#40046
RECORDS OF THE
SCHOOL OF LAW
in the
University Archives and Records Service
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Wilson Library, CB# 3926
Chapel Hill, North Carolina
27514-8890
July 1988

On December 12, 1842, the UNC Board of Trustees authorized the establishment of a Law Professorship and on October 3, 1845, Judge William Horn Battle was selected to fill that position as head of the University's Law Department. In 1843, Battle had opened a private law school in Chapel Hill and from 1845 through January 1879 he taught the University's College Class as well as his Independent Class in the school. Battle's salary was provided from the tuition paid by his law students. UNC President Kemp Plummer Battle succeeded his father as Professor of Law in 1879 and served until 1881 when John Manning was elected to fill the Professorship. The latter was successful in securing an Assistant Professorship for the department in 1898. In August 1899, the Board of Trustees resolved to fully incorporate the Law Department into the University as the School of Law and James Cameron MacRae was chosen as Dean and Professor of Law.

Until 1907 the Law Department or School was housed in various campus buildings. In the latter year with the removal of the Library to new quarters, Smith building became the home of the Law School. In 1923, the School moved to the recently completed Manning Hall which it occupied until 1968 when Van Hecke-Wettach Building was completed.

     William Horn Battle           Professor of Law    1845-1879
     Kemp Plummer Battle           Professor of Law    1879-1881
     John Manning                  Professor of Law    1881-1899
     James Cameron MacRae          Dean                1899-1909
     Lucius Polk McGehee           Dean                1910-1923
     Merton Leroy Ferson           Dean                1924-1926
     Abner Leon Green              Dean                1926-1927
     Charles Tilford McCormick     Dean                1927-1931
     Maurice Taylor Van Hecke      Dean                1931-1941
     Robert Hasley Wettach         Dean                1941-1949
     Henry Parker Brandis          Dean                1949-1964
     James Dickson Phillips        Dean                1964-1975
     Robert Gray Byrd              Dean                1975-1979
     Kenneth S. Broun              Dean                1979-1987
     Judith W. Wegner              Dean                1987- 

For a more detailed history of the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Law, see Robert H. Wettach, ed., A CENTURY OF LEGAL EDUCATION (Chapel Hill, 1947) as well as the Trustee Minutes, Presidents Records, Chancellors Records, Provosts Records, and the University of North Carolina Papers in the University Archives.

Records of the Law School in the Archives consist of the following:

     Folder 1:  Annual Reports of the Dean, 1923-1924

     Folder 2:  Dean Van Hecke's correspondence with Consolidated
                    University President Frank Porter Graham,
                    1932-1936

     Folder 3:  Dean Wettach's file on the wartime proposals to
                    consolidate the UNC, Duke, and Wake Forest
                    Law Schools, 1942-1943

This page was last updated July 9, 1996.
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