Latest from HLS News Staff

Dean Elena Kagan sent the following letter to the Harvard Law School community today, outlining some of the school's efforts to assist those affected by Hurricane Katrina.

For decades, negotiators have struggled to "separate the people from the problem," one of the cardinal rules set forth in the seminal book "Getting to Yes." But what if the people are the problem--or at least appear to be?

When Henry Steiner '55 and Detlev Vagts '51 published the first edition of "Transnational Legal Problems" in 1968, the collaboration marked a milestone in the field of international law.

Which works better--regulation or market-based initiatives? We ask Jody Freeman, who joined the HLS faculty this year.

Kenneth Scott '79 makes sure there's no whitewash after ethnic 'cleansing'

This September, Harvard Law School will hold its second Celebration of Black Alumni, bringing hundreds of black Harvard Law graduates to campus for a range of programming focusing on national and international legal issues. Highlights of the three-day event include a keynote address by U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, a 1991 Harvard Law graduate, and speeches by Harvard President Lawrence Summers and Law School Dean Elena Kagan. The event will take place on the HLS campus September 16-18.

President Bush has nominated Harvard Law graduate John G. Roberts Jr., a federal appeals court judge, to fill the Supreme Court vacancy created earlier this month when Associate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor announced her retirement. Roberts graduated from Harvard Law School in 1979 and from Harvard College in 1976.

The Supreme Court recently agreed to hear the case Whitman v. Department of Transportation in which the petition for certiorari prepared by a class at Harvard Law School. The winter 2005 Supreme Court Litigation class, taught by instructors Amy Howe and Thomas Goldstein, researched and wrote the petition.

Donald Alexander '48 is a partner at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington, D.C., where he has a wide-ranging tax practice.

“Excessive pay isn’t the only cost of flawed compensation arrangements. Executives’ influence over their boards has produced pay arrangements that dilute and sometimes pervert incentives.

A sampling from this year's crop of 3L papers.

Professor Heather Gerken says it can.

For 19th century printers, crime was good business. Brutal murders and other horrific crimes translated into profit when they became the subjects of single-page printings. Today close to 400 of these broadsides, most printed in England from 1820 to 1860, are preserved in an HLS library collection. They highlight acts of wrongdoing, purported confessions from the accused (often set in verse), and accounts of trials and public executions. Many are illustrated with woodcuts.

Two new human rights reports from international groups Human Rights Watch and Front Line draw on research and writing from students in the Clinical Advocacy Project of Harvard Law School's Human Rights Program.

Harvard Law School's historic Langdell South classroom has been renamed Kirkland and Ellis Hall in recognition of a $3 million gift made by the Chicago-based international law firm. The gift will support preservation and upkeep of this important 162-seat teaching space and -- as part of the Harvard Law School endowment -- support the law school's general educational and research activities.

Last week the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that a family is a protected and recognized social group for purposes of refugee protection and asylum eligibility—a ruling praised a group of Harvard Law School students. The students, working with the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic and the Harvard Human Rights Program, had filed an amicus brief in the case of Thomas v. Gonzales urging the court to reach the conclusion reflected in the ruling.