George P Smith II

Education and Career

Born on September 1, 1939, in Wabash, Indiana, of pioneer stock, Smith's father and uncle were prominent practicing attorneys in Wabash.

Smith received his elementary education at the St. Bernard School in Wabash and graduated from Wabash High School in 1957, where he was a member of the National Honor Society. He received his B.S. degree in Business – Economics and Public Policy from Indiana University-Bloomington in 1961 and was awarded a Doctor of Jurisprudence degree, as well, from the University in 1964, and was a member of the Indiana Law Review. He went on to receive a Certificate from The Hague Academie de Droit International for his studies at the Peace Palace in The Netherlands during the summer of 1965. In 1975, Smith was awarded an LL.M. degree in law from Columbia University where he held a University Fellowship during his residency. During 1976-77, he was the Senior Commonwealth Fellow in Law, Science and Medicine at Yale Law School.

Indiana University conferred its Silver Medallion upon Smith in 1985 as a Distinguished Service Alumnus, and in 1998 an LL. D. degree, honoris causa, was conferred upon him. In 1998, a Distinguished Professorship-Chair was established in Smith’s honor at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law in Bloomington. The School of Law, again, in 2007, honored Smith by inducting him into the Indiana Academy of Law Fellows –this, in recognition of his professional contributions to the legal profession. In 2008, a Fellowship in the LL.M. program was created in his honor by the Indiana University School of Law.

Professional Contributions

Over the years, Smith's early reputation as a thoughtful scholar and lecturer has been fortified by his insightful global lectures, national and international academic appointments, his public service and teaching experiences, and his scholarship which has—in turn—both informed and guided contemporary debates on the parameters and perimeters of what has been termed the “New Biology.” He has been recognized widely for these achievements. In 1984, Smith was awarded a prestigious Australian-American Award and served as the Fulbright Visiting Professor of Law and Medical Jurisprudence at the Faculty of Law at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. Under the title of “1984: A Brave or a Confused New World?”, Smith delivered seven Fulbright Lectures throughout the Australian Continent during his Fulbright residency.

Since that initial visit to Australia, Smith has returned regularly to hold academic and research appointments in law faculties at The Australian National University, Macquarie University, Monash University, University of Queensland, University of Sydney and University of New South Wales as well as at University of Auckland and University of Otago.

Consultantships and Public Service

Pro Bono

Honors and Distinctions

In 1970, Winthrop Rockefeller, then-Governor of Arkansas, conferred an Arkansas Traveler Citation of Honor upon Smith for his distinguished accomplishments in public service in the State.

In 1974, Smith received a Citation of Merit for Distinguished Service from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C.

In 2015, then-Governor Michael R. Pence conferred the Sagamore of the Wabash Citation upon Smith for his professional lifetime achievements. That same year, he was also inducted into the Wabash High School Hall of Distinction for "outstanding accomplishments in life."

Scholarship

Smith received the Gitzler Prize for his original scholarship entitled, “Biological Determinism and Genetic Discrimination” at the Tenth World Congress on Medical Law in Jerusalem, Israel in August, 1994.

Judge Richard A. Posner, a member of the United States Court of Appeals for The Seventh Circuit and Lecturer in Law at the University of Chicago Law School, acknowledged Smith as "one of the world’s leading experts on the legal and ethical issues raised by modern medicine" and observed that "he writes with insight and authority, and offers a perspective that will influence policy debates". Dr. Edmund D. Pellegrino, John Carroll Professor Emeritus of Medicine and Medical Ethics, Georgetown University and former Chairman of the President’s Council on Bioethics, recognized Smith as "an internationally acclaimed scholar and pioneer in cultivating the interdisciplinary study of questions in which law, medical ethics and bioethics intersect." In inaugurating the George P. Smith, II, Distinguished Professorship-Chair of Law at Indiana University in January, 2000, Justice Michael D. Kirby of the High Court of Australia, paid tribute to Smith's "awesome" level of transnational scholarship in Bioethics and his "indefatigable spirit and sense of total commitment as a questioning, inquisitive mind" and proceeded to herald Smith as a "prescient prophet of the New Biology." Later in 2009, Justice Kirby hailed Smith's "commitment to universalism" and "his voracious appetite for wisdom in the exploration of legal and bioethical question... beyond the United States."

Early in his career, in 1985, the Institute for Advanced Study at Indiana University in Bloomington presented Smith with a Citation of Honor for his pathbreaking interdisciplinary research and writing on medial and biological issues as they relate to the norms of law and ethics.

On the twenty-fifth anniversary of his career in legal education in 1989, United States Congressman John T. Myers paid tribute to Smith's years of distinguished service to the legal profession. As well, the editors of the Journal of Contemporary Health Law and Policy published his bibliography of scholarship in Law, Science and Medicine.

In 1988, at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City, Smith was recognized for his professional contributions to Law and Medical Science by induction to the Most Venerable Order of the Hospital of St. John of Jerusalem. Similar recognition was given to Smith 1974 by his election to membership in The Cosmos Club in Washington, D.C. Smith is also a life member of the prestigious American Law Institute.

Research Affiliations

Over his career, Smith has had research affiliations with over 100 institutions, including: Columbia University's Center for the Study of Society and Medicine; the University of Chicago's Center for Clinical Medical Ethics; Princeton University's Theological Seminary; Harvard's Petrie-Flom Center; University of Virginia's Center for Biomedical Ethics; the Max Planck Institute in Heidelberg; the Rothermere American Institute at Oxford University; the Lauterpacht Center for International Law at Cambridge University; the Hoover Institution at Stanford University; Yale's Solomon Center for Health Law and Policy; the Yale School of Divinity; the Rockefeller Institution in Bellagio, Italy; the University of Sydney's Center for Health Governance, Law and Ethics; the University of St. Andrew's Center for the Study of Religion and Politics; and the Pellegrino Center for Clinical Ethics at Georgetown University.

Personal life

Smith lives in Washington, D.C., in Georgetown and is unmarried. An avid reader, bibliophile and socially prominent supporter of the Arts, Smith has acknowledged friends and teachers who have had a positive influence in his life by establishing book collections to honor them. To that end, collections honoring Professor Sir David and Lady Williams and Professor Sir Derek Bowett at the University of Cambridge Squire Law Library have been formed. As well, a collection honoring the memories of Dr. W. Taylor Reveley, II, President Emeritus of Hampden-Sydney College, Virginia, and his wife Marie Eason Reveley, has been established at the Bortz Library at the College. The Wabash Carnegie Public Library in Indiana houses collections honoring three teachers form Wabash High School who had a transformative influence of Smith: Martha Biggerstaff Jones, Ruth A. Jones, and Mildred E. Hipskind. Additionally, Smith played a prominent role in establishing an endowed professorship at the Maurer School of Law at Indiana University – Bloomington, honoring the late Professor Harry Pratter.