Reflecting on my time at the Harvard Law School LGBTQ+ Advocacy Clinic 

By Ethan Johnstone ’26

When I first joined the Harvard Law School LGBTQ+ Advocacy Clinic, I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect. I anticipated a space to refine my practical legal skills in a supportive, clinical setting. What I found was so much more—a vibrant, mission-driven community and a deeply transformative experience, both personally and professionally. 

The Clinic offered me the invaluable opportunity to engage directly with LGBTQ+ clients in need—clients whose stories, resilience, and dignity reshaped the way I think about advocacy. But beyond the casework, I found something far more enduring: a network of brilliant, passionate law students, scholars, and practitioners, all committed to dismantling the legal barriers that LGBTQ+ people in America still face every day. 

In many ways, I’ve carried a quiet sense of responsibility—an awareness that the relative freedoms I enjoy as a Queer person today are the hard-won result of generations of relentless, often invisible labor. My work in the Clinic allowed me to give back in a meaningful way, even if only in a small part, to that ongoing legacy of resistance and resilience. 

Over the past year, I’ve never felt more deeply connected to my own identity or more attuned to the urgent needs of our broader community. I was fortunate to be surrounded by mentors who are pushing the boundaries of pro bono legal advocacy—individuals whose courage, brilliance, and compassion continue to inspire me. 

One of the most profound aspects of my experience was my capstone project: working with the Michigan Innocence Clinic on a clemency application for a wrongfully incarcerated transgender man who has spent over 35 years in prison. Our client—an openly queer person at a time when his identity was not only marginalized but criminalized—was the target of a deeply homophobic prosecution. Collaborating with attorneys from across the country to help right such a historic wrong was humbling and powerful. 

Yet, the legal work alone doesn’t capture the full impact of this project. Traveling to Michigan to meet our client in person—sitting across from him in a maximum-security prison and hearing his story firsthand—was a moment that changed me. It reaffirmed what I have always believed: that the practice of law, at its best, is profoundly human. It is about people, dignity, and the pursuit of justice in its most intimate form. 

As my time at the LGBTQ+ Advocacy Clinic draws to a close, I leave with more than skills—I leave with a renewed sense of purpose. The lessons I’ve learned, the truths I’ve confronted, and the people I’ve stood beside have all shaped the kind of advocate I aspire to be. I’m committed to using my training to serve not just those harmed by systemic homophobia and transphobia, but anyone denied equal access to the justice they deserve.