Post date: October 6, 2000
Harvard Law School Professor Steven Shavell has been named the Samuel R. Rosenthal Professor of Law. The professorship honors Samuel R. Rosenthal, Class of 1924, an estate and probate attorney, philanthropist and rare-book collector. Rosenthal died in 1994 at the age of 95.
Professor Shavell joined the Harvard Law School faculty in 1980, having served on the faculty of the Department of Economics at Harvard University since 1974. He received two bachelor’s degrees from the University of Michigan in mathematics and economics in 1968 and a Ph.D. in economics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1973.
Professor Shavell’s research interests focus on the intersection of law and economics. He is president-elect of the American Law and Economics Association and is the director of the Law School’s John M. Olin Center for Law, Economics, and Business, and also of the Law and Economics Program of the National Bureau of Economic Research.
Samuel R. Rosenthal was a legal adviser and director for many American and French corporations and served as a partner at the Chicago law firm of Sonnenschein, Nath and Rosenthal. He also counseled individual clients including former Secretary of State George Schultz and movie star Mary Pickford.
Rosenthal was a leader in Harvard Law School alumni activities, serving on the Dean’s Advisory Council and supporting preservation of the Law School’s library collections. Rosenthal also established book and conservation funds at the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan and endowed a collection of Honore Daumier’s art work to the Art Institute of Chicago.
The Rosenthal chair was endowed in 1991.