The Minnesota Law Community lost one of its most cherished members this past summer — Professor Emeritus Fred L. Morrison — a highly regarded scholar, recognized throughout the world for contributions to international and comparative public law.
Morrison joined the Law School faculty in 1969, teaching thousands of law students for more than 50 years. He was the Oppenheimer, Wolff & Donnelly Professor of Law from 1990 to 1998 and was named the Popham Haik Schnobrich/ Lindquist & Vennum Professor of Law in 1998. He served as interim dean in 1994-95 and as interim co-dean from 2006 to 2008. “Fred Morrison pioneered our international and LL.M. programs and contributed tremendously to the governance of the Law School and the University,” says William McGeveran, dean and William S. Pattee Professor of Law. Today, the LL.M. is recognized as one of the top programs of its type in the country.
“Fred was a truly selfless faculty member who devoted the majority of his career to making both the Law School and the University stronger and more relevant to national and international events,” says Joan Howland, associate dean for information & technology, and Roger F. Noreen Professor of Law.
Professor Brett McDonnell, Dorsey & Whitney Chair and Professor of Law, says Morrison was the person who knew the most about the history of the Law School and its relationship with the University as a whole. “When we had a question about what our rules were that couldn’t be solved by looking at the formal documents, we went to Fred,” he says.
An intellectual powerhouse, Morrison got an A.B. from the University of Kansas before attending Oxford University as a Rhodes Scholar and earning a master’s degree. He then added an M.A. and Ph.D. from Princeton University and a J.D. from the University of Chicago.
“I had the great fortune to take three classes from Fred Morrison while in law school,” says Associate Professor of Law Nicholas Bednar ’16. “After discussing a case, he would draw on his vast experience to explain a situation in which he had been forced to consider the University’s obligations under the Constitution. He had an effortless way of making even the most arcane provisions of the Constitution seem like something we could encounter in practice.”
Morrison represented the U.S. at the International Court of Justice, served as a counselor at the State Department, and strived to prevent conflict in South Sudan by working to develop the country’s rule of law and constitutional infrastructure. He also served as a visiting professor at the University of Bonn, University of Kiel in Germany, and Tsinghua University in China. He was a member of the Board of Curators of the Max Planck Institute on Foreign Public Law and International Law and served on the International Advisory Board of the Walther Schücking Institute of International Law.
He served as a director of the American Society for the Comparative Study of Law and was an elected member of the American Law Institute and the American Society of International Law. In May of 1997, Professor Morrison was honored with the University President’s Award for Outstanding Service.
Morrison’s knowledge of legal systems and legal education around the world was seemingly endless, says Kara Galvin, director of International and Graduate Programs, “He could answer any question about any country and follow it up with a delightful anecdote about his personal experience in that country.”
Visit the memorial board in honor of Professor Emeritus Fred Morrison