Former Attorney General Edward Hirsch Levi, an emeritus member of the Institute’s Council, died on March 7 after a long illness in his home in Chicago. Mr. Levi, who also served as both President and Provost of the University of Chicago and as Dean of its Law School, was 88.

A native of Chicago, Mr. Levi was associated with the University of Chicago for most of his life, having begun his education at the kindergarten of its Laboratory School and remained at the University through Law School. After further study of law at Yale, he joined the Chicago Law School faculty in 1936. During World War II he served in Washington in the Justice Department, but he returned to Chicago as a Law Professor in 1945. Five years later he was named Dean of the Law School. A pioneer in developing interdisciplinary programs at the Law School, his decision to pair lawyers in the classroom with economists—and later with other social scientists—provided the original impetus for the development of the "law and economics school" of thought for which Chicago became famous. In 1962 Mr. Levi became Provost of the University, and in 1968 he was named President and served in that post for the next seven years.

Appointed Attorney General by President Ford in 1975, Mr. Levi won widespread acclaim for restoring a standard of integrity and impartiality at the Justice Department after the corruptions of Watergate. He rejoined the Chicago Law School faculty in 1977 and remained until his retirement in 1984. From 1985 to 1989 he was President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Mr. Levi became a member of the Institute in 1962 and was elected to the Council in 1965. He took emeritus status in 1996. His son, Judge David F. Levi of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California, is a member of the Institute and an Adviser for the ALI’s Federal Judicial Code Revision Project.