November 1, 2007 | Read Time: 2 minutes
In a dispute involving questions about a charity’s obligations to its donors, a Louisiana court of appeals last week ruled that Tulane University had the right to merge its undergraduate college for women into a new coeducational undergraduate division, a move the university made last year as a cost-saving measure after Hurricane Katrina.
Two heirs of Josephine Louise Newcomb, the donor whose gift established the H. Sophie Newcomb Memorial College, sued Tulane in May 2006, saying that the university had violated the terms of the donation agreement by dissolving the 120-year-old women’s college. By a 2-to-1 vote, a three-judge panel of Louisiana’s Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal affirmed an earlier ruling by a trial-court judge against the plaintiffs and instructed the judge to dismiss the lawsuit.
The lawsuit was the second filed over the dissolution of Newcomb College as a separate, degree-granting institution. A federal-court judge threw out an earlier case, filed by a group of alumnae and students, saying they lacked the legal right to sue.
The plaintiffs in this case, Parma Matthis Howard and Jane Matthis Smith, are descendants of Ms. Newcomb’s sister. Their lawyers plan to ask the State Supreme Court to consider the case.
Newcomb College was established in 1886 to honor the donor’s daughter, who died at age 15. Ms. Newcomb left $2-million to the college when she died in 1901. Its endowment was valued at about $40-million in 2006.
Following Hurricane Katrina, Tulane officials voted to merge Newcomb and its counterpart for men, Tulane College, into the Newcomb-Tulane College as part of a plan to save money and streamline programs. The university has established an institute that will coordinate leadership and scholarship programs for undergraduate women, as well as a fellowship program for undergraduate women, all bearing the Newcomb name.
Erin Strout is a reporter for The Chronicle of Higher Education.
