Through 44 legal clinics and student practice organizations, HLS students provide thousands of hours of free legal services to clients around the world each year. For one day last fall, we followed just a handful of these clinics to see their work—and their efforts to advance justice—in action. Here is a look at that day.
“Just Mercy,” the film based on the memoir by Bryan Stevenson ’85, ends with a sobering statistic: For every nine people executed in the U.S., one on death row is exonerated. As Professor Carol Steiker noted in a discussion following a screening of the film, that makes the U.S. No. 1 in a problematic category.
This fall, the Harvard Law School Library hosted a series of book talks by Harvard Law School authors on topics ranging from forgiveness in law, transparency in health and fidelity in constitutional practice.
Led by Carol Steiker, the Henry J. Friendly Professor of Law and faculty co-director of the Criminal Justice Policy Program, the Capital Punishment Clinic at Harvard Law School tests the complex body of constitutional law that regulates the death penalty and its troubled history.
This spring, Professors Jody Freeman, Alex Whiting, Carol Steiker and Paul Butler each shared personal stories and experiences with a group of soon-to-be graduates poised to enter the new phase of Life After HLS as part of the Last Lecture Series, an event sponsored annually by the 3L and LL.M. Class Marshals.
The Harvard Law School Class of 2018 selected Carol Steiker ’86 for the prestigious Albert M. Sacks-Paul A. Freund Award for Teaching Excellence.
Carol Steiker ’86 began her Last Lecture to the class of 2018 by sharing the questions she is frequently asked by students–what electives and classes to take, what summer job they should seek–and the advice she gives them: “It doesn’t matter that much.”
On April 20, HLS in the Community wrapped up a year-long celebration of Harvard Law School’s bicentennial by highlighting the contributions made by HLS clinics and students practice organizations (SPOs).
Now in its second year, the Harvard Law School Public Interest Scavenger Hunt continued its focus on HLS history and trivia, but also highlighted alumni who have done important public interest work.
Bryan Stevenson has battled through the courts, defending the wrongly convicted and children prosecuted as adults, while condemning mass incarceration and racial bias in the criminal justice system; now, he is embarking on a fight to start a national conversation about the painful legacy of slavery, which he says “continues to haunt us today.”
