Alfred Avins (1934–1999) was an American lawyer, law professor, and dean. Born in New York City on June 29, 1934, Avins earned a bachelor's degree from City University of New York, 1954, an Ll.B from

Columbia Law School Columbia Law School (Columbia Law or CLS) is the law school of Columbia University, a private Ivy League university in New York City. Columbia Law is widely regarded as one of the most prestigious law schools in the world and has always ranked i ...

, 1956, his J.D. from the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park, Chicago, Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chic ...

and a Ph.D from the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a public collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209 and granted a royal charter by Henry III in 1231, Cambridge is the world's third oldest surviving university and one of its most pr ...

. His first book was ''The Law of AWOL'' (1957). He was best known as a staunch opponent of Civil Rights legislation; he was the author of numerous articles that criticized

anti-discrimination legislation This is a list of anti-discrimination acts (often called discrimination acts or anti-discrimination laws), which are laws designed to prevent discrimination. Australia *Anti-discrimination laws in Australia ** Age Discrimination Act 2004 **Anti ...

or sought to limit its scope. He was also the author of ''The Reconstruction Amendments' Debates: The Legislative History and Contemporary Debates in Congress on the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments'' ( Virginia Commission on Constitutional Government, 1967), which was designed to show the limited scope of the Reconstruction Amendments to support federal anti-discrimination legislation. It has proven a useful resource for some scholars looking into the history of the Reconstruction Amendments. Avins also argued in the late 1960s that the draftsmen of the 14th Amendment did not intend to nullify anti-miscegenation laws and to prohibit

school segregation School segregation is the division of people into different groups in the education system by characteristics such as race, religion, or ethnicity. See also *'' D.H. and Others v. the Czech Republic'' *School segregation in the United States *Single ...

and that thus cases such as ''

Brown v. Board of Education ''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was a landmark decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that U.S. state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the segrega ...

'' were wrongly decided and "stand[] on clay feet."https://scholarship.law.stjohns.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1721&context=tcl Avins was especially shocked and stunned by the idea that the draftsmen of the 14th Amendment would ''

sub silentio ''Sub silentio'' is a legal Latin A number of Latin terms are used in legal terminology and legal maxims. This is a partial list of these terms, which are wholly or substantially drawn from Latin. __TOC__ Common law Civil law ...

'' enact such a sweeping and transformational change as the abolition of school segregation without ever mentioning or debating this topic at all during this Amendment's Congressional ratification history. In the 1970s Avins was a co-founder of the Delaware Law School. He unsuccessfully sued Delaware Law School in the 1980s. In 1977 he founded the old District of Columbia Law School, which he moved to Alexandria in 1980, changing its name to Northern Virginia Law School. Issues of accreditation with this school also resulted in unsuccessful litigation in federal court. Alfred Avins died on May 24, 1999 in Bethesda, Maryland.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Avins, Alfred Columbia Law School alumni University of Chicago Law School alumni 1935 births 1999 deaths 20th-century American lawyers