Douglas H. Parker
Douglas Hugh Parker was an American law school professor. He began his law teaching career as a Harry A. Bigelow Teaching Fellow at the University of Chicago Law School and later taught as a professor of law at the University of Colorado College of Law and the Brigham Young University J. Reuben Clark Law School.
Early life and education
Parker, the second of four children, was born in August 1926 in Salt Lake City, Utah to Casper Hugh Parker and Carrie Hansen. He graduated from high school at the age of 16 and immediately enrolled at the University of Utah. During his second year at the university, Parker took the medical school admissions test and was accepted.In 1944 during World War II, Parker delayed attending medical school and enlisted in the United States Navy. He was assigned to the Great Lakes Naval Base near Chicago where he served as a scrub nurse, handling instruments in the operating room during more than 400 operations.
Upon the close of World War II, Parker returned to Salt Lake City and subsequently served a two-year mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in the Eastern United States. During his mission service, Parker served as a counselor in the mission presidency. Later in life he served as a bishop of a LDS ward in Provo, Utah.
After his church mission, Parker continued school at the University of Utah where he graduated with a B.A. in political science. He then entered law school at the University of Utah. At law school, Parker was a founding editor of the University of Utah Law Review and graduated first in his class.
Career
In 1952, upon graduation from law school, Parker received a distinguished Harry A. Bigelow Teaching Fellowship at the University of Chicago Law School, a fellowship given to top law school graduates in the country. At Chicago, Parker taught courses in Legal Writing, Legal Research, and Legal Analysis.In 1953, Parker accepted a faculty position at the University of Colorado College of Law. As a professor of law, he taught courses primarily involving client care-taking: civil procedure, wills and trusts, equitable remedies, damages, and legal ethics. While at Colorado, Parker and colleague William J. Bowe accepted an invitation to revise the multi-volume treatise Page on Wills, expanding it to eight volumes. Parker taught at the University of Colorado for 22 years.
In 1975, Parker accepted a faculty position at Brigham Young University's J. Reuben Clark Law School where he sought to expand his intellectual grasp of the province and function of law in teaching a variety of new subjects of a comparative law nature: Federal Indian law, Roman law, Jewish law, Jurisprudence, Professional Responsibility, and Conflicts of Laws.
In 1986, Parker was the first law professor to be awarded BYU's Karl G. Maeser distinguished teaching award. He taught at BYU until 1991 when he retired. In recognition of Parker's contributions to legal education, a former student established in Parker's honor the "Douglas H. Parker Award." The award is presented annually to the student who attains the highest grade in Jurisprudence or Federal Indian Law.
Following his retirement, Parker continued occasionally to teach at other law schools as a visiting professor. When teaching in China with his wife Corene, he was awarded the Excellent Teacher Award by the Shandong Province Education Commission.
Faculty positions
- Bigelow Teaching Fellowship, University of Chicago, 1952–53
- Professor of Law, University of Colorado, 1953–75
- Professor of Law, J. Reuben Clark Law School, Brigham Young University, 1975–91
Visiting faculty positions
- University of Utah College of Law,, Summer 1979
- University of Arizona School of Law,, Summer 1980, 1987
- University of Missouri – Columbia School of Law,, Summer 1981
- University of Alabama School of Law,, Summer 1982
- Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Visiting Research Professor, 1983
- University of New Mexico School of Law,, Summer 1985
- Stetson University College of Law, Culverhouse Chair Professor of Law, 1994
- Shandong Medical University, Jinan, Shandong, P.R. China, Certified Foreign Expert, 1995–96
- Concordia International University Estonia, Tallinn, Estonia,, 1998
- BYU Hawaii,, Spring 2004
Membership in professional and honorary associations
- International Association of Jewish Lawyers and Jurists
- International Association for the Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy
- Institute of Judicial Administration
- Institute of Jewish Law
- The Jewish Law Association
- Colorado Bar Association
- Utah Bar Association
- Order of the Coif
- Phi Kappa Phi
Professional activities and community service
- Wrote questions for the California Bar Examination for ten years
- Former chairman, Atomic Energy Committee, Colorado Bar Association
- Former legal consultant to and member of Technical Advisory Committee on Radiation Protection, Colorado Department of Public Health
- Former member, Junior College Study Committee of Board of Education, Boulder County RE-2 School District
- Former chairman, arbitration panel under Colorado Teacher Tenure Act
- Former member, board of directors, Colorado Continuing Legal Education, Inc.
- Member, Statutory Revision Committee, Probate and Trust Law Section, Colorado Bar Association
- Faculty director and participating instructor, Fraud Investigator Conference
- Faculty director and participating instructor, Appeals Referees Conference
- Special investigator, Colorado Commission on Judicial Qualifications
- Faculty member Annual Educational Conference, National College of Probate Judges
- Former member, Ethics Advisory Committee, Utah State Bar, 1983
Major publications
Books
- Bowe-Parker Revision: Pages on Wills. Cincinnati, Ohio: Anderson Co., 1965. 8v.,
- Title XX, “Legal Problems of Radiation Exposure in Uranium Mining and Milling.”
- Colorado Practice Methods. St. Paul, West Publishing Co., 1956. 2 v. author of Ch. 15.
- *“Forcible Entry and Detainer;” Ch. 25, “Statutory Change of Name;” Ch. 40, **“Discovery, Perpetuation of Testimony and Pre-Trial;”
- *Ch. 41, “Preparation for Trial.”
- Materials on Civil Procedure.. 111 pp.
- Cases and Materials on Federal Indian Law. 300 pp.
- Readings in Jewish Law. 1500 pp..
- Materials in Law and Religion. 581 pp.
Articles
- “Some Tax Title Problems in Utah,” 3 Utah Law Review 97-112
- “Highlights of the 1955 Colorado Legislative Session – Wills, Decedent’s Estates and
- “The Need for State Atomic Energy Programs in the West,” 29 Rocky Mountain Law
- “Some Legal Implications for Personnel Officers,” 24 Journal of the National
- “Normative Criteria for the Validity of Ordering Ideas,” 5 Archiv für Rechts- und
- “From Sensed Injustice to Natural, Legal, and Human Rights,” printed in Human
- “Probate and Trusts, 1971 Annual Survey of Colorado Law” 117–126, published by
- “Rhetoric, Ethics and Manipulation,” 5 Philosophy and Rhetoric 69-87.
- “Periodic Recertification of Lawyers: A Comparative Study of Programs for
- “Survey of Recent Literature,”, 7 The Jewish Law Annual, 255-302.
- “Victory in Defeat – Polygamy and the Mormon Legal Encounter with the Federal
- Review: Handbook of the Law of Evidence. By Charles T. McCormick. St. Paul: West
- Review: Colorado Rules Brief. By Jack W. Hosford. Denver, Colorado: Privately
- Review: The Voice of Modern Trials. By Melvin M. Belli. San Francisco: The Belli
- Review: Cases and Materials on Professional Responsibility. By Maynard E. Pirsig.
- "Encyclopedia of Mormonism," 5 v., Macmillan Publishing Co., 1992, entries on "Divine and Eternal Law," v. 2, pp. 808–810, "Law of Moses," v. 2, pp. 810–812.
- "Conversations with Professors, Judges, Lawyers, and Rabbis in Israel," 3 volumes, transcribed from professional journals kept in connection with a professional development leave as a visiting research professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, School of Law, Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, 1983..
Personal life
In 1950 Parker married Corene Cowan. They had seven children; four sons and three daughters, as well as 36 grandchildren. Three of Parker's sons have followed his footsteps and are lawyers. Parker lived a physically active life and ran fifteen marathons, the last being at age 66. Parker also enjoyed cross-country skiing, backpacking, hunting, and fishing, as well as writing essays engaged in philosophy, religion, theological analysis, speculation, and criticism. He produced over 200 such essays in four volumes:- Journeys of the Mind, 1985–2001
- After Midnight Thoughts, 1989–91
- A Wee Collection of Innocent Thoughts Experienced While Mowing the Lawn, 2002–03
- Searching for the Obvious, 2004–06