Harvard Law School (HLS) has received the largest gift in its history—a $31.4 million donation—from Morgan Chu J.D. ’76 and his wife Helen Chu. The money will endow six new professorships, the law school said in a statement this week.
The gift comes after the law school recorded its most successful-ever fundraising year; in FY2026, the school drew $135 million from donors, $30 million above the previous record. Across the University, fundraising was strong last year; Harvard’s recent financial report showed more than $1.5 billion in gifts across all schools and programs.
Morgan Chu, a former president of Harvard’s Board of Overseers, and Helen Chu, a teacher, are longtime supporters of the law school, where they have previously funded professorships, prizes for academic achievement, need-based scholarships, annual and general-purpose funds, and student and academic initiatives. The law school deanship itself is named for the Chus: HLS dean John C.P. Goldberg is officially the Morgan and Helen Chu Dean and Professor of Law.
Morgan Chu is an intellectual property attorney who currently chairs the litigation group at Los Angeles-based law firm Irell & Manella LLP, where he is a partner. Chu did not finish high school but nevertheless gained admission to the University of California at 16, ultimately earning five degrees before the age of 25. His parents were first-generation immigrants to the United States from China. His brother, Steven Chu S.D. ’09, is a Nobel Prize-winning physicist who was awarded an honorary degree from Harvard in 2009, the same year Morgan Chu was elected to Harvard’s Board of Overseers. Chu served as president of the Board of Overseers in 2014-2015.
At HLS, Chu served on the Harvard Civil Rights-Civil Liberties Law Review, a legal journal dedicated to advancing personal freedoms and human dignity. That interest continued into his professional career: he is known for his dedication to pro bono legal work and has served on the Board of Directors at the Public Counsel Law Center, the largest non-profit public interest law firm in the United States, since 1993.
“I am deeply grateful to Morgan and Helen for their extraordinary generosity and their deep and longstanding commitment to Harvard Law School,” Goldberg said in a statement announcing the gift. “Great law schools depend on great teachers, scholars, and students. This remarkable gift will help ensure Harvard Law School continues to attract and support the most talented faculty, whose teaching and scholarship will advance our understanding of the law and guide the next generation of Harvard lawyers and leaders.”
