Goldstein on James Wilson at the University of Pennsylvania

Ari Goldstein, University of Pennsylvania Law School, has published James Wilson at the University of Pennsylvania. Here is the abstract.

James Wilson was a signer of the Declaration of Independence, one of the principal architects of the United States Constitution, and an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. But he is often remembered instead as the founder of the University of Pennsylvania Law School. This Essay interrogates that claim, arguing that Wilson’s relationship with the school is more interesting and complex than the title of ‘law school founder’ suggests. The University of Pennsylvania was one of the institutional foundations of Wilson’s life, serving as his employer and launchpad when he first arrived in Philadelphia and as a platform for his professional ambitions later in his career. In exchange, Wilson served as the school’s trustee and attorney, helping to save it from ruin when the Pennsylvania State Assembly abrogated its charter in the wake of national independence. When Wilson was appointed the school’s first professor of law, the appointment was the capstone, not the beginning, of a twenty-five-year relationship between a man and a school each essential to the American Founding.

Download the article from SSRN at the link.