Myres Smith McDougal was a well known authority on international law.  He taught at Yale Law School for fifty years.  During his time at Yale, he was the authority who gave many well-known people the approval into law school.  He approved former president Gerald Ford for admission into Yale Law School .  He died on May 7, 1998 .  

Myres Smith McDougal was born in Burton , Mississippi in 1906.  He attended college at the University of Mississippi .  At Ole Miss he received a B.A., M.A., and a L.L.B. degree.  He also attended Oxford and was a Rhodes Scholar.  He received a B.C.L. degree in 1930 from Oxford .  After he finished his education at Oxford , he came back to the U.S. to work to earn a doctorate from Yale Law School in 1931.  

After college, he taught for a short time at the University of Illinois , but then returned to Yale in 1934.  During this time, he was focused on property law, and he was the first scholar to look at this form of law in terms of comprehensive resource planning.  McDougal left Yale during World War II to serve his country.   His duties included assistant general counsel of the Lend-lease Administration in 1942 and general counsel of the State Department’s Office of Foreign Relief and Rehabilitation Operations in 1943.  

After the war, McDougal’s focus turned to international law.  He made his most popular contributions in international law.  Along with the help of some of his students, he was responsible for 6 major treaties.  These treaties were the law of outer space, the law of the sea, the law of war, and the law of human rights. Professor McDougal’s challenge was to develop and apply an approach to the study and practice of law so it could contribute to the achievement of a public order respectful of human dignity.  

He was also a well known author and published many books.   Along with the help of political scientist Harold D. Lasswell, his first book was Legal Education and Public Policy.