is too soon to place Scalia in the history of U.S. jurists, ironically
because his decisions were so controversial that his influence and
intellectual durability will not be known until the Court operates for
a couple decades without him.

These Egghead Wars that Federalist scholars play really are WAY out there!

[47of74]

30. Rigor mortis hadn't even set in....

...and the reich was already calling Scalia the greatest thing since sliced bread or Jesus Christ. It figures these turds would want to do that.

[SheilaT]

27. I may stop including George Mason

in the list of schools I've attended.

[chapdrum]

29. The right marches onward,

head held high.

Trump or no Trump.

[DebbieCDC]

33. It's a winger law school IIRC (nt)

[dbackjon]

39. Public

[dbackjon]

38. So it is ASS Law? Appropriate

[Gungnir]

40. ROFLMAO! Great observation

[mike_c]

41. sigh-- GMU is my undergrad alma mater....

Damn.

[The Second Stone]

43. George Mason opposed the ratification of the US Constitution

and as a result, his former good friend and neighbor, George Washington, never spoke to him again.

How appropriate for his eponymous university to name its law school after a jurist who also opposed the constitution.

[Zira]

46. Thank you! Good info!

[mahatmakanejeeves]

54. He opposed ratification for a good reason. See post #14.

The law school has always skewed to the right.

He opposed ratification because the Constitution did not include a Bill of Rights:

In 1787, toward the end of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia, Mason proposed that a bill of rights preface the Constitution, but his proposal was defeated. When he refused to sign the new Constitution, his decision baffled some and alienated others, including his old friend, George Washington. Mason's stand nonetheless had its effect. At the first session of the first Congress, Madison introduced a Bill of Rights that paralleled Mason's Declaration of Rights of 1776.

[Zira]

45. Eeeww.

What a terrible thing to have on your degree and go look for work with.

[1monster]

48. Considering that George Mason was pretty much the founder of The Bill of Rights,

renaming the law school after Scalia, who undermined the The Bill of Rights repeatedly, it strikes me as obscene.

[davidpdx]

51. That's like 10 big giants coming up and all taking a massive shit on the school

It stinks.

[underpants]

52. Mason is a bastion of conservatism

Especially the poli sci and economics departments, probably the law school too.

[bemildred]

53. George Mason:

George Mason (sometimes referred to as George Mason IV) (December 11, 1725 – October 7, 1792) was a Virginia planter, politician, and a delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention of 1787, one of three men who refused to sign. His writings, including substantial portions of the Fairfax Resolves of 1774, the Virginia Declaration of Rights of 1776, and his Objections to this Constitution of Government (1787) in opposition to ratification of the constitution, have been a significant influence on political thought and events. The Virginia Declaration of Rights served as a basis for the United States Bill of Rights, of which he has been deemed the father.

Mason was born in 1725, most likely in present-day Fairfax County, Virginia. Mason's father died when he was young, and his mother managed the family estates until he came of age. He married in 1750, built Gunston Hall, and lived the life of a country squire, supervising his lands, family and slaves. Mason briefly served in the House of Burgesses and involved himself in community affairs, sometimes serving with his neighbor, George Washington. As tensions between Britain and the American colonies grew, Mason came to support the colonial side, and used his knowledge and experience to help the revolutionary cause, finding ways to work around the Stamp Act of 1765 and serving in the rebel Virginia Conventions of 1775 and 1776.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Mason

Well, I guess they both liked slavery.

[CTyankee]

55. At first I thought this was an April Fool's Day joke...

[MrsMatt]

56. My first thought too

and I'm not convinced it isn't, especially the school acronym would be ASSoL

[CTyankee]

57. Oh, god, that's funny! I laughed out loud at that one...

[sofa king]

61. Hooray, ASSoLs! Please please PLEASE be true!

Antonin Scalia School of Law? ASSoL?!?

It's too close to April Fools Day to be true. It's too high in the Google News list to be true. It's too damned good to be true.

But PLEASE Saint Elvis, PLEASE let this be true!

[mahatmakanejeeves]

62. Comment to the WaPo article:

GetTheMop

8:47 AM EDT

It's not just happening at GMU.
"A review of hundreds of private documents, emails, and audio recordings—along with interviews with more than 75 college officials, professors, students, and others—indicate the Koch brothers’ spending on higher education is now a critical part of their broader campaign to infuse politics and government with free-market principles." http://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2015/10/spreading-the-free-market-gospel/413239/

[Coventina]

64. Is this an April Fool's joke?

If so, good one!

[Justice]

66. I will call it - the law school formerly known as George Mason.

[olddad56]

67. Will they now teach a class in how to manipulate the law to benefit your friends?

[Orsino]

68. Ironically, this contradicts the written intent of the founders. n/t

[yurbud]

70. It will be right next to the Pol Pot School of Urban Planning

[mahatmakanejeeves]

71. Charles Koch gave nearly $48 million to George Mason University

Charles Koch gave nearly $48 million to George Mason University

Posted: Friday, April 1, 2016 9:09 am

Associated Press |

FAIRFAX — George Mason University, a public school outside the nation’s capital, has quietly become a conservative powerhouse in economics and law, a reputation built in part with tens of millions of dollars a year from billionaire Republican donor Charles Koch.

From 2011 to 2014, the Charles Koch Foundation gave nearly $48 million to George Mason in one form or another, tax records show. Though Koch divvies up more than $20 million annually among hundreds of U.S. universities through his foundation, no other school got more than $1 million annually in that period.

Although it is not unusual for billionaires — including those on the other end of the political spectrum — to donate large sums to schools, the size of the donations has raised concerns among some George Mason students and faculty about maintaining academic independence, echoing unease that has cropped up at other schools that benefit from Koch’s largesse.
....

Koch’s giving has tripped alarms at George Mason, where boards and institutes are peppered with people with close ties to Koch Industries. ... In 2014, the last year for which records are available, the foundation gave $16.8 million to George Mason and its Institute for Humane Studies. That accounts for more than a third of the money GMU gets from private sources: The Council for Aid to Education, a not-for-profit organization that drives corporate giving to colleges, reports Mason received $44.6 million in donations in fiscal 2013.

The Institute for Humane Studies? I've never heard of them.

Institute for Humane Studies