Latest from HLS News Staff

On Sept. 19, Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow gave a lecture at Howard Law School in Washington, D.C., in commemoration of Constitution Day – an annual, national celebration of the signing of the U.S. Constitution on Sept. 17, 1787.

Derrick Bell, a distinguished legal scholar, prolific writer and tireless champion for equality, died Wednesday, Oct. 5. Over the course of his five-decade career, he worked to expose the persistence of racism and challenged his students, readers and critics with his uncompromising candor and progressive views.

On September 24th, people from across America and across the political spectrum convened at Harvard Law School to discuss the advisability and feasibility of organizing a Constitutional Convention. The conference was co-hosted by Harvard Law School Professor Lawrence Lessig, founder of Change Congress, and Mark Meckler, co-founder and a national coordinator of Tea Party Patriots.

On September 28, the Harvard Law School Environmental Law Program and Environmental Law Institute hosted a Supreme Court Review and Preview to discuss the implications of recent Supreme Court decisions on the field of environmental law. Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow introduced the event, and emphasized the Supreme Court’s role in the formation of environmental policy in the United States.

Seven hundred alumni and guests gathered in Cambridge on September 16-18 to commemorate the 3rd Celebration of Black Alumni at Harvard Law School. With more black lawyers entering the profession than ever before—and more achieving positions of prominence and power, the event, “Struggle and Progress: Leadership in the 21st Century,” focused on the progress that has been made and the barriers that remain.

In celebration of Constitution Day—the annual celebration of the signing of the U.S. Constitution on Sept. 17, 1787—HLS professors Noah Feldman and John Palfrey delivered talks to university audiences about the document upon which the American legal and political systems have been built.

An essay, Why Death Penalty Opponents Are Closer to Their Goal Than They Realize, by HLS Professor Carol Steiker ’86, appeared in the Sept. 27 edition of The New Republic. The essay focuses on the decline of the death penalty in practice, politics and law, and how the present moment brings the genuine possibility of permanent abolition via judicial decision.

At the 2011 annual meeting of the International Corporate Governance Network held in Paris, Professor Lucian Bebchuk was awarded an ICGN award for excellence in corporate governance. ICGN awards are given annually in recognition of “exceptional achievements in the corporate governance field.”

For upholding the highest principles of the legal profession and for outstanding dedication to the welfare of others, HLS Clinical Professor Deborah Anker LL.M. ’84 was recently elected to the Fellows of the American Bar Foundation. Anker, one of the nation’s top scholars in immigration law, is director of the Harvard Immigration and Refugee Clinic and has taught immigration law and supervised clinical students for over 20 years.

The Situationist blog, established by Professor Jon Hanson and run by the Project on Law and Mind Science at Harvard Law School, recently received the 2011 Media Prize awarded by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology.

In a recent review in the New Republic, HLS Professor Adrian Vermeule ’93 examines the book "The Body of John Merryman: Abraham Lincoln and the Suspension of Habeas Corpus" (Harvard University Press, 2011) by Brian McGinty.

The Harvard Law School community commemorated the 10th anniversary of September 11th with a vigil on Sunday, September 11 at 8:30pm on Jarvis Field. Hosted by Harvard Law School Dean Martha Minow, it was a moment for students, faculty and staff to come together and reflect on the events of that day and the years that followed.

The only way we can keep Americans fully employed and maintain our global lead is by constantly improving their productivity and skills, writes Vivek Wadhwa, a senior research associate for the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School, in an op-ed in today's Washington Post. In his op-ed,  "On jobs, Obama needs to be a radical," published on the eve on the president's address to the nation, Wadhwa writes that American companies must be provided with the incentives to invest in their workers as they used to.

Brilliant trial attorney, unabashed feminist, passionate advocate for civil rights, and one of Boston’s most respected—and controversial—federal judges, U.S. District Court Judge Nancy Gertner joins the HLS faculty this month as a Professor of Practice after retiring from 17 years on the bench. As renowned for her outspokenness as for her carefully considered decisions—explained in lengthy written opinions—Gertner will offer students an insider’s view of the criminal justice system, the challenges judges face today in a 24/7 news cycle, and more.

Harvard Law School Professor Randall Kennedy recently appeared on PBS’s Tavis Smiley show and CSPAN’s BookTV to discuss his latest book, “The Persistence of the Color Line: Racial Politics and the Obama Presidency” (Pantheon Books).

An essay,  "Don't Blame Perry for Texas's Execution Addiction. He Doesn't Have Much To Do With It," by HLS Professor Carol Steiker ’86 and her brother, Professor Jordan Steiker '88 of the University of Texas School of Law appeared in the Sept. 2 edition of The New Republic. The essay focuses on the relationship between Republican presidential candidate and Texas Governor Rick Perry and Texas's standing as the execution capital of the United States.

When an opportunity arose this summer to work in Afghanistan on issues of human rights, Nicolette Boehland jumped at the chance. Little did the second-year Harvard Law School student know that she would soon be crisscrossing the country in Black Hawk helicopters interviewing victims of torture.

HLS Visiting Professor Chibli Mallat recently published an op-ed in the Egyptian newspaper Ahram Online entitled “Libya’s Revolution: a troubling legacy of violence.”