Edinburgh mourns death of law professor and leading nationalist

Professor Neil MacCormick died on 5 April 2009 after serving as Regius Professor of Public Law and the Law of Nature and Nations at the University of Edinburgh for 36 years.

A profound and creative thinker on the role of law in modern society, Professor MacCormick published influential works on law, politics and morality, and on the relations between overlapping legal and political orders.

Having studied law at Oxford and Philosophy and English at Glasgow, he was appointed Regius Professor of Law at the unusually young age of 31.

During his academic career, he was twice Dean of the Law Faculty, as well as serving as Provost of the Faculty Group of Law and Social Science 1994-7, and as vice principal for international affairs, 1997-99.

Colleague Professor of law Neil Walker said: “Neil's work has been and will remain a major reference point for all the major contemporary debates on law's place in the order of things.

"He published ground-breaking studies on the special quality of legal reasoning and on the connection between the conscience of the law and the broader spheres of private ethics and public morality.”

Professor Douglas Brodie, head of the University of Edinburgh's School of Law said Prof. MacCormick “possessed a staggering intellect, great wit and a wonderful, dry sense of humour, but most of all a warmth and spirit that touched all who knew him.”

He said: "Perhaps no other contemporary scholar has influenced so many areas of legal thinking so deeply over such a long period."

Known for his innovative approaches to new ethical dilemmas and for refining his ideas to account for changes in legal and political affairs, his numerous awards provide some measure of the esteem in which he is held.

These include his fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, and of the British Academy. He was a visiting professor in Australia, Sweden and the United States and was awarded seven honorary Doctorates and foreign membership of the Finnish Academy of Sciences.

He was appointed Honorary Queens Counsel (England and Wales) in 1999, and in 2001 he received his knighthood for services to scholarship in law.

After retiring from the university in January 2009, Professor MacCormick continued a lifetime of public service as special adviser to the first minister on European and External Affairs.

Described by colleagues as “the constitutional authority behind the surge of Scottish nationalism in the late 20th century,” Professor MacCormick stood for the UK Parliament at five elections between 1979 and 1997, eventually becoming an SNP member of the European Parliament from 1999 to 2004.

There he served with distinction, as indicated by his being voted Scottish European MP of the year for three consecutive years.