Our Commitment to Justice and Equality for All

The past few weeks have seen our nation struggling to come to terms with the trauma of systemic racism, brought vividly to our attention by the killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor and George Floyd, among others. These issues can sometimes feel distant to us here in our beloved Montana. But as the powerful recent op-ed of our student Jacob Elder demonstrates, racial injustice is a fact of life here, as it is across our country.

As Montana's public law school, the Blewett School of Law has an important role to play in addressing systemic racism, while moving our state and our country toward the goal of equal justice for all. That work must begin with our own community. We must ensure that every faculty member, staff member and student feels a sense of belonging in our law school. Both our physical and virtual spaces must be places in which we all feel safe and valued. We must be able to address critically the most difficult legal issues our society faces with civility and respect.

We took important steps this past year to foster an inclusive community, making changes throughout our building to celebrate the achievements of women and people of color and to acknowledge the injustices visited on Indigenous communities. With the hiring of Professor Kekek Stark to join Professor Monte Mills, we have bolstered our nationally recognized Indian Law Program. But more work needs to be done. I will be working with our newly formed Climate & Culture Advisory Group to ensure that we sustain our focus on these issues.

As teachers and scholars, our faculty have an obligation to examine legal doctrines and the structures that implement them to identify where they fall short of our ideals. Just as our students will one day, each of us has taken an oath to support the constitutions of the United States and of Montana or other states. We believe in the promise of our system of government and laws. We must challenge their failings, and in so doing, we honor their promise.

Our faculty have made a collective commitment to incorporate issues relating to Indian Law and tribal communities throughout our curriculum, as well as in our research and scholarship. That work is ongoing, and will be expanded to include issues of racial justice more broadly.

Ultimately, our primary objective is to empower our students to become the agents of change who will lead us to a better world. We do the most good not when we tell them what to think, but when we give them the knowledge, skills and values to show us the better path forward. We are already seeing our students rise to that challenge.

There is no magic formula that will address systemic racism overnight. This work requires sustained commitment over time. I am committed to fostering an academic environment at the Blewett School of Law in which people of all backgrounds feel welcome, and in which the most difficult issues our communities face can be raised, discussed, and most importantly, addressed. Too often, law and legal institutions have become instruments of inequality and oppression. Still, they remain our best hope to achieve justice for our own and future generations. I look forwarding to working with every member of our community to make sure our legal system is truly a system of justice.

Paul Kirgis

Dean and professor of Law

Alexander Blewett III School of Law

Law Professor Receives Fulbright Scholar Award to Study Indigenous Justice

Professor Jordan Gross has received a Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program award to serve as a research chair in Indigenous public policy and criminal justice at the University of Guelph, Ontario, in spring 2021.

Gross' Fulbright project is "Making Space for Indigenous Justice Norms within Colonialist Legal Structures: Criminal Procedure as a Vehicle and Boundary for Self-Determination Interests in Canada and the United States." It will consider criminal procedure rules and practices that reflect Indigenous and mainstream justice norms, identify how conflicts between imported procedures and normative assumptions are reconciled in different systems, and examine how this process is informed by different understandings of federalism and pluralism in Canada and the United States.

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Public Service Academy is Now Fully Online

The Max S. Baucus Institute's Department of Public Administration and Policy is hosting its second annual Public Service Academy. The Public Service Academy is open to any public or nonprofit sector employees looking to advance their skills in their current professions. Participants will learn from leading experts in the field in a fully online format.

Speakers include Rob Gannon (general manager, King County WA Transit), Tracy Stone-Manning (associate vice president for Public Lands at the National Wildlife Federation) and panels of public sector experts. For more information, including a detailed schedule and speaker bios, visit the Public Service Academy webpage.

Program Fee (before Eventbrite fees): General $95; University of Montana students and employees: $80

Group Rate (before Eventbrite fees): Register 10 or more attendees to receive the group rate of $65 per person.

Registration ends on July 20. Registered participants can begin accessing online modules on July 30. Live Happy Hour Q&As with speakers will take place online from 5 to 6 p.m. on Aug. 5 and 6.