00:00:00RICHARD RUSK: Okay
BEAIRD: But I resent it to a certain extent. That fact that many people with
whom I worked in Washington, particularly from the North East, had a very
condescending view of the South, anyone associated with the South.
RICHARD RUSK: You, Lyndon Johnson, and Dean Rusk.
BEAIRD: That's right. And they didn't believe that there was any institution in
the South that was worth its salt. I had an opportunity to get to know Lindsay
Cowen when he was Associate Dean at Virginia and then later when he became Dean
at Georgia and I did through Charlie Gregory who was the Labor Professor at
Virginia, former Labor Department lawyer. And Lindsay invited me to come down in
00:01:00'65, '66 to visit Georgia. Take sabbatical from my position in government and I
did. My wife and I enjoyed it. This is the time when the Law School was just
expanding from the original Hirsch Hall and it became clear to me at that time
that Georgia presented the opportunity for me to make whatever contribution I
could to improving the quality of legal education in this region and thereby
make a lie of the notion that there's nothing worth anything in the South.
Lindsay and I--
RICHARD RUSK: I wonder if that's part of the reason my Dad came back down here.
00:02:00
BEAIRD: I think it may very well be. I happen to see the other evening a
two-hour segment on Lyndon Johnson, The One Man Show, on public broadcasting.
RICHARD RUSK: Wasn't that a tremendous film.
BEAIRD: And I think he had a lot of the same feeling. I mean it's part of the
inherent southern pride that you have when you're born and reared in the region.
Your roots go deep; you don't want to be considered the tail end. You want to do
what you can to make of the region everything that it's capable of being and I
saw the opportunity to make probably what history will show as a very minor
contribution but a contribution to establishing Georgia as one of the premier
state-assisted law schools in the country. And I seized it. And I think that
00:03:00that may be part of the reason why Dean Rusk came. He grew up in Cherokee County
and Georgia sure had a long way to go during his early years here. I grew up in
Alabama and Alabama had a long way to go. (Rusk laughs) But as part of the
Sunbelt we have an opportunity to really make a difference these days. His
contribution is much more substantial, nationally, than mine. But I think when
you start fitting the pieces together, the things that he did the things I've
been trying to do, we've all contributed to the growth and development of this
Law School which was basically why I came.
RICHARD RUSK: And that's basically why he came. Anyone else on the faculty who--
00:04:00
[break in recording]
RICHARD RUSK: --Talk to the effect that the Law School is planning to build an
addition that might house something called the Dean Rusk Center. What do you
know about this project?
BEAIRD: Well the Law School has planned for a number of years to build a
permanent Dean Rusk Center addition to the Law School. While we're proud of the
converted Waddell Hall Center, it's limited in space. It's not adjacent to the
building. We need the Center to be more accessible to law students, law faculty,
so forth. We, through the campus planning office, planned to complete the Law
00:05:00Center concept of the Law School by adding an addition to the South wing of the
building with the Rusk Center on the first floor facing the Richard Russell
Library. We contemplated building a 30,000 square foot addition, which would
house the Rusk Center, memorabilia room, a place for limited archives, another
floor of an International Law Collection. The LLM program will be housed in that
building as well as the Woodruff professor. And on the first floor
facilities--and electronic courtroom facilities for mock trial, moot court--all
00:06:00skills programs that we're trying to improve here in the Law School. Last fall I
asked several friends to see if they couldn't get planning money for that
building in this past session of the legislature. This building was not on the
interim president's list of priorities nor was it on the Regents list of
priorities. If we had to wait for that it may be many years so I asked Speaker
Murphy and Larry Walker, the Majority Leader and others to see if they couldn't
do something for us with the planning money. Carl Sanders took a very active
role in this. It's interesting that most of the people--Speaker Murphy, Carl
00:07:00Sanders, and others said they wanted to do something for Rusk, frankly, before
he got to the point to where he couldn't appreciate it. They are aware of his
sight problems and so forth.
RICHARD RUSK: The fact that my father's name is sort of attached to the project
in a sense that it would be the Dean Rusk Center--did that have much of a
bearing with these people?
BEAIRD: It was a primary consideration. They were willing to do something for
him. They're all law graduates and they wanted to do something for the Law
School but the primary consideration was they wanted to do something for Rusk to
put it in their words, "before it was too late." And they appropriated $100,000
in planning money. And for a number of years the Planning Office has been
locating this addition on the south side. Much to my surprise a month or so ago
00:08:00a North Campus Preservation Committee that had been appointed by Interim
President Stanford for some reason or another had recommended against any new
construction on the north campus. I've met with one group in connection with
this facility and I meet with another group on the seventeenth. I'm confident
that the building will be built and it will be built where we planned to build
it. It's too important to the Law School and its quality to be deterred by
minimal environmental concerns. I'm confident that if we can get the building
planned, the plans and specifications drawn that it can be funded next year. And
00:09:00one of my real regrets is that I will not be in office to fund it.
[break in recording]
RICHARD RUSK: Dean Beaird I'd like to thank you for an excellent interview.
Thanks for your participation.
[break in recording]
RICHARD RUSK: Testing, 1-2-3-4-5-4-3-2-1. Testing, Testing, Testing. Talking
right here with this recorder sitting on my knee speaking at a normal tone of
voice checking the recording capability of the tape recorder. How does my voice
sound now?