Thanks to a $30 million donation, the law school at George Mason University will soon be the 10th law school to be named after a U.S. Supreme Court Justice.
The Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University will honor the late Justice and longtime Northern Virginia resident who died less than two months ago.
The name quickly became the butt of jokes on social media due to the unfortunate acronym created from the originally announced name, Antonin Scalia School of Law. Commentators made fun of both “ASSLaw” and “ASSOL”.
Dean Henry Butler wrote in a letter to alumni that because of the “acronym controversy on social media,” the name would be tweaked, according to news reports.
The donation, the largest in the university’s history, includes $10 million from the Charles Koch Foundation and $20 million from an anonymous donor who asked the university to name its law school in honor of the justice. The funds will endow three new scholarship programs and boost faculty size, George Mason announced last week.
The name change is pending approval from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia.
Justice Scalia, who served 30 years on the Supreme Court, spoke at the dedication of the law school building in 1999, and was a guest lecturer at the law school, located in Arlington, Va.
Scalia passed away in February.
“Justice Scalia was an advocate of vigorous debate and enjoyed thoughtful conversations with those he disagreed with, as shown by his longtime friendship with Justice [Ruth Bader] Ginsburg,” said George Mason University President Ángel Cabrera. “That ability to listen and engage with others, despite having contrasting opinions or perspectives, is what higher education is all about.”
George Mason is the second institution this year to announce a major donation and name change, following January’s $25 million donation to Villanova University creating the Charles Widger School of Law.
Northwestern University School of Law changed its name in October after a $100 million gift from J.B. Pritzker, the second largest gift to a law school, following a $130 million gift in 1999 to The University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. Six other universities have changed their law school names in the past five years, including Drexel University, Chapman University and Hofstra University.
While 19 schools are named after benefactors, just six Supreme Court Justices have had law schools named after them. Four schools are named after Supreme Court Justice John Marshall. Others include the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University; Northern Kentucky University – Salmon P. Chase College of Law; Texas Southern University – Thurgood Marshall School of Law; The Sandra Day O’Connor College of Law at Arizona State University; and University of Louisville’s Brandeis School of Law.
