A California state appeals court has ruled that the state acted lawfully when it removed Serranus Clinton Hastings’ name from the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco, rejecting claims by Hastings’ descendants and alumni that the change violated a binding contract and constitutional protections.
In a unanimous opinion authored by Justice Jeremy M. Goldman and issued Wednesday, the First Appellate District Court of Appeal upheld a lower court’s decision to dismiss the lawsuit, concluding that California’s legislature retained the sovereign authority to rename and restructure a public institution—even one established by statute in the 19th century.
Court Rejects Contract and Constitutional Claims
The plaintiffs had argued that an 1878 legislative act, which declared the school “be forever known and designated as ‘Hastings’ College of the Law,” constituted a binding contract between the state and S.C. Hastings, California’s first chief justice and a major benefactor of the law school. However, the court rejected that theory, emphasizing that the naming provision was a statutory designation, not a contractual promise.
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