Remembering Dean Dan
The Northeastern Law community mourns the loss of our treasured colleague and friend.
LEFT: In 2014, the law school community gathered for a glamorous gala at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum to celebrate Dan Givelber’s retirement. ABOVE RIGHT: Dan Givelber back in the day. BOTTOM RIGHT: Dan Givelber with his wife of 60 years, Fran.
Professor Dan Givelber, known as “Dean Dan,” passed away on June 25, 2023, after a brief illness. He was a pioneer in legal education — as one of the first faculty members of the re-opened Northeastern University School of Law (the school re-opened in 1968; he joined in 1969), he was a Harvard Law graduate who wanted to do things completely differently from his alma mater. With no letter grades and an emphasis on being cooperative and collaborative, Northeastern was the antithesis of the “Paper Chase” era. Many of the facets of legal education that the world takes for granted today — including clinics, co-ops/internships and recruiting women and people of color — were revolutionary (and in many circles, disdained) in the legal world of the 1960s and early 1970s when Dan was helping to put Northeastern on the map.
Dan served as dean of the law school from 1984 until 1993 and was interim dean during the 1998–1999 academic year. He taught and published primarily in the areas of criminal law, criminal procedure, evidence and torts. He was a national leader in advocating against the death penalty; he directed Northeastern Law’s Certiorari Clinic and was a founding member of the board of the New England Innocence Project.
The story of Dan’s career is the story of generational change, from his training in the ultimate “old boys” law school to helping to found, and ultimately lead as dean, one of the most progressive law schools in the nation. Northeastern Law would not be what it is today or where it is today if not for Dan Givelber’s vision and leadership.
“Dan Givelber was at the heart of what we do today, and the power of what our community of students, graduates, faculty and staff are able to accomplish in making the world a better place was built on a foundation that Dan helped lay brick by brick,” said Dean James Hackney. “He was one of our school’s greatest strategists, torchbearers and leaders. As dean, his brilliance and good humor advanced our law school, and through his support, our community was, as Dan would say with a shake of his head and hand gestures that defied gravity, ‘this special place.’”
He was one of our school’s greatest strategists, torchbearers and leaders. As dean, his brilliance and good humor advanced our law school ….”
THEN AND NOW: Dan Givelber, Steve Subrin and Judy Brown were an inseparable trio, from their early days at Northeastern (right) to their return to the law school in 2019 (inset) for a ceremony to install plaques in their honor.
Thoughts from …
Professor Emeritus Steve Subrin
In losing Dan, I have lost my best friend, second only to my wife. In addition to countless hours of talk and laughter in our offices and homes, we have run together for the equivalent of dozens of marathons.
Dan was brave. He marched in Selma and took on the enormous responsibility of representing a man on death row; in this he succeeded. He wrote brilliantly with what seemed like effortless, lucid, almost poetic prose. We laughed more than any two people I know. He was on the right side of numerous public issues, a particularly outspoken advocate of unlimited free speech. He was a brilliantly successful law school dean. That Northeastern Law is known for welcoming women, LGBTQ+ and progressive students is part of his legacy.
Dan had no doubt about what was most important in our law school. It was always the students. He absolutely loved the students. In his view the most important committee in the law school was admissions.
Northeastern Law has a distinctive personality, largely dependent on its commitment to public interest and openness. It is Dan writ large.
Thoughts from …
Professor Emerita Judy Brown
I cannot believe he is gone. We wrote together, taught together, laughed together and wept together. He was my colleague, my dean, my mentor, my lunch buddy, my friend.
This is his legacy: He built this law school. He hired great faculty. He recruited wonderful students. He was a pioneer in legal education: the Certiorari Clinic, the innovative classes, the deep commitment to public interest. He was a brilliant classroom teacher. He was an elegant writer. Dan was a passionate and tenacious advocate for the causes he believed in so deeply. Dan took a school that prided itself on being the new kid on the block and led us into adulthood with humor, with energy, with wit and wisdom and caring.
When I arrived at Northeastern, a few years after Dan, I felt a little lost. I did not know what law professors were supposed to do. So, I asked Dan. His response guided me for the next 30 years. “It’s all about the kids,” he said. “The purpose of this law school is to teach the kids how to be excellent lawyers: no more, no less.”
He was well and truly beloved.
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