Race and the Law

Sociologist and 
legal expert 
Dorothy E. 
Roberts ’80 
works for radical 
change and a 
more just society

A new online course by Harvard Law Professor Michael Klarman explores the history of race and the United States Constitution.

Harvard Law Professor Kenneth Mack says that early unions often excluded Black workers, but that today’s labor and social justice movements often ‘dovetail’.

In the Biddle Lecture, civil rights scholar Dorothy Roberts draws a throughline from the horrors of slavery to the Supreme Court’s recent abortion ruling.

As the Supreme Court wraps up another blockbuster term, Harvard Law School faculty members reflect on the ways the justices’ most recent decisions might reshape the law.

On the 70th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, experts at Harvard Law School discussed the future of racial justice at the inaugural Belinda Sutton Symposium.

Professor Randall Kennedy sits in conversation with Martha Minow on his book of essays on a broad range of controversial topics.

Harvard Law alumnus Randolph McLaughlin pioneered an enduring strategy to get justice for victims and bankrupt the Ku Klux Klan.

On November 29, Sherrilyn Ifill delivered a talk titled “Reimagining American Democracy: Becoming Founders & Framers” to mark her appointment as this year's Steven and Maureen Klinsky Visiting Professor of Practice for Leadership and Progress.

Hannah Shaffer ’21, whose research interests focus on criminal procedure, criminal law, and law and economics, will join Harvard Law School as an assistant professor of law.

In his last lecture to the J.D. and LL.M. classes of 2023, Michael Klarman celebrates civil rights heroes and issues a clarion call for democratic engagement.

Civil rights leader Sherrilyn Ifill encourages an examination of institutions and urges the inclusion of marginalized voices.

Harvard Law School’s Guy-Uriel E. Charles spoke about the demise of the “civil rights consensus” and what comes next, at a lecture celebrating his appointment as the Charles J. Ogletree, Jr. Professor of Law.

Tomiko Brown-Nagin’s book recounts the remarkable — and too little-known — life and achievements of civil rights lawyer and judge Constance Baker Motley

In the first of the series, “Cases in Brief,” Harvard Law Professor Dehlia Umunna discusses the infamous “Scottsboro Boys” case, Powell v. Alabama (1932), in which the U.S. Supreme Court ruled for the first time that defendants in capital cases have the right to adequate legal counsel.

Randall Kennedy seeks nuance in an age of absolutism

HLS faculty on COVID-19 and the pressing questions of racism, racial injustice, and abuse of power that have driven this difficult year—and that are the focus of three new lecture series at the school.

Bryan Stevenson ’85 creates a memorial and museum to foster conversation on America's original sin.