Harvard Law Review Elects Sophia Hunt as Second Black Female President in 137 Years
In a historic move, Harvard Law Review has elected Sophia M. Hunt as its next president, marking only the second time in its 137-year history that a Black woman will lead the prestigious law journal.
Hunt is a Harvard College graduate in History & Literature, pursued a sociology PhD at Stanford University before taking a leave to earn a law degree from Harvard. She is focused on studying racial and class inequality in the legal system. Influenced by the racial justice movement that gained momentum after the high-profile killings of Black individuals by police, Hunt expressed her passion for criminal defence work. She traces her interest back to the formative years of her political and social awakening during the aftermath of Michael Brown's death in 2014.
Hunt's journey includes clerking for the federal public defender office in Washington, D.C., and upcoming plans to work with the Brooklyn Defender Services.
The Harvard Law Review has a legacy of producing legal and political luminaries, including former President Barack Obama, who served as its first Black president in 1990. Hunt succeeds Apsara Iyer, the first Indian-American woman to lead the Law Review, and has been commended as a "visionary scholar and editor" by her predecessor. In response to recent campus tensions over the Israel-Hamas conflict, Hunt emphasised her dedication to leveraging the diversity of editors to address neglected areas in legal discourse.
The next volume of the Harvard Law Review is anticipated to benefit from Hunt's interdisciplinary approach, as she plans to publish original, well-researched scholarship. The student-edited journal, founded in 1887, maintains the largest circulation of any law journal globally and is published monthly from November through June.
