Tom Joel Farer ’57

Although born in New York City, Tom came to Princeton from Manchester Central High School in New Hampshire. At Princeton he majored in the Woodrow Wilson School, foreshadowing his later career accomplishments. He joined Campus Club, for which he played touch football and golf, and was president of the Whig-Clio and Wilson School Debate Panels, and the Princeton Senate. He also participated in WPRU and the Speakers Bureau. Senior year he roomed with George Fedden, Bob Miles, and Ed Said.

Tom was a Fulbright Scholar at Glasgow University, U.K., and then received his LL.B. from Harvard Law School. He was a clerk for Judge Learned Hand of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York, followed by stints with the Agency for International Development, the Department of Defense, the government of Somalia, and the firm of Davis Polk. Then he became a professor at Columbia and Rutgers, followed by a period as president of the Inter-American Human Rights Commission and then president of the University of New Mexico. He served as a professor at American University in Washington, D.C., and then became dean of the University of Denver Law School.

Tom wrote several academic papers and books, including most recently Migration and Integration: The Case for Liberalism with Borders.

He married Mika Ignatieff, a graduate of McGill University. They had two children, Paola and Dima. Tom died March 3, 2025. His wife and children and their families survive him.