Opening Remarks By: Vice Dean Randy Hertz
Moderated By: Prof. Kim Taylor-Thompson
Co-Sponsored By:
NYU Law School Public Interest Law Center (PILC)
Coalition on Law & Representation
National Lawyers Guild
Law Students for Human Rights
Black Allied Law Students Association
Gerald P. López is a Professor of Law at UCLA and a core faculty member of the Critical Race Studies Program. He is the author of several influential books and articles, including Rebellious Lawyering: One Chicano’s Vision of Progressive Law Practice.
In 1975, after a clerkship with the Honorable Edward J. Schwartz, Gerald P. López joined Tom Adler, Roy Cazares and Napoleon Jones in founding a San Diego law firm specializing in criminal defense, civil rights litigation and community mobilization. In 2003, López founded the Center for Community Problem Solving in New York City working with low-income, of color, and immigrant communities to address social, economic and legal problems.
López has litigated extensively as lead counsel in a wide variety of criminal and civil matters before trial courts, appellate courts, and the United States Supreme Court. He has been honored with many community, civil rights and teaching awards, including Stanford Law’s and UCLA Law’s Teacher of the Year, UCLA Law’s Rutter Award for Teaching Excellence, and UCLA’s university-wide Distinguished Teaching Award, the Eby Award for the Art of Teaching. Among the courses he teaches are Rebellious Lawyering Workshop, Reentry Clinic, Economic Development Clinic, Problem Solving Workshop and Transforming Legal Education Workshop.
Through his scholarship, legal work, and pedagogy, López has championed a rebellious vision of progressive legal practice — a vision rooted in the belief that progressive law students and lawyers who seek to support marginalized communities must re-think the assumptions, value systems, and models of practice that continue to inform traditional approaches to public-interest lawyering.