John McLaren elected ASLH fellow

John McLaren, Landsdowne Professor of Law emeritus at the University of Victoria, was elected an Honorary Fellow of the American Society for Legal History. It is the highest honour conferred on a fellow ASLH historian and recognizes a lifetime of scholarly distinction and leadership in the field.

Professor emeritus McLaren was recognized at the ASLH conference in Washington, DC on October 31st. Professor Bruce Mann of the Harvard Law School had this to say at the ceremony:

"Professor McLaren’s scholarship across seventy-five articles and book chapters, eight co-edited volumes, and one monograph is impressive in its own right and amply merits electing him an Honorary Fellow of the Society.  The many co-edited volumes, together with his earlier role as a founder of the Canadian Journal of Law and Society, speak to another qualification for the honor.  Professor McLaren builds fields of scholarship.  He organizes conferences, connects scholars from different fields and disciplines, encourages younger scholars, and brings the best of their work together in edited volumes that define new sub-fields and spur new scholarship.  He did this for the then-emerging field of Canadian legal history nearly thirty years ago, as he has more recently for Australasia and the Commonwealth.  Even now, in “retirement,” he is a key organizer of “legal history of the British empire” conferences in Singapore and Ghana.  If Honorary Fellows of the Society are the scholars on whose shoulders we stand, Professor McLaren has actively lifted scores of other scholars to his shoulders as they join with him in pursuing new and invariably important questions in legal history."

Ann McLaren, John McLaren and Professor Michael Grossberg, retiring President of the ASLH.