Changemaker 10: Charles Hamilton Houston

Today’s changemaker is Charles Hamilton Houston. Born in 1895 in Washington, DC, he served as an Army officer in WWI. He later became a Constitutional attorney who dedicated his life to egalitarianism and the elimination of racial segregation.

He was the first Black editor of the Harvard Law Review and later served as the Dean of Howard University, an Historically Black College or University (HBCU) in Washington, DC. The main law school building at Howard is named for Houston. He later became the special counsel for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and argued several critical civil rights cases before the Supreme Court. In 2005, The Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race and Justice was established at Harvard Law School.

In 2021, a sculpture titled “Unity” was installed at Charles H. Houston Elementary School in Washington, DC. The piece is by Irish sculptor Alex Pentek, who also designed the “Kindred Spirits” sculpture in Cork, Ireland, honoring the generosity of the Choctaw people during the Irish Famine.

Want to know more? During #DouglassWeek this year, we will have a conversation with Alex about his work!

#DouglassWeek #changemakers #bethechange #creativearts #DW2022 #competitiontime #countdown #bethechange #FrederickDouglass #UShistory #Activism #NAACP

📸 Harvard Law Today