Garrett Coleman '25
Executive Editor
In honor of his fortieth year on the bench, the Virginia Law Review published an online edition dedicated to Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III ’72 of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. Judge Wilkinson was appointed to the bench by President Reagan in 1984, after he had served in the U.S. Army, worked as an editor for a Virginia newspaper, taught at the Law School, and served as Deputy Assistant Attorney General.
The edition begins with a tribute from Professor John C. Jeffries ’73, who gave a sense of Judge Wilkinson as a law school professor. While teaching Miranda v. Arizona in Criminal Procedure, “Jay began to complain of the heat in the classroom and, to the growing consternation of the students, took off his jacket, then tie, then shirt, to reveal the “famous cases” tee shirt of Miranda, which encapsulated the Supreme Court’s advice for custodial interrogation: (1) call a lawyer; (2) STFU. The class roared.”[1]
Judge Wilkinson also seemed to be a natural for the judiciary. A former clerk of Judge Wilkinson and now colleague in the federal judiciary, Judge Daniel A. Bress for the Ninth Circuit had this to say: “What was immediately apparent to me when I began clerking for Judge Wilkinson was that this was a person who was most naturally at home in the medium of law.”[2] And in the same vein, he noted that Judge Wilkinson brought that knowledge and enthusiasm to every case that came before him, no matter how small.[3]
The special edition concludes in classic UVA Law fashion with an ode to civility. And Judge Wilkinson seems to have practiced that kindness well in his tenure. Another former clerk, Professor Allison Orr Larsen of William & Mary Law School, said that “Judge Wilkinson practices what he preaches” when it comes to collegiality.[4] According to Larsen, the Judge loves telling those in the legal field to “disagree agreeably.”[5] In her words, “To disagree agreeably, one must commit to creating a culture in which repeat players both act in good faith and give each other the benefit of the doubt.”[6] And Larsen saw this on full display in the many friendships Judge Wilkinson has with colleagues of other political or ideological dispositions, though this never meant that the Judge was forfeiting his own beliefs.
It is one of the many privileges of going to a law school like ours to celebrate fellow alumni who have reached the heights of a Judge Wilkinson.
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jxu6ad@virginia.edu
[1] John C. Jeffries, Jr., Jay Wilkinson as Teacher, 110 Va. L. Rev. Online 248, 248 (Sept. 2024).
[2] Daniel A. Bress, The Judge, 110 Va. L. Rev. Online 261, 262 (Sept. 2024).
[3] See id. at 266.
[4] Allison Orr Larsen, Learning to Disagree Agreeably, 110 Va. L. Rev. Online 283, 284 (Sept. 2024).
[5] Id.
[6] Id. at 285.