The George Washington University last Thursday installed GW Law Dean Dayna Bowen Matthew as Harold H. Greene Professor of Law, formally welcoming her to the GW Law faculty in a virtual ceremony.
As well as Dr. Matthew, speakers included GW President Thomas J. LeBlanc, GW Provost M. Brian Blake and David and Maria Wiegand, who established the Harold H. Greene Professorship of Law Fund in 2000 in honor of Harold H. Greene, J.D. ’52, a senior judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
“Our university aspires to advance GW Law’s long tradition of attracting, cultivating and producing some of the finest minds across the spectrum of legal industry and scholarship,” Dr. LeBlanc said. “We are delighted that Dean Matthew will now lead the school through its next chapter.”
Dr. Matthew, a lawyer and legal scholar who is a nationally recognized expert in health equity and public health policy, thanked the GW community and the Wiegands and said the opportunity to steward GW Law was “a calling.”
“The spirit and the principles that have brought me to this wonderful university and to this great law school are the same identical spirit and commitment that I have chosen to live my life by,” she said.
The Wiegands established the Harold H. Greene Professorship fund in honor of Mr. Greene’s judgment in the 1984 settlement of the AT&T antitrust breakup case, which made it possible for the young couple—former AT&T employees—to start their first telecom company. The 1984 AT&T Consent Decree opened the telecom industry to competition, and over the next 20 years the Wiegands would own and operate multiple telecom companies. They said their business success was made possible by the competitive environment created by Mr. Greene’s ongoing oversight of the industry.
Both the Wiegands and Dr. Matthew said they were inspired not just by Mr. Greene’s landmark antitrust work but also by his personal history of service and his ongoing legacy in civil rights. He came to the United States as a 20-year-old refugee from Nazi Germany, served as an intelligence officer during World War II and graduated first in his class from GW Law in 1952. As a Justice Department lawyer before taking the bench, he was regarded as a principal architect of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
“Judge Greene….served his country and improved his country,” Dr. Matthew said. “This is my life’s calling as well.”
And she said stepping into a leadership role at GW during a tumultuous global moment was not as daunting as it might appear.
“Ever since I arrived, people have been asking me whether I’m overwhelmed by the challenge of leading a great law school in the midst of three ‘pandemics’—a global pandemic in racial justice, a global pandemic in coronavirus and a contentious national election,” Dr. Matthew said. “The answer is that I’m not overwhelmed at all…Joining a law school like this in the midst of adversity has the unintended consequence of making it very easy for me to fall in love with this school and this community…Because we are in crisis, I have learned and seen firsthand how much we care for one another here at GW.”
