A native of North Carolina, Calvin Woodard attended VMI and served in the U.S. Navy before receiving a B.A. in economics from the University of North Carolina in 1950. He earned an LL.B. from Yale University in 1953 and a Ph.D. in History from Cambridge University in 1961. From 1953 to 1955 he was in private practice in New York City with the firm of Sullivan and Cromwell. Prior to joining the faculty of UVA, he taught history and law at Yale University, among other places. He joined the Law School faculty in 1965, teaching primarily legal history and legal philosophy and was appointed the Henry L. and Grace Doherty Charitable Foundation Professor of Law, a position he held until his retirement in 1994. In 1967 he became a member of the Order of the Coif. Professor Woodard held visiting professorships at the law schools of Stanford University, Washington and Lee University, The College of William and Mary, the University of Hanover in Germany, Fudan University in Shanghai, and National Chengchi University in Taipei. He was awarded fellowships from the Fulbright Program, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the National Endowment for the Humanities for postdoctoral study in England and Germany and at Yale University. During the latter part of his career, Professor Woodard helped develop the Law School’s Graduate Program for Judges, and was a frequent lecturer for the American Bar Foundation Conferences of Appellate Judges and at seminars for judges. He died in 2004.
History, Legal History and Legal Education, 53 Va. L. Rev. 89-121 (1967).
The Limits of Legal Realism: An Historical Perspective, 54 Va. L. Rev. 689-739 (1968); reprinted in Herbert L. Packer & Thomas Ehrlich, New Directions in Legal Education 331-384 (McGraw-Hill, 1972).
Reality and Social Reform: The Transition from Laissez-Faire to the Welfare State, in Essays in Nineteenth-Century American Legal History 59-102 (Wythe Holt ed., Greenwood Press, 1976) (reprinted from 72 Yale L.J. 286-328 (1962)).
Humanists, Higher Learning and the Humanistic Concept of Man, in The American Future and the Humane Tradition: The Role of the Humanities in Higher Education 23-42 (Robert E. Hiedemann ed., Associated Faculty Press, 1982).
Justice Through Law – Historical Dimensions of the American Law School, 34 J. Legal Educ. 345-368 (1984).
Dimensions of Social and Legal Change: The Making and Remaking of the Common Law Tradition in Nineteenth-Century America, 17 New Literary Hist. 233-248 (1986).
Progress and Poverty in American Law and Legal Education, 37 Syracuse L. Rev. 795-850 (1986).
Common Law and Common-Law Legal Systems, in 2 Encyclopedia of the American Judicial System 500-516 (Robert J. Janosik ed., Scribner’s, 1987).
Historical Aspects of the American Judiciary: New World Transformations and the Common Law Judge, 3 Fla. Sup. Ct. Hist. Soc’y Rev. 1-3, 14-15 (1987).
Joseph Story and American Equity, 45 Wash. & Lee L. Rev. 623-644 (1988); also published as Commentaries on Equity Jurisprudence: Notes from the Editors (Legal Classics Library, 1988).
Thoughts on the Interplay Between Morality and Law in Modern Legal Thought, 64 Notre Dame L. Rev. 784-804 (1989).
A Wake (or Awakening?) for Historical Jurisprudence, in The Victorian Achievement of Sir Henry Maine: A Centennial Reappraisal 217-237 (Alan Diamond ed., Cambridge University Press, 1991).
Is the United States a Common Law Country?, in Essays on English Law and the American Experience 120-135 (Elisabeth A. Cawthon & David E. Narrett eds., Texas A&M University Press, 1994).
Listening to the Mockingbird, 45 Ala. L. Rev. 563-584 (1994).
Review of Miller, The Life of the Mind in America, 21 Reading Guide 12-16 (1966).
Review of Forkosch, ed., Essays in Legal History in Honor of Felix Frankfurter, 56 Ky. L.J. 500-510 (1967).
Review of Dumbauld, The Life and Legal Writings of Hugo Grotius, 25 Reading Guide 29-31 (1970).
The Effect of Historical Change on University Purpose (University of Virginia Resident Staff Program, 1976).
Reply to Richard Harvey Brown, 17 New Literary Hist. 255-257 (1986).
Toward a “Super Liberal State” (reviewing Unger, The Critical Legal Studies Movement), N.Y. Times Book Rev., Nov. 23, 1986, at 31; reprinted in L.A. Daily J., Dec. 12, 1986, at B14.
Who Writes the Laws? (reviewing Friedman, A History of American Law), N.Y. Times Book Rev., Feb. 16, 1986, at 31; reprinted in L.A. Daily J., Feb. 21, 1986, at B20.
Charles O. Gregory, 74 Va. L. Rev. 3-10 (1988).
Foreword, in William H. Harbaugh, Lawyer’s Lawyer: The Life of John W. Davis vii-xii (University Press of Virginia, 1990).
Whose Law Is It? (reviewing Posner, The Problems of Jurisprudence), N.Y. Times Book Rev., Sept. 9, 1990, at 15, 18; reprinted in Chi. Daily L. Bull., Sept. 12, 1990, at 2.
Bergin Retired – With Bases Loaded, Va. L. Wkly., Feb. 28, 1992, at S3-S4.
In Defense of Discrimination (reviewing Epstein, Forbidden Grounds), N.Y. Times Book Rev., May 3, 1992, at 36.
Tribute to Bergin, 78 Va. L. Rev. 797-803 (1992).
Speak No Evil (reviewing Fish, There’s No Such Thing as Free Speech; MacKinnon, Only Words; and Sunstein, Democracy and the Problem of Free Speech), N.Y. Times Book Rev., Jan. 2, 1994, at 11-12.
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