Debate Erupts at Georgetown Law Over Scalia

A debate has erupted within the Georgetown law community over whether the school should honor one of its most prominent alumni, the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia.

Scalia, who graduated valedictorian and summa cum laude from Georgetown University in 1957 with a degree in history before studying law at Harvard, is a controversial figure due to his conservative leanings. His death and a subsequent memorial from the Georgetown University Law Center touched off a ferocious email debate at the school over whether Scalia, who two professors called “a defender of privilege, oppression and bigotry,” should be praised so generously by the university, according to news reports.

Now, the Georgetown Black Law Students Association has weighed in with a post on its Facebook page, taking umbrage with some complaining that young Republican students were “traumatized, hurt, shaken, and angry” about such vitriol over Scalia.

“While we support an individual student’s choice to mourn, it must also be acknowledged that Justice Scalia’s legacy affects us in vastly different ways,” the association wrote. “Many Black students were also ‘traumatized, hurt, shaken, and angry’ as ‘22-year-old 1Ls’ when the law school declined to make unprompted timely statements last school year regarding the uptick in racialized policing, law enforcement, and the lack of indictments of violent police officers.”

The statement also takes Scalia to task for racial comments he once made about low African-American enrollment rates at the University of Texas, suggesting that maybe they would do better at a “less-advanced school.”

“If the late Justice Antonin Scalia were correct in his assertions, if members of our organization were relegated to a ‘less-advanced school,’ BLSA might not even have a vibrant presence on this campus to mourn his passing,” the association added. “In the same spirit of understanding and empathy called for by professors, and given Justice Scalia’s often polarizing, offensive and intolerant stances, we ask that an individual’s decision of whether or not to mourn be equally respected.”

The issue was first reported on by the Washington Post.