© The contents of this finding aid are the copyright of the University of Chicago Library
© 2004 University of Chicago Library
Material in Series IX is restricted. Subseries 1 and 2 are restricted indefinitely; Subseries 3, 4 and 5 will be open for research in 2046.
When quoting material from this collection, the preferred citation is: Edward H. Levi. Papers, [Box #, Folder #], Hanna Holborn Gray Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library
Edward Hirsch Levi was born on June 26, 1911 in Chicago, Illinois, to Gerson Levi and Elsa Hirsch. Levi's lifelong affiliation with the University of Chicago began with his enrollment as a kindergartener in the University's Laboratory Schools, from which he graduated in 1928. He went on to receive a PhB in English from the University in 1932 and a J.D. from its Law School in 1935.
Levi left Chicago briefly for Yale University, where he was named a Sterling Fellow in 1935 and received a J.S.D. in 1938. He first joined the University of Chicago Law School faculty as Assistant Professor in 1936, teaching and performing duties in the Law Library.
Levi's election of a career in the law was a break with longstanding Levi and Hirsch family traditions of rabbinical service. His father was rabbi of Chicago's Temple Israel; among his maternal ancestors were grandfather Emil Gustave Hirsch and great-grandfather David Einhorn, both major leaders of American Reform Judaism. Hirsch was an associate of William Rainey Harper and a member of the early University of Chicago faculty.
The Second World War again drew Levi away from Chicago. From 1940 to 1945, he served in the U. S. Department of Justice, first joining the Antitrust Division as Special Assistant to Attorney General Francis Biddle. He headed the Consent Decree Section and later the Economic Warfare Section in the newly-created War Division. In the latter position, he led research into German industry for the development of strategic bombing plans. In March, 1944, Levi was appointed First Assistant to Wendell Berge, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Antitrust Division. Levi left Washington in the fall of 1945, but continued his public service in the following years, serving as an Advisor to the Federation of Atomic Scientists in 1945 and as Counsel to the Subcommittee on Monopoly Power of the U. S. House Judiciary Committee in 1950. He had been admitted to the bar of the Supreme Court while at the Justice Department, and argued the Frankfort Distilleries price-fixing case in 1945. After returning to Chicago, he was appointed by the Court to represent indigent Illinois petitioners in two habeas corpus cases.
Upon his return to Chicago, Levi was named Professor of Law. He taught courses in both his specialties of antitrust and commercial law and in basic jurisprudence. Levi first taught "Elements of the Law" to first year law students in 1939. He offered the course regularly, with continued refinements of lectures and materials, until his retirement five decades later. In the 1950s and 1960s, Levi and economist Aaron Director taught the "Law of Competition and Monopoly," a course that was innovative in its linkage of law and economics and representative of Levi's interest in interdisciplinary studies for legal education.
In 1949, Levi was named dean of the University of Chicago Law School. His administration was devoted to the academic and physical growth of the school. Among the faculty joining the Law School under Levi were Soia Mentschikoff, Karl Llewellyn, Nicholas Katzenbach and Allison Dunham. The student body also became larger and academically stronger in the 1950s.
Dean Levi strongly supported legal research and scholarship. The Journal of Law and Economics and the Supreme Court Review were both founded at the Law School during his tenure. He supported, and later defended before a congressional committee, Harry Kalven and Hans Zeisel's pioneering but controversial research on jury deliberations. He wrote and spoke, for both local and national audiences, on the nature and challenges of legal education and worked with the American Bar Association and American Law Foundation, both based in Hyde Park, in close proximity to the Law School. Levi's deanship also saw the opening of the Mandel Legal Aid Clinic, one of the nation's first, in 1957. Levi's most widely recognized achievement as Dean was probably the successful campaign to fund and build a new home for the Law School, the Laird Bell Law Quadrangle, designed by Eero Saarinen and completed in 1959.
In 1962, Levi entered University administration in the newly-created position of Provost. His term as Provost coincided with the Presidency of George Beadle; he is generally agreed to have had a major role in University leadership during those years. Among the many challenges facing the Beadle administration was the need to maintain the quality of University faculty and facilities in the face of local urban decay and competition from other institutions. One response was a major fundraising campaign in which Levi played a central role. From 1964 to 1965, Levi also served as acting dean of the undergraduate college. He was largely responsible for implementation of the five Collegiate Divisions and the Common Core program.
In 1968, Levi succeeded the retiring George Beadle, becoming the first Jewish president of a major American university. As University of Chicago President, Levi became a nationally recognized authority on higher education. He wrote and spoke often on the subject and served on President Nixon's Task Force on Higher Education. He also continued efforts to bring vigor and stability to the University and the surrounding community. Major building projects were begun or continued under President Levi, including Regenstein Library and new laboratories and teaching facilities for medicine and the sciences.
Levi's administration gained national attention for its response to student protests, particularly the February, 1969 student occupation of the administration building in response to the denial of tenure to professor Marlene Dixon. Levi and his administration and staff moved their work offsite for the two-week duration of the protests. Many protesters were then expelled or suspended. The measured nature of Levi's initial response, the reliance on university rules and disciplinary bodies and the severity of the punishments were the subject of widespread comment.
In 1975, Levi left Chicago to become Attorney General of the United States in the new administration of Gerald Ford. His appointment was widely seen as a move towards restoring public confidence in the Department of Justice in the wake of the scandals of the Nixon presidency. In this regard, Levi implemented rules regarding FBI investigations of private citizens and the activities of government intelligence agents and an ethics code for government lawyers. Other issues facing the Justice Department under Levi included school busing, gun control and affirmative action.
Upon leaving the Justice Department in early 1977, Levi completed a Chubb fellowship at Yale and the Phleger Professorship at Stanford University. He then returned to the faculty of the University of Chicago, where he taught, in both the College and the Law School, until his retirement in 1984. In 1986, Levi was named to a two-year term as President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He remained active in the Academy and many other organizations until the early 1990s.
Levi married Kate Sulzberger in 1946. They had three sons, John, David and Michael. Edward H. Levi died in Chicago on March 7, 2000.
The Edward H. Levi Papers have been divided into nine series: Series I, Biographical and Personal Files; Series II, Correspondence; Series III, General and Subject Files; Series IV, University of Chicago; Series V, Department of Justice; Series VI, Organizations; Series VII, Speeches and Writings; Series VIII, Clippings and Audio/Visual Materials and Series IX, Restricted Files. The collection spans the years 1894 to 1998, with the bulk of the material dating from 1936 to 1992. It contains correspondence, manuscripts, notes, published materials, newspaper and magazine clippings, photographs, certificates and plaques, academic regalia and one audio tape.
The Levi Papers primarily reflect Levi's professional life as a teacher, lawyer and administrator. Series I, Biographical and Personal Files, includes a small amount of personal material, including some family correspondence. The correspondence in Series II also sheds some light on Levi's personal and family life, and on the interaction between his private life and career.
Series II, Correspondence, includes both incoming and outgoing correspondence spanning Levi's career and retirement. Outgoing letters tend to be quite brief, incoming correspondence is often more revealing. Levi often prepared tributes or memorial addresses for colleagues and researched the careers of those with whom he was scheduled to meet or work. As a result, his files often contain biographical notes or photocopied documents about his correspondents. Material in the correspondence files often supplements, and sometimes duplicates, items in other series, particularly Series IV and VI. Notable correspondents include Robert M. Hutchins, William Benton, Saul Bellow, Mortimer Adler, Richard A. Posner, William O. Douglas, Antonin Scalia and Gerald Ford.
Series IV, University of Chicago and Series V, Department of Justice, contain limited information about Levi's duties in university administration and in government. The files are much more revealing about the personal contacts and social obligations associated with his professional positions. Series V, Subseries 1, Department of Justice, 1940-1945 is among the richest segments of the collection for understanding the development of Levi's early career.
The collection contains an incomplete, but representative, selection of teaching materials used by Levi. In addition to the casebooks, notes and student exams and papers in Series IV, Series III, General and Subject Files, contains files of notes on topics and writings in the law that were probably used by Levi as he lectured and wrote.
Almost half of the materials in the Levi Papers falls into Series VI, Organizations, which documents Levi's involvement with more than 130 professional, academic, social and public service groups. The organizations' files typically include memoranda to members, publications and materials distributed for meetings. Correspondence to or from Levi or other documentation of his activities forms a smaller part of most files. Among the organizations best represented are the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Bar Association, the American Law Institute, the American Philosophical Society, the Aspen Institute and the Salzburg Seminar on American Studies.
Series VII, Speeches and Writings, is a particularly rich series and documents the development of Levi's career. It includes articles on jurisprudence and antitrust law from the 1930s and 1940s, establishing his reputation as a legal scholar, speeches and papers on legal education and higher education from the 1950s through the 1970s and addresses on law and government delivered after his service as Attorney General.
Series VIII, Audio/Visual Items, contains material in a variety of formats, ranging from newspaper clippings to plaques and certificates to academic regalia.
Series IX contains files for which access is restricted. Grades, letters of recommendation and other student records have been restricted in compliance with University of Chicago policies, as have confidential records of University finances, personnel and governing bodies. Also restricted are records of several organizations on whose boards Levi served.
Series I covers the years 1894-1996, with the bulk of the material dating from 1941 to 1994. It includes several files of basic biographical data on Edward H. Levi, mostly in the form of press releases or submissions to biographical publications. A small amount of correspondence and biographical material relates to Levi's immediate and extended family. The files on his great grandfather, Rabbi David Einhorn contain only correspondence regarding Einhorn family genealogy and photocopied publications. Also in Series I are honors and awards, primarily honorary degrees, presented to Levi by organizations and universities. These files include certificates and diplomas and associated documents and correspondence. Other awards may be found in Series IX: Audio/Visual materials. Both the small file of personal correspondence from the 1940s and a file of itineraries, 1967 to 1990, document mostly incidental matters, such as vacation travel. Another file contains correspondence and articles related to community response to President Richard Nixon's rumored consideration of Levi for nomination to the Supreme Court. A file on the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools primarily documents Levi's receipt of the Distinguished Alumni Award in 1990.
Series II contains incoming and outgoing correspondence from 1936 to 1998. The bulk dates from 1961 to 1992, though there is a notable body of correspondence dated 1936 to 1939. Series II is subdivided into two subseries: 1. Business Correspondence, 1947 to 1997 and 2. General Correspondence, 1936 to 1998.
Most personal and professional correspondence from the years in which Levi was employed by the Department of Justice and living in Washington, DC, 1940 to 1945 and 1975 to 1977 are in Series V. Some items from these years remain in Series II. Lists of correspondents in both series should be consulted. Family correspondence is in Series I.
Subseries 1: Business Correspondence contains primarily brief outgoing correspondence or letters to Levi from members of the public. The group chronological correspondence consists mostly of short notes from Levi and his staff, often in reply to invitations or other requests.
Subseries 2: General Correspondence includes both personal and professional correspondence, though mostly the latter. It is arranged alphabetically, by the names of correspondents. Levi retained carbons and photocopies of much of his outgoing correspondence, which tended towards brevity. A small number of draft letters are included.
Levi sometimes filed letters discussing a third person under the subject's name, rather than that of his correspondent. Also, he occasionally intermingled notes, drafts of memorial addresses or other biographical materials with his correspondence. Cases in which a significant amount of material is about, rather than to or from the person listed are identified in the list of correspondents.
Levi corresponded frequently with other prominent University of Chicago leaders. His letters to Robert M. Hutchins date to his early years on the faculty, while discussions with George Beadle and William Benton reveal University affairs in the 1960s. Similarly, his involvement with Law School affairs included correspondence with Wilber G. Katz, Gerhard Casper, Harry Kalven, Phillip Kurland, Soia Mentschikoff and Hans Zeisel. Correspondence with Walter Blum and Bernard Meltzer reveals long personal and professional relationships.
Other University of Chicago faculty notable among Levi's correspondents, both during and after their tenure at the University, include economist George J. Stigler, Martin E. Marty of the Divinity School and writers and professors Saul Bellow and Norman Maclean. Levi's correspondence with Mortimer Adler is fairly brief, and appears to be incomplete, but suggests a long relationship and mutual admiration.
Levi also communicated regularly with leaders of other universities in the United States and abroad. Particularly frequent correspondents include Leon Botstein of Bard College, Dallin Oaks, a law school professor who became President of Brigham Young University, the Reverend Theodore M. Hesburgh of the University of Notre Dame and Paul D. Carrington and Terry Sanford of Duke University.
Notable correspondents in the field of jurisprudence, many of who were University of Chicago Law School graduates or faculty, include Thurman Arnold, Supreme Court Justices William O. Douglas, Hugo L. Black, Abe Fortas, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., John Paul Stevens and Antonin Scalia, and Judges Richard A. Posner and Mark L. Wolf. Both Scalia and Wolf served under Levi at the Department of Justice and retained strong ties with the Attorney General in their later careers.
Among many other correspondents of note are scholar John Hope Franklin, Washington Post publisher Katherine Graham, advice columnist Eppie Lederer [Ann Landers] and New York Times columnist Anthony Lewis. Levi maintained regular contact with Gerald Ford after his service in the President's administration. Ford's files include personal letters, mailings from the Ford Presidential Library and the Gerald Ford Foundation and notification of events.
Levi often received papers or draft articles. Correspondents whose files include notable attached texts include Saul Bellow, Stephen J. Burton, Frank Easterbrook, Jamie Kalven, Vincent L. McKusick, Roger Michener, Norval Morris, Richard A. Posner, Edward Shils, Kenneth S. Tollett and Myron W. Watkins. Also notable is correspondence with Geoffrey Kabaservice, who conducted an oral history interview with Levi as part of Yale University's [Alfred Whitney] Griswold - [Kingman] Brewster History Project. A draft transcript of the interview, in which Levi discusses his career as a lawyer, teacher and administrator and his ties to Yale University, is attached.
Series III contains files on a wide array of subjects falling outside the scope of other series in the Edward H. Levi Papers. It is subdivided into three subseries: 1. General Files, 1942-1994, 2. Subject file, 1937-1954, 3. Subject File, 1951, 1964-1991.
Subseries 1, General files, contains materials dated 1942 to 1994 with the bulk dated 1978 to 1991. It includes small files on Levi's 1946 nomination to the Atomic Energy Commission and his service in the 1950s as counsel to the U. S. House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Monopoly Power. Several files relate to Levi's 1987 testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee in favor of friend and former Department of Justice colleague Robert H. Bork's nomination to the Supreme Court. In 1988, Levi joined with several noted lawyers and legal scholars and 184 members of Congress to file a brief as amici curiae in Patterson v. McLean, a civil rights case heard by the Supreme Court. Correspondence and draft briefs are included in subseries 1. Also in the general files are materials documenting visiting professorships or fellowships held by Levi at Stanford University, Yale University and the University of Colorado and well as a Cambridge University visiting professorship that Levi was forced to decline upon his appointment as Attorney General. Subseries 1 also includes several manuscripts and reprints of writings by others. Writings with attached notes or correspondence have been identified in the folder list.
The subject files in subseries 2 and 3 contain notes made and documents collected by Levi on a wide range of legal subjects. Most files are quite brief. While the items in both subseries are mostly undated, papers in subseries 2 appear to date from the late 1930s through the early 1950s and those in subseries 3 from the late 1970s and the 1980s. Older items in subseries 3 were probably moved from earlier files during subject research. Most items in the subject files were clearly used in the preparation of lectures, articles and course materials, but they have not been linked to specific courses or publications.
Series IV spans most of Levi's professional tenure at the University of Chicago, barring his earliest years on the faculty. It is divided into five subseries:
1. General files, 1939-1996, 2. Law School, 1939-1994, 3. Provost, 1962-1968, 4. President, 1967-1975 and 5. Course materials, 1937-1994. Each subseries is arranged alphabetically.
Subseries 1, General files, 1939-1996, primarily contains papers from Levi's later years at the University, following his return from Washington and Stanford in 1978. Many files contain correspondence or publications distributed widely among faculty or other members of the university community. A small amount of material dates from earlier portions of Levi's career, most notably two files on the Committee of the Faculty on Legislative Investigations, which was headed by Levi and paralleled by a committee of University trustees. The committee was formed in 1953 to consider University of Chicago responses to Congressional investigations into the political activities of faculty and students. Levi's files include correspondence, draft committee statements and transcripts of Senate testimony by several members of the University community. The file "University of Chicago items, 1968-1978" contains a range of documents collected by Levi under that heading, including a draft of his 1968 inaugural statement, items related to student protests in 1969, memoranda on the development of an Ambulatory Care Center in 1974 and a copy of a 1978 affirmative action agreement.
Subseries 2, Law School, 1939-1994, contains material related to Levi's work at the University of Chicago Law School. A series of chronological files, 1977 to 1989, includes a variety of material, particularly correspondence and departmental memoranda. A subject file of mimeographed items provides a snapshot of day-to-day concerns of the Law School under Levi's administration, while a small number of faculty memoranda and minutes do the same for the years 1936 to 1940. Several files concern a legal research program begun in the Law School in 1946. Development of the program involved the solicitation of University support and the hiring of faculty members E. Houston Harsha, W. Robert Ming, Jr. and William H. Speck. Levi appears to have played a significant role in the creation of the research program. Among its activities in the 1940s were studies of post-war housing shortages and the work of the Illinois Supreme Court. Subseries 2 contains correspondence documenting the development of the research program and notes and papers related to its projects and studies. A small amount of correspondence discusses the "Jury Project," the pioneering but controversial Law School research project for which Levi found funding and provided defense before a Congressional committee in 1956. Information on Levi's early years on the Law School faculty may also be found in Series V, Subseries 1: Department of Justice, 1940 to 1945, particularly in his correspondence with Law School deans Wilber Katz and Sheldon Tefft. Further information on the legal research program may be found in the Law School files in the Presidents Papers, 1945-1950 and Presidents Papers, 1940-1946.
Subseries 3, Provost, 1962-1968 and Subseries 4, President, 1967-1975, contain small amounts of material from Levi's tenure as Provost (1962 to 1968) and President (1968 to 1975.) Further information on Levi's administration of the University of Chicago may be found in his correspondence from the period (Series II,) in his writings (Series VII) and in the numerous articles collected in his clippings files (Series VIII).
Subseries 5, Course Materials, 1937-1994, includes material pertaining to courses taught by Levi at the University of Chicago. The vast majority of papers in this subseries are notes or manuscripts for casebooks of student readings. Other items include lecture notes, student papers, class lists and correspondence. Levi taught the basic law course "Elements of the Law" throughout his tenure at the law school; materials for many sessions of the course, from its inception in 1937 to Levi's retirement in 1984 may be found here. In 1981, Levi began editing the Elements casebook for publication by Little, Brown. Files for 1981 to 1984 show evidence of this never-completed project. After returning to Chicago in 1978, Levi taught several courses in the College's program in Politics, Economics, Rhetoric and Law (PERL.) Files on PERL courses contain mostly reading materials and notes; many contain materials drawn from files for "Elements of the Law." Records for "Law of Competition and Monopoly," taught regularly by Levi in the 1950s and 1960s, include correspondence suggesting that Levi collaborated in 1958 on development of the course's casebook with Professor Harlan Blake, a University of Chicago graduate who taught at the University of Minnesota and Columbia University. Material containing grades or other records of individual students has been removed from this file and placed in Series IX: Restricted.
Series V documents Levi's service at the U. S. Department of Justice, in several positions during World War II and as Attorney General under President Gerald Ford. It is subdivided into three subseries, 1. Department of Justice, 1940-1945, 2. Attorney General, 1975-1977 and 3. Post-Attorney General, 1975-1996.
Papers produced by Levi in the course of Justice Department service were generally retained as public records by the federal government. They may be found in the collections of the National Archives (www.nara.gov) and the Gerald Ford Presidential Library (http://www.ford.utexas.edu) and in the records of the Department of Justice. Items in the Levi Papers contain only a limited amount of information about his official government duties and decisions; they are more relevatory of social obligations and interpersonal contacts associated with his professional positions.
Subseries 1, Department of Justice, 1940-1945, consists of materials compiled by Levi during his wartime service at the Department of Justice. Levi joined the Antitrust Division of the Department in 1940 as Special Assistant to Attorney General Francis Biddle. He served as chief of the Consent Decree Section and later as head of the Economic Warfare Section in the newly created War Division. In March, 1944, Levi was appointed First Assistant to Wendell Berge, Assistant Attorney General in charge of the Antitrust Division. He remained in this position until returning to Chicago in the fall of 1945.
Subseries 1 includes both materials directly linked to Levi's government duties and correspondence with family, friends, colleagues and offices and personnel of the University of Chicago. The papers provide a snapshot of a stage in Levi's early career, documenting the influence he had gained in his first years on the University of Chicago faculty and showing him building a network of contacts among scholars and public officials.
As an official in wartime Washington, DC, Levi was often contacted with requests for personal and professional assistance on issues ranging from law school admission to immigration to government employment. With the exception of Series VII: Speeches and Writings, Subseries 1 is perhaps the richest segment of Levi's papers on his work as a lawyer and legal scholar. In addition to those discussed below, prolific correspondents included Bennett Boskey, Walter Blum, Hazel Buchbinder, Philip Glick and Fowler Hamilton.
Levi retained strong ties to the University during his years in Washington, DC. He corresponded often with the deans of the Law School, first Wilber Katz, then Sheldon Tefft. Katz, Levi's most frequent correspondent, sought his opinion on matters of instruction and personnel and solicited Levi's assistance in the arrangement of his own admission to the bar of the Supreme Court. A letter dated May 11, 1945 presents Levi's interest in bringing to the Law School faculty suitable for a study of the "significant conduct of business enterprise," a plan soon realized in the development of the Law School's legal research program. (See Series IV, Subseries 1)
Correspondence between Levi and University President Robert M. Hutchins was brief but frequent and often discussed Law School affairs and the search for "good men" for the University faculty. Subseries 1 also includes Levi's 1943-1945 correspondence with University Vice-President William Benton, as well as carbons of Benton's correspondence with others. The letters primarily concern the "University of Chicago Roundtable" radio program and also reflect Benton's strong general interest in radio broadcasting and subscription radio. Other University of Chicago officials with whom Levi corresponded frequently include Dean of the Humanities, Richard McKeon and Assistant to the President Reuben Frodin.
Levi also maintained contact with Chicago economist Henry C. Simons, who served as an economic consultant to the Justice Department. Some details of Simons' work may be found in correspondence between Levi and Thurman Arnold.
Although the most significant documentation of Levi's wartime work remains in federal government records, the correspondence files do contain some memos and letters exchanged by Levi and his Justice colleagues. Correspondence with Attorney General Francis Biddle includes details of Levi's appointments and work on the issue of wartime cartels and a small number of personal exchanges. Levi's exchanges with Assistant Attorney General and later appellate court judge Thurman Arnold reveal both departmental operations and the development of a strong relationship begun as Arnold's student in the Yale School of Law. Correspondence between Levi and Assistant Attorney Generals Hugh Cox and Tom Clark is limited.
Among other Subseries 1 papers, drafts of a speech "Cartels on International Trade," written by Levi for Biddle, provide an example of his departmental work. Several files of "statements by others" include transcripts of speeches, public statements and testimony given by Justice Department staff other than Levi. The largest number are from Wendell Berge; Thurman Arnold, Francis Biddle and Joseph Borkin also appear frequently.
Subseries 2, Attorney General, 1975-1977, also comprises both professional and personal materials compiled during Levi's service at the Justice Department, as Attorney General from February 1975 to January 1977. The correspondence files contain mostly items of a personal nature, including contact with friends and colleagues. Levi's outgoing correspondence tends to be quite brief. Letters from government figures, including President Gerald Ford and F.B.I. Director Clarence Kelley are largely personal. Levi corresponded frequently with University of Chicago officials, faculty and trustees, but was careful to separate himself from University governance and fundraising.
Several files contain logs and datebooks noting Levi's private appointments and public activities. Among many other items reflecting on the quotidian affairs of a high-ranking government official are files of invitations, correspondence regarding honorary positions offered the Attorney General and records of visits to universities and organizations.
Levi did retain copies of some documents related to notable moments and issues from his tenure as Attorney General. For example, the files include notes and memoranda on school busing, executive privilege, selection of important Justice personnel, communication with the White House and provisions for his own security. Levi's efforts to ensure that all items with which he returned to Chicago were officially sanctioned by the Justice Department are documented in a folder labeled "Files released and retained by the Justice Department..., 1977."
Subseries 3, Post-Attorney General, 1975-1996, contains papers compiled by Levi after his service as Attorney General but related to his time in that position. It includes correspondence reflecting on issues such as the development of new F.B.I. guidelines and records of conferences discussing the role of the Attorney General and the record of the Ford administration. The largest part of the subseries are files on litigation in which Levi was involved, sometimes as an individually named defendant, because of actions taken by the Justice Department under his leadership. The litigations files contain copies of court documents and correspondence to Levi from his attorney Bennett Boskey.
Series VI documents Levi's strong involvement in professional, social and public service organizations. It is subdivided into four subseries: 1. American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1963-1995, 2. American Bar Association, 1951-1995,
3. American Law Institute,1955-1996 and 4. Other Organizations, 1936-1996.
Subseries 1 documents Levi's membership in and leadership of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Levi was elected a fellow of the Academy in 1962 and served as President from 1986 to 1989. Material predating his presidency is limited to a small quantity of correspondence and publications.
Files from Levi's presidency are extensive and provide good documentation of the Academy's operations and his own activities.
Among the major concerns of the Academy during Levi's tenure were the need for a larger and more geographically diverse membership and for stabilization of Academy funding. The first concern is reflected in the files of the Western and Midwestern Centers, the second in files on the Budget Committee, fundraising and foundation funding of Academy projects.
Academy projects well-represented in Levi's papers include: a five-volume study of worldwide religious, social and cultural fundamentalism, directed by Martin E. Marty of the University of Chicago; the Academy's role as the U. S. member organization of the International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA); development of the Corporate Council on the Liberal Arts, to study the contributions of liberal arts education to effective corporate leadership; and the Committee on International Security Studies (CISS) which published studies on arms control and defense policy and oversaw the Pugwash Conference on Science and World Affairs.
Notable names in Levi's Academy correspondence files include Herman Feshbach and Leo Beranek, his predecessor and successor as President, Joel Orlen and John Voss, Executive Officers of the Academy, Franklin Long, chair of the CISS and Harvey Brooks, who was particularly active in dealing with the IIASA.
Several files titled "Notes and drafts" document extensive research by Levi into the history and operations of the Academy. The purpose of the files is not certain, but they may have been used to support the writing of the annual Presidential Reports.
Subseries 2, American Bar Association, 1951-1995, documents Levi's participation in the professional organization from 1951 through the early 1990s. The subseries mainly includes reports, correspondence and meeting materials from the committees and other subgroups on which Levi served. These groups reflect the range of Levi's professional interests, from antitrust law to legal education to the place of the law in civic life and national security. Notable among them are the Anitrust Section, which he chaired in the 1950s, the Commission on Undergraduate Education in the Law and Humanities, chaired by Levi from 1978 to 1983, the Task Force and Consulting Panel on Advanced Judicial and Legal Education (1974-1981) and the Standing Committee on Law and National Security, to which Levi was named a "counselor" in 1977. The A.B.A. was based in Hyde Park, in offices approximate to the University of Chicago Law School, until the mid-1980s.
Subseries 3, American Law Institute, includes information on the organization's legal research and scholarship from 1955 to 1996. Levi became a member of the A.L.I. in 1951 and served on its Council from 1965 until the mid 1980s. The A.L.I. is dedicated to the "clarification and simplification of the law." It publishes "restatements" of the law and advocates legal reform. Much of Subseries 3 consists of drafts of these restatements and other publications, distributed to Council members for review in advance of meetings. The drafts contain limited notes and annotation by Levi. Other materials include correspondence to Councilors and documents from a joint A.L.I. - A.B.A. committee on continuing professional education for lawyers.
Subseries 4, Other Organizations, contains records of 130 groups with which Levi was involved from 1936 to 1996. It includes professional, scholarly, philanthropic, social, cultural and commercial bodies, reflecting both Levi's interests and his leadership in law, scholarship and public service.
The organizations' files typically include correspondence to members, publications and materials distributed for meetings. A small amount of correspondence to or from Levi, notes or other documentation of his activities may be found in many folders.
Files for a few organizations are particularly valuable for assessing Levi's activities. He served on several committees of the American Bar Foundation, a professional and research organization then based in Hyde Park, from 1957 to 1964. He became a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1978 and President in 1991; files document both his presidency and his chairmanship of the Henry M. Phillips Prize in Jurisprudence Award Committee in the 1980s.
During his years as a university leader in the 1960s and 1970s, Levi was particularly active in educational groups, including the Council on Legal Education for Professional Responsibility, which he chaired in the early 1970s, the Task Force on Education and Law of the group Education and World Affairs, chaired by Levi, 1965-1967, and the White House Task Force on Education, of which he was a member in 1966 and 1967.
Levi was also involved with groups designed to address social issues or influence public policy. He served on the board of the Urban Institute from 1968 to 1975, on the Sloan Commission on Cable Communications, 1970-1971 and on the National Commission on Productivity and Work Quality, 1970-1974. Following his Attorney Generalship, he was appointed to bodies such as the Martin Luther King, Jr. Federal Holiday Commission and appeared in noteworthy public forums such as the Salzburg Seminar on American Studies, to which he presented "Three Talks on American Jurisprudence" in 1980.
Other notable organizations well-documented in Levi's papers include the Aspen Institute on whose board he served in the 1970s and 1980s; the William Benton Foundation, with which he was involved from its founding in 1981; the National Humanities Center, where he was trustee from 1978 to 1984 and the Emergency Committee to Save Habeas Corpus.
Levi suspended participation or membership in many groups during his tenure as Attorney General. He largely retired from public life in 1992; material from later years rarely reflects his involvement in an organization. An exception is the National Criminal Justice Commission, whose meetings he appears to have attended in 1994 and 1995.
Levi was also a member of the Boards of Directors of the Aerospace Corporation and the MacArthur Foundation. Papers from these organizations have been placed in Series IX. These items are restricted.
Series VII: Speeches and Writings, documents articles, speeches, essays and books published or delivered by Levi from 1936 to 1992. It is subdivided into two subseries, 1. Texts, 1936-1992 and 2. Associated documents, 1958-1992.
Subseries 1, Texts, 1936-1992, includes notes, manuscripts, correspondence, publications and research materials associated with specific texts written by Levi. The files are arranged chronologically, by the date of publication or delivery.
Most of Levi's writings on legal topics were completed during the early years of his career, from 1938 to the mid-1950s. The 1940s saw the publication of articles on antitrust law, trade regulation and jurisprudence that, along with his early teaching and work at the Justice Department, established his reputation as a lawyer. Levi's classic text An Introduction to Legal Reasoning was published in the University of Chicago Law Review in 1948 and in book form a year later; it remains in print internationally and in regular use in law school classrooms.
Upon becoming Law School dean in 1950, Levi continued to write on the law itself, but also began to write and speak frequently on legal education, often appearing before university audiences and professional and legal organizations around the United States. As Provost and President of the University of Chicago, he wrote and spoke widely on higher education, for both local and national audiences. Point of View: Talks on Education, a collection of Levi's speeches, published in book form in 1969 was particularly widely distributed.
As Attorney General, Levi spoke regularly at universities and before civic and government groups, granted occasional interviews and testified before Congressional committees. Files from the years 1975 to 1977 mostly contain Justice Department releases of transcripts of Levi's speeches, interviews and testimony. Notes and drafts for a small number of speeches are included.
After his Attorney Generalship, Levi spoke occasionally on issues of law and government. A notable example is the 1977 Owen Roberts Lecture at the University of Pennsylvania, "The Jurisprudence of Foreign Electronic Surveillance." His "Three Talks on American Jurisprudence," delivered in Austria in 1980 to the Salzburg Seminar on American Studies and reprinted in several formats, are filed with other papers from the Salzburg Seminar, in Series IV: Organizations.
Most of Levi's speeches and writings from the years 1977 to 1992 are convocation addresses, memorials or tributes to deceased or retiring colleagues, or talks to University of Chicago campus and alumni groups. Levi often prepared memorial addresses and tributes by plumbing his files on his subject. Correspondence may often be found in his writings files, just as notes and other evidence of research may be found in Series II, Correspondence.
While most writings files do not seem complete, containing only partial drafts or limited notes, they still provide ample evidence of the meticulous research and extensive revision that Levi applied to projects ranging from articles in influential journals to talks before small campus groups.
Subseries 2, Associated documents, 1958-1992 includes documents such as bibliographies, correspondence with publishers and requests for book reviews that are not related to individual texts. Also included is a file of correspondence regarding the abandoned publication of the "Elements of the Law" casebook, in the early 1980s. Drafts and other information on the casebook may be found in Series IV, subseries 5, Course Materials.
Series VIII includes clippings, photographs, plaques, certificates, posters, academic regalia and other visual items, and one audiotape.
The clippings, from magazines and newspapers, are largely biographical or concern the University of Chicago. Many are related to Levi's selection and inauguration as University President or his nomination as Attorney General. A scrapbook contains clippings about Levi's career and the development of the Law School in the 1950s.
Many of the photographs were signed and presented to Levi by his colleagues at the Department of Justice and the University of Chicago, including Thurman Arnold, Hugh B. Cox, Francis Biddle and Robert M. Hutchins. Two snapshots, showing Levi with family and friends on leisure trip in 1931, were sent to Levi while Attorney General.
The plaques and certificates were presented to Levi by a range of academic, professional and service organizations. Series VIII also contains academic hoods acquired by Levi while receiving honorary degrees or performing University of Chicago and other academic duties.
Series IX contains files for which access is in some way restricted. It is divided into five subseries.
Subseries 1, Correspondence, 1963-1995, contains mostly letters of recommendation written for former students or employees of Levi or the University of Chicago.
Subseries 2, Supreme Court cases, 1946-1993, contains records of two Illinois habeas corpus cases for which Levi served as counsel.
Subseries 3, University of Chicago, 1951-1996, includes confidential communications from the Board of Trustees, University Senate and other governing bodies, letters of recommendation for Chicago Law School students or other sorts of student records and records of University budgetary matters.
Subseries 4, Organizations, 1978-1996, includes confidential communications from organizations for which Levi served as an officer or board member.
Subseries 5, MacArthur Foundation, 1978-1996, contains records of the organization for which Levi served as an early director. The subseries contains records of finances, personnel matters and grant distribution that were provided to Levi with an understanding of confidentiality.