Annual Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. Lecture
The 29th Annual Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. Lecture (2023)
Maya Wiley, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights and The Leadership Conference Education Fund
About the Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. Lecture
(National Archives, Washington, D.C.)
The annual Joseph L. Rauh, Jr. Lecture series serves as a dedicated forum at UDC Law in which leading members of the bench or bar speak directly to the people of the District and the law school community on issues of vital importance to the practice of law in the public interest.
Established in 1993 in honor of the late civil liberties attorney and founding member of the law school Board of Governors Joe Rauh, some of the nation’s most respected civil rights and public interest figures – including then-U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, U.S. Supreme Court Justices Ruth Bader Ginsberg and Sonia Sotomayor and many others – have delivered the Rauh Lecture.
The Rauh Lecture, which is open to the public and free of charge, includes a catered reception at the conclusion of the event courtesy of the D.C. School of Law Foundation.
About Joe Rauh
Joe Rauh envisioned a law school that would function as a training ground for public interest lawyers: a school where law students could learn basic skills and represent the underrepresented at the same time, a school that made dedication to public service a criterion for admission and commitment to public service a life-long responsibility. The University of the District of Columbia David A. Clarke School of Law is Joe Rauh’s dream come true. A founding member of the Law School’s Board of Governors, Rauh remained one of its staunchest supporters until his last hours with us.
Past Rauh Lecturers
2019
vanita gupta
stephen bright
sen. cory booker
bryan stevenson
tom perez
sen. elizabeth warren
supreme court justice sonia sotomayor
harold koh
| 2010 | Eric Holder |
| 2009 | Sen. Patrick Leahy |
| 2008 | Vernon Jordan |
| 2007 | Nina Totenberg interviewed by Wade Henderson |
| 2006 | Theodore M. Shaw |
| 2005 | Congressman Barney Frank |
| 2004 | Congressman John Lewis |
| 2003 | Marian Wright Edelman |
| 2002 | Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton, Ralph Neas and Wade Henderson on “Civil Rights in the 21st Century” |
| 2001 | Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg |
| 2000 | Charles Ruff |
| 1999 | The Sleep Room (an award-winning film about Joe Rauh’s last case) |
| 1998 | Jack Greenberg |
| 1997 | Elaine Jones |
| 1996 | Father Robert Drinan |
| 1995 | Rick Seymour |
| 1994 | Judith Lichtman & Roger Wilkins |
| 1993 | William Taylor |