McSweeney, Thomas J.

Robert E. & Elizabeth S. Scott Professor and Professor of Law

Areas of Specialization

Legal History-Early History of the Common Law, Common Law's Relationship to Civil Law, History of Lawyers; Property Law; Trusts and Estates

Representative Professional Activities and Achievements

Thomas J. McSweeney earned his B.A. from William & Mary, where he was a James Monroe Scholar. He continued his studies at Cornell University, where he earned a J.D. and a Ph.D. in medieval history. He has won a number of awards in his time at William & Mary, including the Plumeri Award for Faculty Excellence (2018), the Walter Williams Award for Excellence in Teaching (2019), the Robert and Elizabeth Scott Research Professorship (2020), the 1L Professor of the Year Award (2021), the William & Mary Alumni Association's Faculty Fellowship Award (2022), and the McGlothlin Award for Exceptional Teaching (2025).

Professor McSweeney's research focuses on the early history of the English common law. He is particularly interested in the ways the judges and lawyers of the thirteenth century taught and learned the law. His book, Priests of the Law: Roman Law and the Making of the Common Law's First Professionals (Oxford University Press 2019), which was awarded an honorable mention for the Selden Society's David Yale Prize, examines the ways in which thirteenth-century justices modelled their practices on those of the jurists of Roman law to make the case that the English common law was part of a pan-European legal culture. He is an elected member of the American Law Institute and a fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Professor McSweeney also sits on the board of directors of the Ames Foundation at Harvard Law School, which funds research in legal history, and in November of 2021 began a five-year term as an editor for Cambridge Studies in Legal History, the American Society for Legal History's book series at Cambridge University Press.

A devoted alumnus of William & Mary, Professor McSweeney has also written on the history of the college. His article "A University in 1693," co-authored with law students Katharine Ello and Elsbeth O'Brien, argues that William & Mary was awarded the status of a university in its 1693 charter, and thus has a claim to the title of oldest university in the United States.