4 Wilkins on a Today profession in Harvard Law rapid flux november 2005 november

‘Promises to keep’ Obama leads focus on Katrina aftermath during Celebration of Black Alumni

By Dick Dahl he 2005 celebration of Black Alumni, held at HLS in mid-September, was the Dean Elena Kagan ’86 moderated the panel discussion second chapter in a story that began five between top judges from the U.S. and the U.K. T

JUSTIN IDE/HARVARD UNIV. NEWS OFFICE NEWS UNIV. IDE/HARVARD JUSTIN years earlier. Sharon E. Jones ’82 remembers the excitement she and other participants felt in 2000 Judging on both sides during the first Celebration of Black Alumni: a sense that they were making history. This time, of the Atlantic said Jones, who co-chaired the 2005 celebration with Neil Brown ’78 (’79), although the excitement Comparing roles, American and was there, “there was more of a focus on ‘Where do British judges agree more than differ we go from here?’” That focus was reflected in the event’s theme: By Michael Armini “Promises to Keep: Challenges and Opportunities t’s not every day that two Supreme Court in the 21st Century.” The celebration drew more justices speak at Harvard Law School. This fall, than 1,000 participants—many of the country’s top Ithe school hosted five—assuming you take a black lawyers working in settings ranging from global view. law firms to corporations to nongovernmental At a September event that packed the Ames organizations and academia. Substantive Courtroom and an overflow room in Langdell Hall, discussions occurred in sessions U.S. Supreme Court Justices Stephen Breyer ’64 and 3 At a gather- on topics such as “Strategies to Antonin Scalia ’60 were joined by three of their British ing of black Survive and Thrive in Large Law counterparts for a panel discussion titled “The Practice alumni, a Firms” and “Promises to Keep: of Judging: Comparative Perspectives.” call to fight Serving the Public Interest.” The U.K. judges included The Right Honourable The complacency But a celebratory tone was also After Hurricane Katrina, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama ’91 Lord Rodger of Earlsferry, The Right Honourable The evident throughout, starting the challenged black alumni Lord Scott of Foscote and The Right Honourable The day before the event began, with the dedication to ask, “Are we doing everything we can?” Lady Justice Arden LL.M. ’70. All are senior British of the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for judges who decide appellate cases in the U.K. Race and Justice, named after the black civil Moderated by Dean rights lawyer and HLS graduate who laid the legal Elena Kagan ’86, a former groundwork for Brown v. Board of Education. “We’re not there to clerk for Justice Thurgood During the weekend, black luminaries who make sure the good Marshall, the discussion graduated from HLS were recognized for their guy won and the focused primarily on contributions. They included 93-year-old George bad guy lost.” comparisons between Leighton ’43 (’46), former U.S. district judge for the Antonin Scalia ’60 the American and British northern district of Illinois, who is still practicing judicial systems. Kagan law with the Chicago firm Neal & Leroy. began the event by The star of the weekend—who sold out the asking Scalia and Breyer if they agreed with the notion Sept. 17 Harvard Law School Association Award that American judges act primarily as “umpires,” Luncheon and attracted crowds of students and an analogy debated during the recent confirmation others outside the entrance to the Holmes Field hearings of John G. Roberts Jr. ’79, now chief justice of tent where it was taking place, and in several over- the United States. flow rooms—was U.S. Sen. Barack H. Obama ’91. While he didn’t refute the concept, Scalia said that Obama, the first black president of the Law Review, the Supreme Court is different from other courts received the HLSA Award for his commitment to

because of its ability to decide which cases it will >>6public service, an honor traditionally >>7 PHIL FARNSWORTH BY PHOTOGRAPHS

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Celebration of black alumni continued from page 1 ECHOES… bestowed decades after graduation. Dean Elena Kagan ’86 presented Obama with the …from the Celebration of Black Alumni award. She has known him since their days together at the University of Chicago Law School, where she was a professor and he was an adjunct professor. Introducing “WHEN I ENTERED this law a celebration of a life in the law issued, you will hop in your SUV, Obama at the alumni gathering, she referred to his school the day after Labor that has been successful. And it and fill it up with $100 worth of now-famous speech at the Democratic National Day in 1940, there were five is the proper thing to celebrate. gasoline, and load up your trunk Convention in Boston in July 2004. other colored faces in a class And what we have to do by with some sparkling water, and “Barack spoke, in that convention speech, of ‘the of 1,249 students. … Since then, example and by other successes take your credit card and check audacity of hope,’” Kagan said. “Barack, Senator an affirmative action program is to prove what I think is obvious: into the nearest hotel until the Obama, you give so many of us hope—hope in our was instituted in this law school. The increase of a diverse storm passes. And the notion political life, hope in our country and hope in the population at the law school, that folks couldn’t do that simply future.” the opening of the law school did not register in the minds In his own remarks, Obama focused in part on to others with ability and of those in charge. And it’s not governmental failures revealed by Hurricane Katrina. opportunity, benefits everybody, surprising that it didn’t register, He said that he was angered by the “achingly slow” including the society in which we because it hasn’t registered for response of the Federal Emergency Management live.” the past six, seven, eight, 20, 50, Agency. But he told the The Hon. George Leighton ’43 75, 100 years. The incompetence 3 Black lawyers audience that criticizing the (’46), U.S. district judge (ret.), at was color-blind. But what was agree: corporations Bush administration or the the CBA luncheon important to understand was must do more for Republican Congress was the fact that the people we the inner cities an insufficient answer. “The “I DO NOT ASCRIBE to the saw in front of the Superdome truth is, we haven’t been White House … any actual malice. and in front of the convention

entirely on the case either,” he said. “We’ve been a PHIL FARNSWORTH I don’t think they were there center, they’d been abandoned little complacent. We haven’t displayed the kind of That was an innovation in the plotting and saying, You know, before the hurricane. They had cool, focused outrage that Charles Hamilton Houston administration of American law these were black people; let’s been abandoned to dilapidated displayed when the calamities of Jim Crow were schools. Who started it? Erwin not rescue them. But rather housing, and inadequate schools, occurring around him. In fact, our anger at Bush and Griswold, Louis A. Toepfer and what was revealed was a passive and the mayhem and violence the administration lets us off the hook. It allows us to the faculty of this great law indifference that is common and chaos that exist in inner cities say, ‘Well, I didn’t vote for him. I wrote John Kerry a school. And now see what has in our culture, common in our all around the country.” check, so it’s not my problem.’ But of course it is our happened, what has blossomed society, a sense that, of course, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama ’91, at problem.” into a celebration of black alumni, once the evacuation order is the CBA luncheon Hurricane Katrina—which had struck only two weeks earlier—and related issues of social inequities came up in discussions throughout the event. In a energy to rectifying social problems. “I don’t think the the day, I think it’s our responsibility.” plenary session, “Lawyers as Leaders: Charting the purpose of the corporation is just to make money,” said In the same session, David Lammy LL.M. ’97, Course of Corporate America,” participants seemed to Adebayo O. Ogunlesi ’79, executive vice chairman and Member of Parliament and minister for culture in the agree that the corporate world needs to devote greater chief client officer of Credit Suisse First Boston. He United Kingdom, said one of the things that Katrina argued that focusing on short- revealed to the rest of the world was a “paradox” term profit is not only morally about black America. “I think that we have fooled New Houston institute launched at HLS and ethically wrong, but bad ourselves into a false sense of security,” he said. “When The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice was long-term business as well. we see images of Oprah and Denzel Washington and officially launched at Harvard Law School on Thursday, Sept. 15, kicking During another panel, “A Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell, when you hear off the Celebration of Black Alumni that followed over the next three Global Commitment: The about a group of people coming together like this—the days. Power and Influence of HLS people just in this room—we forget about the nature The new institute honors the legacy of Charles Hamilton Houston Alumni,” Deborah C. Wright of poverty in America and the world. The images from ’22 S.J.D. ’23, the attorney primarily responsible for mapping out the ’84, chairman, president and New Orleans have brought plaintiffs’ litigation strategy in Brown v. Board of Education. CEO of Carver Bank Corp. Inc., back to the entire world the “It is a distinct honor to serve as the founding director of an institute in Harlem, said she thought fight that you had in the that will further the vision of racial justice and equality that was so Hurricane Katrina revealed 1960s for civil rights. They well articulated by Charles Hamilton Houston,” said Professor Charles “how weak the private sector have come back to remind us Ogletree Jr. ’78. is in our central cities, the that there is more to do.” The institute will sponsor interdisciplinary research on issues such as wealth gap, the talent gap,” That reminder reverber- voting rights, the future of affirmative action and the role of race in the and suggested that black HLS ated throughout the criminal justice system. alumni find ways to strengthen Celebration of Black Alumni. Several hundred participants attended panels and heard from a American inner cities Obama concluded his speech number of speakers, including members of the Houston family, surviving financially. “The reality is that by echoing words of Dr. PHIL FARNSWORTH members of the legal team that fought successfully for the Supreme a huge base of our people are in Martin Luther King Jr.: “The Court’s landmark ruling in Brown, Supreme Court Associate Justice the inner cities, and they need arc of the moral universe is long, and it bends toward Stephen Breyer ’64, Howard Law School Dean Kurt Schmoke ’76, us to focus on every possible justice. But it doesn’t bend on its own. It bends because Harvard University President Lawrence Summers, Dean Elena Kagan way that we can to get first- each of us—Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood ’86, Assistant Professor Kenneth Mack ’91 and Professor Cornel West of class resources and talent in Marshall and John Lewis and all of you—puts your Princeton. there. If we don’t do it, I’m not hand on the arc and you bend it in the direction of ø sure who will. So at the end of justice. That’s our task. That’s what we must do.” 2005 november today law harvard

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