Tenured law professor leaves Marquette amid questions
A tenured professor has parted with Marquette University Law School more than a year after his suspension amid an investigation that he had an inappropriate relationship with a student.
Paul Secunda, a wellknown blogger and authority on labor and employment law, was dismissed from his teaching duties near the end of the 2018 fall semester.
Then-Marquette Provost Dan Myers reportedly was negotiating a resolution with Secunda
before suddenly resigning in October 2018. Secunda was suspended from teaching a short time later.
Secunda said at the time he respected the university’s position but felt he was the subject of an injustice and would fight for his job.
“I have confidence in the process Marquette and the faculty have established to protect tenured professors in these circumstances, and believe I will clear my name at the end,” he said in 2018.
His case was headed for the Faculty Hearing Committee process, the same one that resulted in a report against Marquette professor John McAdams. Marquette suspended McAdams in 2014 after he was suspended for using his politically conservative blog to criticize a graduate student who told an undergraduate in her class he couldn’t say he opposed gay marriage. The graduate student then received numerous threats and eventually left Marquette.
His case became a conservative cause célèbre and he won his job back when the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled Marquette’s suspension breached McAdams’ contract that guaranteed his academic freedom of speech.
Seconda’s case proceeded with far less attention. It has not been disclosed if the student was in his class or whether she filed the original complaint. Neither he nor the university would discuss the progress of the Faculty Hearing Committee review throughout 2019.
But this week, Secunda started a new job at Walcheske & Luzi, an employment law firm in Milwaukee, and said his last day with Marquette was April 27. Neither he nor Marquette would discuss the terms of his departure or the findings of the Faculty Review Committee.
Marquette would say only that Secunda no longer worked for the university. Secunda, in an email, said he was trying “trying to put the Marquette chapter of my life behind me and will have no further comment.”