Justin Simard
Assistant Professor of Law
Justin Simard’s research studies the modern citation of slavery by American judges and lawyers.
Get in touchBiography
Justin Simard is an assistant professor at MSU College of Law, where he teaches Professional Responsibility, Legal History, and Commercial Law. Prior to joining the faculty at MSU Law, he taught at Willamette University College of Law in Salem, Oregon.
Professor Simard received his bachelor’s degree in History from Rice University, and he completed his Juris Doctor and Ph.D. programs at the University of Pennsylvania. With his background, he aims to bring a new perspective to legal education as
...
a historian, presenting the big picture view of concepts taught in his courses.
He has a natural enthusiasm for teaching, motivated in part by his own experiences as a student and knowing the impact of a passionate professor firsthand. He believes in helping students to find where they fit in law and is inspired by the moments when they truly understand and appreciate challenging concepts and legal skills.
Professor Simard’s research studies the modern citation of slavery by American judges and lawyers today and recognizes the profession’s history of legitimizing slavery through commercial practice. He has written and presented extensively on the topic, and his research can be found on his website.
Education
University of Pennsylvania: Ph.D., History | 2016
University of Pennsylvania: J.D., | 2011
Rice University: B.A., History | 2006
Selected Press
Judges still cite cases in which enslaved people are property
Futurity | 2023-06-15
“One of the most surprising things I’ve found is how extensively these cases are cited for so many different reasons,” Simard says. “There’s just so many areas of law—criminal law, property law, criminal procedure—all because in the 19th century, there were so many slave cases. And this is such an important formative era in making American law that just basic ground rules are established in that time. In just about any legal issue you can think of, cases of enslaved people are cited.”
Slave cases are still cited as good law across the U.S. This team aims to change that
NPR | 2023-06-14
Justin Simard, an assistant professor at Michigan State University's College of Law, estimates there are about 11,000 such cases out there — and about one million more that use them to back up their arguments.
"I've done some analysis just with a sample of cases and concluded that 18% of all published American cases are within two steps of a slave case, so they either cite the slave case or cite a case that cites a slave case," Simard tells NPR. "The influence is really, really extensive."
How the legal system continues to treat once-enslaved people as property
Michigan State University | 2023-06-14
“What I thought would be a footnote in my dissertation highlighting the odd decisions of a few judges turned into a broader examination of the legal profession’s treatment of slave cases,” said Simard, assistant professor of law. “Not only are we ratifying their treatment as property in the past but also continuing to treat them as property in the present.”
Fighting racial bias with an unlikely weapon: Footnotes
The Washington Post | 2022-01-18
Justin Simard, a law professor and legal historian at Michigan State University — Henderson’s alma mater — has been fighting bias with an unlikely weapon: footnotes. Director of the Citing Slavery Project, Simard is building a database of cases involving enslaved people and modern cases that cite them as a precedent. He even got the editors of the Bluebook — the legal profession’s arcane but rigorously adhered-to citation bible — to change its rules in its 2021 edition, requiring cases involving slavery to be identified.
