Harvard Law Review

The Harvard Law Review published its first issue on April 15, 1887, making it one of the oldest operating student-edited law reviews in the United States.[2] The establishment of the journal was largely due to the support of Louis Brandeis, then a recent Harvard Law School alumnus and Boston attorney who would later go on to become a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.

From the 1880s to the 1970s, editors were selected on the basis of their grades; the president of the Review was the student with the highest academic rank. The first female editor of the journal was Priscilla Holmes (1953-1955, Volumes 67-68);[3] the first woman to serve as the journal's president was Susan Estrich (1977), who later was active in Democratic Party politics and became the youngest woman to receive tenure at Harvard Law School; its first non-white ethnic minority president was Raj Marphatia (1988, Volume 101), who is now a partner at the Boston law firm of Ropes & Gray;[4][5][6] its first African-American president was the 44th President of the United States Barack Obama (1991);[7][8] its first openly gay president was Mitchell Reich (2011);[9] its first Latino president was Andrew M. Crespo, who is now tenured as a professor at Harvard Law School.[10] The first female African-American president, ImeIme Umana, was elected in 2017.[11]

Gannett House, a white building constructed in the Greek Revival style that was popular in New England during the mid-to-late 19th century, has been home to the Harvard Law Review since the 1920s. Before moving into Gannett House, the journal resided in the Law School's Austin Hall.

Since the change of criteria in the 1970s, grades are no longer the primary basis of selection for editors. Membership in the Harvard Law Review is offered to select Harvard law students based on first-year grades and performance in a writing competition held at the end of the first year except for twelve slots that are offered on a discretionary basis.[12][7][13] The writing competition includes two components: an edit of an unpublished article and an analysis of a recent United States Supreme Court or Court of Appeals case.[12] The writing competition submissions are graded blindly to assure anonymity.[13][14] Fourteen editors (two from each 1L section) are selected based on a combination of their first-year grades and their competition scores. Twenty editors are selected based solely on their competition scores. The remaining twelve editors are selected on a discretionary basis. According to the law review's webpage, "Some of these discretionary slots may be used to implement the Review's affirmative action policy."[12] The president of the Harvard Law Review is elected by the other editors.[7][15]

It has been a long tradition, apparently since the first issue, that the works of students published in the Harvard Law Review are called "notes," and they are unsigned as part of a policy reflecting "the fact that many members of the Review besides the author make a contribution to each published piece."[16]

In 2012, Harvard Law Review had 1,722 paid subscriptions.[17]

Volume 1 of the Harvard Law Review (1887–1888).

Prominent alumni of the Harvard Law Review include:

• Harvard Law Record
• Hart–Fuller debate

• Official website