Nesson Steps Down From Teaching Amid Protests

Weld Professor of Law Charles R. Nesson ’60 announced that he will give teaching responsibilities for his first-year torts class to Dean of the J.D. Program Todd D. Rakoff ’67 and another professor.

The move comes in the wake of student criticism of Nesson following his offer to defend Matthias Scholl, a first-year law student who sent an e-mail to a classmate in which he defended the use of the word “nigger.”

Nesson’s decision, which applies only to the rest of this year and was first reported by the New York Times Saturday, means that he will still attend the classes and teach it informally, in addition to giving the “finale” of the class. Rakoff and Warren Professor of American Legal History Morton J. Horwitz will assume Nesson’s teaching duties.

Nesson said his decision to step down was a way of “smoothing over” strained relations with the class and was in no way forced on him by administrators.

“At no point have I been told to step down...These are people, who are my friends and colleagues,” Nesson said yesterday of the administration. “We are people on the same side who want to deal with a problem.”

He said his decision may address the concerns of the Black Law Students Association (BLSA), which sent an open letter to Law School administrators last week demanding that the Law School publish a written reprimand of Nesson in The Crimson and the Harvard Law Record.

The BLSA also asked that Nesson be barred from teaching mandatory first-year classes, such as the torts class he is stepping down from, and that “appropriate administrative action” be taken against Nesson.

Following the incident, Nesson said he regretted that his proposal offended some students. He intended the mock trial to “give a chance for ideas to be articulated, hard questions asked and deliberated on, some meeting of minds and, conceivably, a solution.”

“I feel terrible about the emotional upset I have caused, and deeply regret that I have placed students who were already hurt once in the position of having to deal with yet another occasion for apology,” he added. “I acted with good intention but without due care.”

Nesson said yesterday he does worry that the move will give the appearance that the HLS administration forced him to drop the class as punishment for proposing the mock trial.

“The threat is that it makes it look like Harvard Law School will punish a teacher for raising the issue of a racial problem in class,” Nesson said. “Harvard Law School does not stand for that.”

Rakoff also said that Nesson was not pressured to relinquish control of the class.

“We talked about it together and he fully wants to do it, he is going to be in the classroom, he is not disappearing,” said Rakoff. “He thinks this is the best thing he can do for his students....he had a party at his house after he announced it, and explained to them what he thinks is important.”

In its letter, the BLSA also demanded that Law Professor David Rosenberg also be reprimanded publicly and not be allowed to teach required first-year courses.

According to students, on March 13 Rosenberg said in class that “feminism, Marxism and the blacks have contributed nothing to torts.”

When some students took offense, Rosenberg issued a statement to clarify what he said in class.

“What I criticized was strands of black scholarship—notably, black studies and its contributions to critical race theory and various other areas...I said that this scholarship does not enhance understanding of tort theory and I stand fully behind my criticism,” the statement reads.

Rakoff said that while HLS takes the concerns of the BLSA very seriously, there are no plans to reprimand either Nesson or Rosenberg.

“I’ve spoken to both professors about the incident but there is no plan of doing anything further,” Rakoff said.

“We want to make a Law School in which we can discuss hard issues, in the classroom and out of the classroom, so that people end up learning from the discussion rather than just getting mad,” Rakoff said.

Nesson said that while he disagrees with the BLSA letter, he respects the opinions of the association.

“I don’t agree with their position...that an issue that arose in our class shouldn’t be discussed in our class,” said Nesson. “[But] I respect it, because it has been done in a very civil and lawyerly way.”

“I responded to the BLSA letter by saying I’d be happy to appear at any time to respond to their concerns, subject only to the requirement that it be recorded,” Nesson continued, “and I was verbally informed that they did not want this.”

—Staff writer Joseph P. Flood can be reached at flood@fas.harvard.edu.