Harvard Law Review elects its first black woman president

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ImeIme Umana is the first black woman to be elected as president of the Harvard Law Review.

Umana graduated from Harvard College in 2014 and, according to her LinkedIn profile, hopes to graduate with her law degree in 2018. Her undergraduate studies were focused on government and African-American studies, and she worked as a criminal law investigative intern for the public defender’s office in Washington, D.C. in 2013, where she said that her eyes were opened to the injustices around her.

Congrats to Imelme Umana, HLS ’18, on her selection as President of the Harvard Law Review. 1st black woman to serve as President. #Herstory pic.twitter.com/liqu40K4Va

— Harvard BLSA (@HarvardBLSA) January 30, 2017

“It’s very easy to presume that you know a lot about urban communities and the troubles they face,” Umana told the Harvard Crimson. “I read ‘The New Jim Crow,’ and I read ‘Sister Citizen,’ and I read ‘Killing the Black Body,’ and I’ve watched all of these documentaries, and I’ve written all these papers, but the internship, really, in just a few days, showed me how little I actually did know about the realities of the situation and urban America.”

The current issue of the Harvard Law Review is focused on another history-making president: Barack Obama, who was the first black man elected to the Harvard Law Review presidency before he was President of the United States. We hope that Umana will be just as extraordinary.