85 / 462
g a z e t t e
april
1991
John
John Kelly's untimely death has
deprived Irish academic life in
general, and the Faculty of Law at
Un i ve r s i ty College Dublin in
particular, of a gifted and distin-
guished legal scholar whose loss
will be keenly felt by those who
knew him as a generous and
supportive colleague.
John was appointed to the Chair
of Ju r i sp r udence and Roman
Law in University College Dublin in
1965 and during his long tenure of
that office he was in the front rank
of academic lawyers in this and the
ne i ghbou r i ng island, and in
mainland Europe. Indeed, w i th
respect to his published work in
t he field of Roman Law, his
scholarly reputation knew no
geographical boundaries but was
worldwide.
Like other distinguished lawyers
of his generation he did not read
law for his primary degree but
pursued a brilliant undergraduate
career in classics, obtaining first
class honours In his final degree
examination. His Professor of Latin,
among others, hoped that he would
pursue an academic career in the
Faculty of Arts in University College
but this was not to be. He was
awarded a Travelling Studentship by
the National University in 1953
which took him to the renowned
German University of Heidelberg.
There his doctoral research which
obtained for him a Dr. Jur. was
conducted in the field of Roman
Law which was to remain one of his
abiding interests throughout his
academic life.
On his return to Ireland he
pursued his legal studies for the
Irish Bar to which he was called in
1957. It was perhaps inevitable,
however, that someone of his
ability, and w i th his interests,
should return to the academic
world which he did to Oxford
where he obtained a B. Litt. in 1960
and an M.A. in 1961. He was a
Fellow and Lecturer in Law at Trinity
College Oxford from 1961 until his
return to Dublin in 1965.
Shortly after his return to Dublin
he succeeded William Finlay as
Dean of the Faculty of Law in
University College. His tenure as
Kelly
Dean coincided w i th a policy
change in the Faculty of Law which
had been initiated by his prede-
cessor as Dean, William Finlay,
which saw part-time teachers who
were almost all distinguished
practitioners being replaced by full-
time academics. John Kelly's
reputation as a teacher and scholar
was to make University College
Dublin an attractive goal for
aspirant young academics of law.
The transition to a Law School
staffed by full-time academics took
some time however and dis-
tinguished practitioners continued
to teach in the Law School. A
measure of the quality of such
part-timers during John's period
as Dean is that three of them
became judges of the High Court
and one a judge of the Supreme
Court.
Not least of his contributions to
the Law School in University
College was his part in the acquisi-
tion of
The Irish Jurist
on the death
of its then proprietor and editor
Vincent Delany. During John's
editorship of the
Jurist
his own
standing as a Roman lawyer
enabled him to commission articles
from leading Roman lawyers in
Europe and this guaranteed the
international appeal of the
Jurist.
It
continues to enjoy the international
r epu t a t i on established during
John's editorship under its current
editor, Professor W.N. Osborough,
who worked closely wi th John in
t he early days of University
College's stewardship of the
Jurist.
It has provided law teachers in
University College and elsewhere in
this jurisdiction wi th an important
outlet for the publication of learned
articles on different aspects of Irish
law and a heavy debt is owed by
the Irish legal community to John
Kelly for his work on, and com-
mitment to, the
Jurist.
Law as an academic discipline in
Ireland had suffered because of the
dearth of indigenous legal materials
and John's seminal work
Funda-
mental Rights in the Irish Law and
Constitution,
published in 1961, set
a salutary example for Irish law
teachers to follow. His magnum
opus on the
Irish Constitution
was
first published in 1980, and is now
in its second edition. His Roman
Law publications include
Princeps
Judex
(Weimar 1957), and
Roman
Litigation
(Oxford, 1965).
He has added much more to the
corpus of Irish legal literature,
and his retirement from active
politics and return to full-time
academic life held the promise of
more books and many learned
articles. He had taken leave of
absence in the first term of the
cu r r ent academic session to
complete work on a major new
book entitled "
We s t e r n Legal
Thought
"; academic friends and
colleagues must ensure publication
of this work as a posthumous
tribute to a great Irish scholar.
He wore his own distinction
lightly and was the most congenial
and affable of men who was ever
ready to help and encourage his
junior colleagues to publish the
f r u i ts of their research. He
established an impressive rapport
with his students and was prepared
to listen to their various woes and
tribulations wi th sympathy and
understanding without sacrificing
t he
high s t anda r ds
wh i ch
characterised his academic life.
I knew John Kelly for more than
twenty years as a colleague and I
was privileged to have numbered
him among my f r i ends. The
members of the Law Faculty of
University College express their
sincere condolences to his widow,
Delphine, his son Nicholas who not
so long ago was one of our
students, and the other members
of his family.
Ar dheis Dé go raibh a anam dilis.
J.C.B.
65