Twomey Scholar in Residence
JSRI's current Twomey Scholars are Bill Quigley, J.D. and Dr. Ronnie Moore.
In 2023, JSRI launched the Father Louis J. Twomey, S.J., Legacy Scholar in Residence Program to honor the life and work of Fr. Twomey, one of the greatest social apostles the Jesuit Province of the South ever produced. The program invites distinguished scholars who have retired from a life of service in a field of study related to one or more of JSRI’s core issues (race, poverty, and migration) and Catholic Social Teachings to reflect and write about their life’s work. The Twomey Legacy Scholar is invited to spend time at JSRI to reflect on their legacy and learnings to create a Blueprint for Social Justice. The scholar will have dedicated office space at JSRI and access to resources to host events and convenings including the Twomey lecture in the Fall semester, which will present the scholar’s published Blueprint for Social Justice.
Dr. Daniel Thompson, a contemporary of Fr. Twomey and professor at Dillard University said, “Twomey was a voice crying in the wilderness. He was one of the greatest leaders New Orleans ever had.”
Fr. Twomey was a Loyola alumnus (1931) and beloved Jesuit priest who returned to Loyola University New Orleans in 1947 to found the Institute of Industrial Relations. Its mission was to promote fairer conditions for all people in their various places of work, with express support for union organizing, as well as improving labor-management relations. Fr. Twomey was an early and outspoken advocate for racial justice, hosting racially integrated classes at Loyola, starting in 1950. Fr. Twomey’s monthly newsletter, Blueprint for the South, was an inspiration for a generation of Jesuits and lay people engaged in the fight for equal rights for all Americans.
Donations:
Click here to make an online donation to the Twomey Legacy Fund.
JSRI publications:
Father Louis Twomey and the Fight for Labor and Civil Rights at Loyola by Dr. Cody Melcher, JustSouth Monthly, March 2023
Loyola publications:
Twomey: Social Justice Warrior by Kloe Witt and Mark Michel, The Maroon, September 2023; also here
In 2024, JSRI invited William Quigley, J.D., Loyola Law Professor Emeritus, to be our next Fr. Louis J. Twomey, S.J. Scholar in Residence.
Bill Quigley has been an active public interest and human rights lawyer since 1977. He is an emeritus professor of law and served as Director of the Law Clinic and the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University New Orleans for more than 30 years. Bill has served as counsel with a wide range of public interest organizations on issues including public housing, voting rights, death penalty, living wage, civil liberties, educational reform, constitutional rights, civil disobedience, and social justice issues following Hurricane Katrina. Bill has also litigated numerous cases with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., the Advancement Project, and with the ACLU of Louisiana where he was General Counsel for over 15 years.
Bill is the author of Ending Poverty As We Know It: Guaranteeing A Right to A Job At A Living Wage (2003) and Storms Still Raging: Katrina, New Orleans and Social Justice (2008), as well as countless articles that focus on revolutionary lawyering, civil disobedience, international human rights, and a continuing history of how the laws have regulated the poor since colonial times.
As one of his first initiatives at JSRI, Bill will serve as the editor for a special series of the JustSouth Monthly newsletter to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and explore the impact of the storm with attention to JSRI’s core issues of race and poverty.
Bill is also a leader that is deeply informed by Catholic Social Teaching and his work is informed by his faith and guided by the pursuit of justice. Bill’s work answers the call from Fr. Pedro Arrupe in 1967 to have ‘Courage of a high supernatural order” to realign “our manpower and resources to meet the crying needs of our brothers in Christ who languish in racial degradation and inhuman poverty.”
In his 2006 article on Revolutionary Lawyering, Bill urges us to “Refuse to accept the reality of those who think that our future is predetermined by the powerful and will never change. Certainly, never accept our current reality as the inevitable future. Accept no limits! Never let anyone tell you what you can achieve or who you can become. Challenge injustice even if you don’t know the solution.”
Bill has spent his life challenging injustice, building coalitions, and working with communities. In his role as the Fr. Louis J. Twomey, S.J. Legacy Scholar in Residence, Bill will continue to lead and inspire new generations of freedom fighters and revolutionaries at Loyola and beyond. We are grateful to work with him!
If you would like to collaborate with Bill Quigley or invite him to speak to your class, please contact JSRI@loyno.edu for more information.
JSRI Publications by Bill Quigley, J.D.:
Affordable Public Housing, Home to Over 5000 Families, Demolished by HUD After Katrina by Bill Quigley, J.D., JustSouth Monthly, May 2025
Katrina at Twenty: Still Left Behind Twenty Years Later by Bill Quigley, J.D., JustSouth Monthly, February 2025
Katrina at Twenty: What Happened to our Poorest Sisters and Brothers in 2005? by Bill Quigley, J.D., JustSouth Monthly, January 2025
