Quintin Johnstone

Johnstone was born in Chicago, Illinois, on March 29, 1915.[5] He was raised in Hyde Park and enrolled in the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools for primary and secondary education.[2] Due to the close proximity of his home to the University of Chicago, he became acquainted with professors who inspired him to enter academia. Johnstone matriculated at the university, where he obtained his Bachelor of Arts and served as co-captain of the track team,[6] then attended the University of Chicago Law School, graduating with a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree.[7] Regarding his time as law student, Johnstone later recalled his experience as "typical".[6] He was admitted to the bar of Illinois in 1939.[5]

After a year of study, Johnstone obtained a Master of Laws (LL.M.) from Cornell Law School in 1941. He subsequently went to Yale Law School, becoming one of six students in the J.S.D. program to have already taught at domestic law schools,[8] and graduated in 1951 with his Doctor of Juridical Science.[7]

After graduating from Cornell Law, Johnstone worked briefly in private practice before becoming an attorney in the Office of Price Administration. In 1947, he became an assistant professor at the Willamette University College of Law, later joining the faculty of the University of Kansas as an associate professor in 1950. After five years of teaching, Johnstone became a visiting professor at Yale Law School in 1955, with President Alfred Whitney Griswold announcing his appointment as an associate professor on August 10, 1956, alongside future-judge Ellen Ash Peters.[9] He rose to a full-time professorship in 1959, and received the Law School's appointment as the Justus S. Hotchkiss Professor of Law in 1964.[10]

From 1967 until 1969, Johnstone took a leave from Yale to move to Ethiopia, where he co-founded the Haile Selassie I University Law School of Addis Ababa University and served as its dean.[1] Having previously been stationed in Tanzania, he grew concerned that African legal education too closely mirrored the West and advocated for relinquishing control of the American-governed law school to native Ethiopians.[11] Johnstone also aimed to train future students for government office at the university, replacing foreign professors on the faculty with Ethiopian ones.[11]

Johnstone achieved emeritus status at Yale Law in 1985, and assumed a professorship at the New York Law School (NYLS) that same year, becoming a professor emeritus at NYLS in 2000.[10] He chaired the Graduate Committee at Yale, efficiently managing a controversial program, and oversaw the school's admissions for a period.[12] He was alone in teaching the specialty of property law, and made multiple unsuccessful efforts to increase the number of faculty in the field, though succeeded on only one occasion. During a meeting of the Yale Governing Board, he persuaded the faculty to hire Charles A. Reich, who expressed interest in teaching property law, and argued for the importance of teaching property.[13] Johnstone was also noted for his concern regarding the legal profession, which had been a focus of his scholarly works as a legal academic.[4]

Johnstone gained a reputation for being among the toughest graders at Yale Law. With no class rankings at the school, he remembered its absence as meaning "less push for top grades than there might be at other places".[14] Both Anita Hill and future-Justice Clarence Thomas were among his students. Johnstone taught Thomas in three classes, remembering him as a serious student that "performed very well" and who "[took] stands and aggressively [defended] them" in class.[15][16] In considering the importance of Johnstone's teaching of the essentials of law, Judge Ralph K. Winter Jr. likened his and Joseph W. Bishop Jr.'s[lower-alpha 1] eventual retirement to being "the equivalent of a loss of 20% of the faculty" at Yale Law School.[12]

Throughout his career, Johnstone received multiple accolades for his legal service. He was awarded an honorary degree by Quinnipiac University in 1993.[18] In 1996, the Connecticut Bar Association awarded him its John Eldred Shields Distinguished Professional Service Award for outstanding service to the legal community.[19] Johnstone was also a member of the Connecticut Bar Foundation's board of directors and served as its president[20] from 1987 until 1991.[10][21] On June 2, 2011, Johnstone was given the Service to the Profession Award by the Connecticut Law Tribune,[22] where he previously had been the chair of the editorial board from 1999 to 2011,[23][24] and the Tribune renamed it in his honor afterwards.[10] The Connecticut Bar Association presented him its Tapping Reeve Legal Educator Award on April 4, 2014,[3][25] in recognition of his longstanding contributions to legal education.[26] The CATIC Foundation established two memorial prizes in his honor: the Quintin Johnstone Scholarship, presented to students interested in property law, and the Quintin Johnstone Prize in Real Property Law, awarded to a student of Yale Law "who has demonstrated excellence in the area of real property law".[27][28]

Johnstone had a wife, Nancy, and two children: Robert Dale Johnstone and Katherine Mary Johnstone.[10] He died at 99 years of age on June 27, 2014, within his home in Hamden, Connecticut.[2][29] A memorial service was held at Yale Law School on November 9, 2014. Robert Post, then the dean of the school, said of him:

Quintin Johnstone was an iconic figure at the Yale Law School [...] He taught here for more than 55 years, and perhaps instructed more students than any other teacher in the School’s history. His mastery of the intricacies of property law was treasured by generations of students, as were his insights into the legal profession. He was still actively teaching at 96 years of age. We shall miss him deeply. A treasured landmark has passed away.[30]

• Berger, Curtis J. (1962–1963). "The Research Frontiers of Real Property Law: Commercial Land Transfers". Journal of Legal Education. 15 (3): 282–292.
• "Books Noted". Lawyers and Their Work (1967)—By Quintin Johnstone and Dan Hopson, Jr. William & Mary Law Review. 8 (4): 711. June 1967.
• Willy, Roy E. (November 1967). "Review of Lawyers and Their Work by Quintin Johnstone, Dan Hopson, Jr". American Bar Association Journal. American Bar Association. 53 (11): 1054–1055. JSTOR 25724221.
• Craig, Walter E. (February 1968). "Review of Lawyers and Their Work: An Analysis of the Legal Profession in the United States and England by Quintin Johnstone, Dan Hopson, Jr". Stanford Law Review. 20 (3): 610–612. doi:10.2307/1227518. JSTOR 1227518.
• Slain, John J. (June 1968). "Review of The Lawyers by Martin Mayer; Lawyers and Their Work by Quintin Johnstone, Dan Hopson, Jr". Administrative Law Review. American Bar Association. 20 (4): 509–524. JSTOR 40708628.
• "Legal Writings of Quintin Johnstone" (PDF). Yale Law Journal. 95 (2): 215–217. 1985. ISSN 0044-0094. JSTOR 796351.
• Pipkin, Ronald M. (September 1987). "Review of Paralegals: Progress and Prospects of a Satellite Occupation. by Quintin Johnstone, Martin Wenglinsky". Social Forces. 66 (1): 285–286. doi:10.2307/2578920. JSTOR 2578920.
• Paul, James C. N. (2008). ""In The Beginning": Reflections on the Early Years of the Addis Law School". Journal of Ethiopian Law. 22 (1): 145–153.