Harvard Law Review

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Lore & Background

The Harvard Law Review has been home to Gannett House, a white building constructed in the Greek Revival style popular in New England during the mid-to-late 19th century, since the 1920s; before that, it resided in the Law School's Austin Hall. From the 1880s to the 1970s, editors were selected based on their grades, with the president being the student with the highest academic rank. Since the change in criteria in the 1970s, membership is offered based on first-year grades and performance in a writing competition held at the end of the first year, except for twelve slots offered on a discretionary basis. The writing competition includes an edit of an unpublished article and an analysis of a recent United States Supreme Court or Court of Appeals case, graded blindly. Fourteen editors are selected based on a combination of grades and competition scores, twenty based solely on competition scores, and twelve on a discretionary basis, with some slots possibly used to implement the Review's affirmative action policy. The president is elected by the other editors. The first female editor was Priscilla Holmes (1953–1955, Volumes 67–68); the first woman to serve as president was Susan Estrich (1977); the first non-white ethnic minority president was Raj Marphatia (1988, Volume 101); the first African-American president was Barack Obama (1991); the first openly gay president was Mitchell Reich (2011); the first Latino president was Andrew M. Crespo; and the first female African-American president, ImeIme Umana, was elected in 2017.

Reader's Guide

The Harvard Law Review is significant as one of the oldest and most cited student-edited law reviews in the United States. According to the Journal Citation Reports, its 2015 impact factor of 4.979 placed it first out of 143 journals in the category 'Law', and it also ranks first in other ranking systems of law reviews. The journal, in conjunction with the Columbia Law Review, the University of Pennsylvania Law Review, and the Yale Law Journal, publishes The Bluebook, the primary guide for legal citation formats in the United States. Its alumni include a U.S. President (Barack Obama), multiple Supreme Court Justices (including Stephen Breyer, Felix Frankfurter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Ketanji Brown Jackson, Elena Kagan, John G. Roberts Jr., Antonin Scalia, and Edward Sanford), and numerous other jurists and government officials. The Review has a tradition of student works called 'notes' that are unsigned, reflecting the collaborative contribution of many members. In 2012, it had 1,722 paid subscriptions. In November 2023, the Review stopped publication of a commissioned essay by Rabea Eghbariah, leading to objections from 25 editors who called the decision an 'unprecedented decision [that] threatens academic freedom and perpetuates the suppression of Palestinian voices.' The essay was later published in The Nation and The Harbinger of the N.Y.U. Review of Law & Social Change, and expanded as a full article in the Columbia Law Review.

Did You Know?

• The Harvard Law Review's first issue was published on April 15, 1887, making it one of the oldest operating student-edited law reviews in the United States.
• Its establishment was largely due to the support of Louis Brandeis, then a recent Harvard Law School alumnus and Boston attorney who later became a Supreme Court Justice.
• The first female editor was Priscilla Holmes (1953–1955, Volumes 67–68); the first woman to serve as president was Susan Estrich (1977).
• Barack Obama served as president of volume 104 of the Harvard Law Review.
• In November 2023, the Harvard Law Review stopped publication of a commissioned essay by Rabea Eghbariah, which was later published in The Nation and The Harbinger of the N.Y.U. Review of Law & Social Change.