Courthouse named for law professor, Obama mentor
The Merced County courthouse in Merced has been named for a native son who went from working in the fields to a distinguished career at Harvard Law School, where he taught Barack and Michelle Obama.
Family members and supporters attended a ceremony Friday naming the courthouse to honor Charles James Ogletree Jr.'s contributions to law, education and civil rights, the Fresno Bee reported.
Ogletree, 70, represented Anita Hill when she accused Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment during his U.S. Supreme Court confirmation hearings in 1991, and he defended the late rapper Tupac Shakur in criminal and civil cases. He also fought unsuccessfully for reparations for members of Tulsa, Oklahoma's Black community who survived a 1921 race massacre by white people.
The legal scholar, who retired from Harvard in 2020 after a diagnosis of Alzheimer's, did not attend. But a brother and sister were among dozens of people, including judges and notable community members.
Ogletree has spoken of his humble roots, where he grew up in poverty on the south side of the railroad tracks in Merced in an area of Black and brown families. His parents were seasonal farm laborers, and he picked peaches, almonds and cotton in the summer. He went to college at Stanford University and then Harvard Law School. Richard Ogletree said if his brother had been present for the ceremony, he would expect him to say what he has heard him say in previous speeches and presentations: “I stand on the shoulders of others.”
“He always wants to give credit to others and not accept credit himself, which he so richly deserves,” said Ogletree, who called his brother his hero.
The idea to name the Merced courthouse after Charles Ogletree was spearheaded by the Merced branch of the NAACP, Adam Gray, and other devoted members of the community.
But getting to Friday's momentous naming ceremony wasn't an overnight process. Gray, who up until recently served in the state Assembly representing Merced, began working closely with the NAACP two years ago to get the necessary legislation passed to name the courthouse after Charles Ogletree.
Gray and the group also had to work with California's Judicial Council to get the courthouse name approved.
“As one of Merced's native sons who has made incredible contributions to the advancement of racial justice in the American legal system, there is no more deserving individual on whom to bestow the honor of naming this courthouse than professor Ogletree,” Gray said.
Allen Brooks, president of the Merced NAACP, said the occasion is also fitting, given that February is Black History Month. “He's a pillar of our community. His name still rings loudly through our barbershops, through our grocery stores, so this is a wonderful achievement.” Brooks said.
“Adam Gray's team, the NAACP team, we got together and made sure that this happened.”
Many public officials and members of Merced County's legal community attended Friday's event, including Merced County Superior Court Presiding Judge Mark Bacciarini, Judge Brian McCabe and Judge Donald Proietti.
“Dr. Ogletree has put Merced on the map in many ways, which makes the three judges here very proud. All three of us were also born and raised in Merced,” Bacciarini told the audience Friday.