First Glimpse of Awaited Obama Harvard Video
- Posted on March 7, 2012 at 1:36pm by
Madeleine Morgenstern
Image source: Buzzfeed/YouTube
Editor’s note: See update below.
The video of a young Barack Obama addressing a Harvard Law School protest emerged Wednesday, showing the future president speaking out in support of one professor’s protest for racial diversity.
The 1991 video, posted by BuzzFeed, shows Obama — then the president of the Harvard Law Review — speaking glowingly of Professor Derrick Bell, who had vowed to take a leave of absence until a black woman was given tenure at the law school.
Watch below (transcript follows):
Obama: “And I remember that the black law students had organized an orientation for the first-year students. And one of the — persons who spoke at that orientation was Professor Bell. And I remember him sauntering up to the front and not giving us a lecture, but engaging us in a conversation and speaking the truth and telling us that he [inaudible] to learn at this place that I’ve carried with me ever since. Now how did this one man do all this? How has he accomplished all this? He hasn’t done it simply by his good looks and easy charm — although he has both in ample measure. He hasn’t done it simply because of the excellence of his scholarship, although his scholarship has opened up new vistas and new horizons and changed the standards of what legal writing is about. Open up your hearts and your minds to the words of Professor Derrick Bell.”
According to BuzzFeed — which licensed the footage from Boston public broadcasting station WGBH — this is the first time this particular video has been available online.
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