Reginald Heber Smith Community Lawyer Fellowship Program

Organization

Staff Only

Historical Note

The Reginald Heber Smith Community Lawyer Fellowship Program (RHS) was established in 1967 in order to attract young lawyers to the field of poverty law. Initially sponsored by the Legal Services Program within the Office of Economic Opportunity and administered by the University of Pennsylvania, the program recruited recent law school graduates, trained them in various aspects of poverty law, and placed them (for one or two years) in regional legal services projects throughout the country.

The program was named for Reginald Heber Smith, author of Justice and the Poor (1919), a work that is credited with furthering the legal aid movement in the United States; and the Program's Fellows were accordingly called Reggies. In 1969, the Program was moved from the University of Pennsylvania to Howard University where greater emphasis was placed on attracting minority Fellows. When OEO was dismantled in the mid-1970's, the Reggie Program moved to the Legal Services Corporation. From 1967 to 1985, when the program ended, there were approximately 2,000 Reggies.

Found in 6 Collections and/or Records:

Clinton Bamberger Papers

Collection

Identifier: NEJL-033

Scope and Contents The papers of E. Clinton Bamberger Jr. document Bamberger's career as a legal services administrator, educator, and advocate. The collection, to some extent, also documents the history of legal services in the United States from the mid 1960's through the mid 1990's. And while some items such as articles and neighborhood law office handbooks and manuals pre-date the mid-1960's, the collection essentially begins with Bamberger's arrival on the scene as the first Director of the Legal...

Dates: ca. 1960-ca. 1990

Found in: National Equal Justice Library / Clinton Bamberger Papers

Henry A. Freedman Papers

Collection

Identifier: NEJL-014

Scope and Contents This collection consists of Legal Services Corporation (LSC) materials covering such matters as litigation with LSC as defendant, back-up centers, and legislation. Other materials relate to Action for Legal Rights and other legal organizations such as NLADA and Poverty Lawyers for Effective Advocacy. Forms of material include memos, news clippings, journal articles, reports and brochures.The Henry A. Freedman papers are organized into two series: Legal Services Corporation materials and...

Dates: 1967 - 2000

Found in: National Equal Justice Library / Henry A. Freedman Papers

Kent Morrison Papers

Collection

Identifier: NEJL-004

Scope and Contents

The Legal Services Program file contains materials related to Morrison's work during his tenure from 1972 to 1973 as Acting Chief of the Evaluation Division of the Office of Economic Opportunity’s Legal Services Program, and Special Assistant to the Director of that office.

The second series contains materials related to Morrison's tenure as Executive Director of El Paso Legal Assistance Society from 1971-1972.

Dates: 1964 - 1975

Found in: National Equal Justice Library / Kent Morrison Papers

Marna Tucker Papers

Collection

Identifier: NEJL-002

Dates: 1968 - 1974

Found in: National Equal Justice Library / Marna Tucker Papers