W&L’s Thomas H. Speedy Rice is Third Speaker in Mudd Lecture Series Rice's lecture, which is open to the public to view online, is titled "Cultural Norms and the Export of the W&L Honor System."

By Erica Turman
October 7, 2020

Thomas H. Speedy Rice, a professor of practice at Washington and Lee University School of Law’s Transitional Law Institute, will deliver a virtual lecture on Oct. 19 at 5 p.m. as part of Washington and Lee University’s Mudd Center for Ethics and Center for International Education’s series on Global Ethics in the 21st Century: Challenges and Opportunities.

Rice’s lecture, which is open to the public to view online, is titled “Cultural Norms and the Export of the W&L Honor System.” The public can register for the virtual event for free at http://go.wlu.edu/mudd/rice.

Rice designed and is currently teaching practicum courses globally. These courses include one assisting the Defense Support Services of the International Criminal Court and the Military Commissions at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; another with W&L’s School of Law and four other law schools in Ukraine promoting anti-corruption education using the United Nations (U.N.) Convention Against Corruption; and a third in Serbia on the European Court of Human Rights.

“Professor Rice, a beloved professor who has taught and trained our law students for years, will place W&L’s own honor system in an international context,” said Brian Murchison, director of the Mudd Center. “We are looking forward to hearing about his experience in advocating for the W&L system and the values it represents to educational institutions abroad. W&L’s impact extends farther than we knew.”

Rice is recognized worldwide for his work in international legal reforms and human rights (specifically access to legal aid in criminal matters), in the fight against the death penalty, and teaching in international legal education reform. His collaborative legal education practicums and clinics are acknowledged as academically and technologically innovative.

He has tried cases in U.S. state and federal courts and argued appellate cases before a number of American courts, including briefing and arguing before the United States Supreme Court.From 2002 to 2004, Rice was a Fulbright scholar in human rights and legal education reform to the law faculty of the University of Montenegro, Podgorica, Serbia and Montenegro. Rice has taught and lectured at numerous international schools and programs in more than 30 other countries. He was on the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime working group drafting the “U.N. Principles and Guidelines for Access to Legal Aid in Criminal Justice Systems.”

The Mudd Center was established in 2010 through a gift to the university from award-winning journalist Roger Mudd, a 1950 graduate of W&L. By facilitating collaboration across traditional institutional boundaries, the center aims to encourage a multidisciplinary perspective on ethics informed by both theory and practice. Previous Mudd Center lecture series topics have included Race and Justice in America, The Ethics of Citizenship, Markets and Morals, Equality and Difference, The Ethics of Identity and The Ethics of Technology.