Thomas R. Kline, one of the nation’s most successful personal injury and medical malpractice lawyers, will have a second law school named after him, after donating $50 million to Duquesne University School of Law in Pittsburgh.
The school will change its name to the Thomas R. Kline School of Law of Duquesne University.
Kline, a graduate of Duquesne, previously donated $50 million to Drexel University in 2014 and the Philadelphia school changed its name to Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law. It was odd at the time that Kline had donated to a school other than his alma mater.
It is the second time a donor has given a naming gift to two different law schools. William P. Carey donated $30 million to University of Maryland in 2011 and that school changed its name to Francis King Carey School of Law, in honor of the donor’s father. Carey died in 2012 and in 2019 his foundation gave $125 million to University of Pennsylvania, which changed its name to University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School. Carey did not attend law school.
John Marshall, the 19th-century chief justice of the Supreme Court, previously had three law schools named after him. However, University of Illinois, Chicago School of Law dropped his name in 2021 because it said Marshall was a slave trader and owner. Cleveland State University recently announced it will also drop the Marshall name from its law school. Atlanta’s John Marshall Law School is the lone school named after the influential jurist.
Kline’s commitment to Duquesne will support student scholarships, faculty grants for excellence in teaching and scholarship, the school’s bar preparation program, new clinical offerings and other strategic priorities.
It is the single largest commitment to the school in its 144-year history. Kline had already been the largest donor to the school, with a $7.5 million gift in 2017. With the support of that gift, the school opened the Thomas R. Kline Center for Judicial Education, which assists the courts in providing continuing judicial education to judges.
“I have long been proud of my alma mater and have been happy to have played a role in strengthening its future,” Kline said in a press release. “President Ken Gormley and Dean April Barton have immediate plans to empower students and faculty to lead.”
Prior to being president of the university, Gormley was dean of the law school from 2010 to 2016. Barton became dean in 2019 after 18 years at Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law.
