Topics
Civil Rights
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Supreme Court Preview: Brackeen v. Haaland
October 31, 2022
Harvard Law Professor Joseph Singer says the Supreme Court’s decision in Brackeen v. Haaland has the potential to upset tribal sovereignty.
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Lesson from Latin America for US abortion rights movement
October 28, 2022
This article was originally published in the Harvard Gazette. Mexico and Colombia recently legalized abortion in landmark rulings that offer a stark contrast to…
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The Civil Rights Queen and Her Court
July 16, 2022
Tomiko Brown-Nagin’s book recounts the remarkable — and too little-known — life and achievements of civil rights lawyer and judge Constance Baker Motley
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Larry Schwartztol, White House lawyer focused on voting rights and democracy reform, has been named a professor of practice. He will serve as the faculty director of the Democracy and the Rule of Law Clinic.
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Faculty Books in Brief: Summer 2022
July 2, 2022
From the Hughes Court to stock market short-termism to the U.S.'s "defend forward" cyber strategy
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Brianna Banks named winner of Stuntz Memorial Award
May 20, 2022
This year, Brianna Banks was named the 2022 winner of the William J. Stuntz Memorial Award for Justice, Human Dignity, and Compassion, which recognizes a graduating student who has demonstrated an exemplary commitment to the principles of justice, human dignity, and compassion while at Harvard Law School.
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‘Change the world around you’
April 29, 2022
In a philosophical and wide-ranging Last Lecture, Harvard Law School Assistant Professor Nikolas Bowie ’14 reminded the Class of 2022 that they are on the verge of changing the world.
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Cases in Brief: Powell v. Alabama with Dehlia Umunna
April 5, 2022
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.
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Loretta Lynch is Harvard Law School’s 2022 Class Day speaker
March 31, 2022
The Hon. Loretta Lynch ’84, who was Attorney General of the United States from 2015 to 2017, will be this year’s speaker for the Class Day ceremonies at Harvard Law School.
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Limiting lessons
March 30, 2022
Alexander Chen of Harvard Law’s LGBTQ+ Advocacy Clinic says Florida’s Parental Rights in Education bill likely will face First Amendment and Equal Protection Clause challenges.
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Securing justice for George Floyd
February 28, 2022
In a recent talk at Harvard Law School Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison reflected on the George Floyd murder trial of Derek Chauvin, and verdict.
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Who we are
February 23, 2022
Jeffery Robinson ’81 has made challenging false narratives about racism his life’s work.
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Constance Baker Motley
February 15, 2022
Georgetown Law Professor Sheryll Cashin ’89 once asked her mentor, Thurgood Marshall, why he had passed over Constance Baker Motley to succeed him when he…
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‘Maybe I will do something bigger that hopefully impacts the world’
February 14, 2022
At an HLS talk, Byron Allen — owner of the most successful Black-owned media group in history — shared his career history and experiences with the law.
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Remembering Alan Stone 1929–2022
February 4, 2022
Alan A. Stone, the Touroff- Glueck Professor of Law and Psychiatry Emeritus in the faculty of law and the faculty of medicine at Harvard, died Jan. 23. He was 92.
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Race and Place
January 31, 2022
Caste is alive and well in the United States — and it starts with the very neighborhoods we call home. That’s the uncomfortable truth Sheryll Cashin asks us to confront in her new book.
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Justice for all
January 25, 2022
For the past two years, students in Harvard’s Prison Legal Assistance Project have helped prisoners they say were targeted for retaliatory violence.
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Andrew Manuel Crespo elected to American Law Institute
January 21, 2022
HLS Professor Andrew Crespo was one of 59 members elected to the American Law Institute this year. Thirteen Harvard Law School alumni were also elected.
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Crimmigration Clinic helps score First Circuit victory for asylum-seeker, Boston-area immigrants
January 18, 2022
In a case that could have national implications, the Harvard Law School Crimmigration Clinic recently convinced judges at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit to discredit the use of controversial municipal gang databases in immigration proceedings.
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Rescuing MLK and his Children’s Crusade
January 14, 2022
In “Civil Rights Queen: Constance Baker Motley and the Struggle for Equality,” Harvard Law Professor Tomiko Brown-Nagin traces the tactics of the groundbreaking lawyer amid pivotal protests.
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Weighing President Biden’s first year: Voting and elections
January 11, 2022
Harvard Law School election law expert Ruth Greenwood applauds the Biden administration’s support for new voting legislation, but says the filibuster remains an obstacle to finishing the job.
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In Memoriam: Lani Guinier 1950 – 2022
January 7, 2022
Lani Guinier, the first African-American woman to be tenured at Harvard Law School and an influential scholar who devoted her life to justice, equality, empowerment, and democracy, died Jan. 7.
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Supreme Court preview: Garland v. Gonzalez
January 4, 2022
Two Harvard Law School scholars explain why the Garland v. Gonzalez case could have broader implications for immigrants and advocates.
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January 6, 2021: Harvard Law experts reflect a year later
January 4, 2022
Harvard Law Today asked experts from across Harvard Law School to share their perspectives on January 6, 2021, the events that have unfolded since, and the implications for American democracy going forward.
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On the bookshelf
November 30, 2021
Here are some of the latest from HLS authors to add to your reading list over the holiday break.
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‘Talent is equally distributed; opportunity is not’
November 30, 2021
Future-L, a pilot collaboration between Harvard Law School and the National Education Equity Lab, introduces high-achieving high school students from historically underserved backgrounds to the legal field.
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The Tortys return
November 24, 2021
Oscars-style event back in person for its fifth year, celebrating student short films on tort law and justice.
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In their honor
November 10, 2021
To mark Veterans Day, Harvard Law Today highlights a few of the profiles and stories that illustrate the profound commitment of those in the HLS community to service and the law.
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In a potentially precedent-setting case, Veterans Clinic students work to help LGBTQ widower secure VA benefits
November 8, 2021
Members of the Veterans Legal Clinic at Harvard Law School are representing a same-sex widower in his appeal before the VA and in federal court in a potentially precedent-setting case.
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‘I felt almost like I had a responsibility; people my age were getting blown up, and I’m sitting here in college.’
November 2, 2021
As a U.S. Marine in Afghanistan, Nathan Lowry ’24 led a team of counterterrorism intelligence specialists targeting Taliban operations.
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‘Protect expression, protect speech, protect thinking’
October 20, 2021
During a recent discussion about his new collection of essays, “Say it Loud! On Race, Law, History, and Culture,” Randall Kennedy shared background on a few of his favorite pieces, defended free thought, and spoke about his view on the future of race relations in America.
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Intisar Rabb has been appointed special adviser to ICC prosecutor
September 28, 2021
Professor Intisar Rabb, director of the Program in Islamic Law at Harvard Law School, was appointed as a special adviser on Islamic Law to the new chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court.
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‘We have to spend more time on the inequalities that are embedded in the law itself’
September 21, 2021
September 2021 saw the publication of the inaugural issue of The American Journal of Law and Equality, a project developed by Professors Martha Minow, Randall Kennedy, and Cass Sunstein, in collaboration with MIT Press.
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‘Our original Constitution was both brilliant and highly flawed’
September 15, 2021
Harvard Law Professor Alan Jenkins discusses the U.S. Constitution and its treatment of race, how to guarantee fundamental rights, and why lawyers should be better communicators.
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Investigating mask mandate bans
September 13, 2021
Michael Ashley Stein ’88, executive director of the Harvard Law School Project on Disability, says the Department of Education should go beyond the Americans with Disabilities Act in investigating state bans against mandating face coverings in schools.
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John B. Bellinger III ’86: ‘I really mostly worry about the future’
September 10, 2021
Former legal adviser to the National Security Council during the Bush administration says 20 years after 9/11, he's frustrated there hasn't been more progress toward an international legal framework for dealing with terrorism.
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Juan C. Zarate ’97: ‘There’s a lot of presumption of the demise of American power, and I’m raging against that’
September 10, 2021
A counterterrorism czar in the Bush administration, and the first-ever assistant secretary of the Treasury for terrorist financing and financial crimes, says the U.S. needs to reconceptualize what power means in the 21st century.
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Jane Harman ’69: ‘We haven’t learned that when we work together we overcome’
September 10, 2021
Twenty years after the 9/11 attacks, a former California congresswoman and ranking member of House Intelligence Committee reflects on events of that day and the calamities we still confront.
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Twenty years after 9/11, leaders in the nation’s response reflect
September 9, 2021
On the 20th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, Harvard Law Today asked five Harvard Law School alumni and a former adjunct professor, all of whom had prominent roles in counterterrorism and other national policies during and after 9/11, to share their reflections about the events of that day.
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Michael Chertoff ’78: ‘What are we going to do to make sure it doesn’t arise again?’
September 9, 2021
The former head of Homeland Security and co-author of the USA Patriot Act says the U.S. needs a strategy for dislodging terrorist groups.
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A co-author of the 9/11 Commission report, who served on the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States, says engaged citizenry united in its efforts will make this country safer.
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Each year, half of HLS’ first-year J.D. students and around a quarter of LL.M. students participate in at least one of HLS' 11 Student Practice Organizations, with some involved in multiple organizations at once.
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A special responsibility
September 9, 2021
As special master of the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund, or VCF, Rupa Bhattacharyya ’95 is working to ensure that fair compensation goes to the victims of the attacks.
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Faculty on the move
September 1, 2021
With the start of the academic year, a look at nine faculty who have joined Harvard Law School, been promoted, or taken on new roles in 2021.
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Fourteen selected as Wasserstein Public Interest Fellows
August 6, 2021
This academic year, 14 Wasserstein Public Interest Fellows have been named at Harvard Law School.
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Polyamory and the law
August 3, 2021
Harvard Law Lecturer on Law Alexander Chen '15, founding director of the LGBTQ+ Advocacy Clinic at HLS, is working with students in the recently-formed Polyamory Legal Advocacy Coalition to offer legal protections for people in polyamorous relationships.