Ingrid Brunk Wuerth has been named to the Helen Strong Curry Chair in International Law at Vanderbilt Law School.
Wuerth, a leading scholar of foreign affairs and public international law, is the inaugural holder of Vanderbilt’s first chair in international law. The Helen Strong Curry Chair was endowed in 2015 through an estate gift from Jean Curry Allen (BA’44), who earned her J.D. at Emory Law School in 1948. Her gift will also fund significant scholarships for those interested in international law. The chair is named in honor of Allen’s mother, Helen Strong Curry.
Wuerth joined Vanderbilt’s law faculty in 2007 and has directed the International Legal Studies Program since 2009. She currently sits on the board of editors of the American Journal of International Law and is a member of the American Law Institute and the State Department’s Advisory Committee on Public International Law. She was selected in 2012 as a Reporter for the Restatement (Fourth) of the Foreign Relations Law of the United States. The numerous honors and fellowships she has received include the Morehead Scholarship at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a Fulbright Senior Scholar award, the German Chancellor’s Fellowship, election to the German Society of International Law and election to the Order of the Coif at the University of Chicago, where she earned her J.D.
During her career, Wuerth’s scholarship has focused on assessing the president’s power over foreign affairs and international law, the application of international law by domestic courts, and competing visions of customary international law. Her broad intellectual interests also include the German Constitution, which she has studied as a resident scholar at Humboldt University and the Free University in Berlin. Professor Wuerth has published articles in the world’s leading peer-reviewed and student-edited law journals. She is currently working on several projects on jurisdiction and immunity, international human rights, and U.S. foreign relations law.
“Ingrid is an internationally respected scholar of foreign affairs and public international law whose influential work displays intellectual rigor and courage,” said Chris Guthrie, Dean and John Wade-Kent Syverud Professor of Law. “This chair is a fitting recognition of her many contributions to the field of international law and to Vanderbilt Law School.”
Wuerth was named to the chair in fall 2015, and her appointment was formalized at a university celebration in February. She delivered a lecture on the role of human rights in international law at VLS March 17, after which she was honored at a reception. She teaches Civil Procedure, for which she has been honored twice with the student-selected Hall-Hartman Award for Outstanding Teaching, and upper-level courses in Foreign Affairs and Public International Law and serves as the faculty adviser to the Vanderbilt Journal of Transnational Law.
