Dalhousie University. Schulich School of Law

Corporate body (Dalhousie University)

Dalhousie University. Schulich School of Law

• Dalhousie University. Faculty of Law
• The Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University

CAN-NSHD/1613

1883-

Dalhousie’s Schulich School of Law originated as the first university law school established in the common-law provinces of Canada, and became the model for legal education across the country. The school was opened in 1883 with Richard Chapman Weldon as dean, supported by a volunteer faculty of Halifax lawyers and judges.

After four years in temporary housing, in 1887 the law school moved into a corner of the new Dalhousie College, known from 1919 as the Forrest Building. In 1951 the school moved to the Law Building (currently the University Club), which had been designed and built for the purpose thirty years earlier, but commandeered for other uses; by 1966 the law students and faculty had outgrown the space and moved into their current residence, the Weldon Law Building, named for the school’s first dean. After the fifth-floor library was destroyed by fire in 1985, the building was expanded and renovated to create the new James Dunn Law Library.

The Faculty of Law counts among its notable graduates Dalhousie’s first black graduate, James Robinson Johnston, who earned his law degree in 1898. In 1918 Frances Fish became the first woman to graduate from Dalhousie Law School and later the first woman to be admitted to the Barristers’ Society of Nova Scotia. By 1936 Dalhousie Law School graduates sat on the bench of all but three Provincial Supreme Courts, and in 1950 the faculty began offering graduate programs.

During the second half of the twentieth century the law school established initiatives and programs including Dalhousie Legal Aid (1970); the Marine and Environmental Law Program (1974); the Indigenous Blacks and Mi’kmaq Initiative (1989); the Health Law Institute (1992); and the Law and Technbology Institute (2001). In 2009 Sir Seymour Schulich donated $20 million to fund 40 new annual scholarships, the largest gift of its kind ever made to a Canadian law school, and the school was renamed the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University.

A $3 million gift from John McCall MacBain in 2011 established the MacBain Chair in Health Law and Policy, and Joanna Erdman was the first person to hold the chair.

The Office of the Dean of Law is located in the Weldon Law Building on Dalhousie's Studley Campus.

The Schulich Law School offers a Juris Doctor (JD) Program with certificates invAboriginal and Indigenous Law; Criminal Justice; Business Law; Marine & Environmental Law; Law & Technology; and Health Law & Policy. They also offer combined JD and specialist Master degree programs in association with the Faculty of Management, as well as programs leading to Master of Laws (LLM) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degrees. In 1989 the Indigenous Blacks & Mi'kmaq (IB&M) Initiative at the Schulich School of Law was established to increase representation of Indigenous Blacks and Mi'kmaq in the legal profession in order to reduce discrimination.

The faculty supports graduate and faculty research in a number of areas and through its centres of excellence: the Health Law Institute, the Law & Technology Institute, and the Marine & Environmental Law Institute. It hosts Canada Research Chairs in Ocean Law and Governance and in Maritime Law and Policy, and is home to the Canadian Journal of Law & Technology, the Dalhousie Law Journal, the Dalhousie Journal of Legal Studies and Ocean Yearbook.

The basic statute relating to Dalhousie University is Chapter 24 of the Acts of 1863. This statute replaced earlier statutes, and the 1863 statute itself has been amended and supplemented several times over the years. The provisions of these various statutes provide for the establishment and regulation of the university, the membership of the Board of Governors and its rights and powers, the authority of senate for the internal regulation of the university (subject to the approval of the board), and various other matters.

The Schulich School of law is overseen by a Dean of Law, assisted by an Associate Dean, Academic; Associate Dean, Graduate Studies; and Associate Dean, Research.

Dalhousie University. Faculty of Science. Marine Affair Program (1988-)

Dalhousie University. Board of Governors (1821 -)

Cameron, Camille

Brooks, Kimberley (1973-)

Schulich, Sir Seymour (January 6, 1940 -)

Saunders, Phillip

Russell, Dawn

Ghiz, Joseph A. (1945-1996)

Girard, Philip (1955-)

Charles, William H.

Christie, Innis M. (November 8, 1937 - February 9, 2009)

Donald, Robert Thomas (d. 1971)

MacKay, W. Andrew (1929-2013)

Wilson, Bertha (1923-2007)

Nicholls, George

Beaverbrook, Lady (1909-1994)

Findlay, Allan Charles (1914-1982)

Smith, Sidney Earle (March 9, 1897 – March 17, 1959)

Read, Horace Emerson (1898-1976)

Read, John Erskine, OC, Justice, 1888-1973

MacDonald, Vincent Christopher (1897-1964)

Fish, Frances Lilian (1888–1975)

MacRae, Donald Alexander (1872-1955)

Dunn, James Hamet, Sir (1874-1956)

Johnstone, John Hamilton Lane ([ca. 1890-1973])

Weldon, Richard Chapman (1849-1925)

Bennett, Richard Bedford (1870-1947)

Dalhousie University Archives

CA-NSHD

Manual of style: The Chicago Manual of Style. 17th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017.

Descriptive standard: ISAAR (CPF) - International Standard Archival Authority Record For Corporate Bodies, Persons and Families, 2nd ed.,Camberra: International Council on Archives, 2004.

Authorized form of name: Library of Congress Authorities.

Date and time format: ISO 8601-1:2019 - Date and time — Representations for information interchange — Part 1: Basic rules.

Country code format: ISO 3166-1:2013 - Codes for the representation of names of countries and their subdivisions -- Part 1: Country codes.

Institution identifier: ISO 15511:2011 - Information and documentation -- International standard identifier for libraries and related organizations (ISIL).

Institution identifier: Library and Archives Canada - Symbols and Interlibrary Loan Policies in Canada.

Language format: ISO 639-3:2007 - Codes for the representation of names of languages -- Part 3: Alpha-3 code for comprehensive coverage of languages.

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Sources: ISO 690:2010 - Information and documentation -- Guidelines for bibliographic references and citations to information resources.

Sources: The Chicago Manual of Style. 17th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2017.

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2019-05-08: Creighton Barrett added list of standards and guidelines used to create the archival authority record (ISAAR 5.4.3).