Charles Ogletree Obituary American Attorney, Harvard Law Professor Has Died

Charles Ogletree Obituary Death – Charles J. Ogletree Jr., a Harvard Law professor who promoted civil rights in the classroom and in court, passed away on August 4 at his home in Odenton, Maryland. He was best known for his persistent but fruitless efforts to secure compensation for the survivors of the 1921 Tulsa race massacre and the descendants of enslaved people. He was 70. From a difficult upbringing in California’s Central Valley, Mr. Ogletree, also known as “Tree,” rose to fame as a public defender in Washington, a preeminent legal theorist at Harvard Law School, and a lawyer for prominent figures including Tupac Shakur, John A. Gotti, the head of the Mafia, and Anita Hill, who accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment.

Mr. Ogletree attended Harvard Law School, where he graduated with a law degree in 1978 and started teaching there in 1984. Harvard Law School had previously been noted for its concentration on legal theory. Additionally, he added some diversity to a faculty that was predominately White. Barack and Michelle Obama were among the students that Mr. Ogletree supervised. He promoted the idea that the law should be viewed as “a tool to empower the dispossessed and disenfranchised” and “an instrument for social and political change.”

In order to achieve this, he established the Harvard Criminal Justice Institute, where students advocate for underprivileged Boston area clients. He also established the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race & Justice, a center for public policy and legal advocacy named after the civil rights attorney who taught Oliver Hill, who helped overturn legal segregation in Virginia, and Thurgood Marshall, the first Black Supreme Court justice, as well as a “Saturday school” program geared toward minority students seeking additional training in the complexities of tort law or civil procedure.

According to fellow Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz, “If you mention the name ‘Ogletree,’ I don’t think the word ‘weakness’ comes into anyone’s mind,” he said in the Boston Globe in 1995. “This man can be anything he wants to be. He might hold the positions of judge, dean, or justice on the Supreme Court. He is a man for every occasion.