Law Students Will Argue Discrimination Complaints

Law student members of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau have been permitted to appear in housing cases before the Massachusetts Commission Against Discrimination.

This is the first time that persons other than members of the state bar have been allowed to appear before a Massachusetts administrative commission.

Attorney General Elliot L. Richardson '41 made the change by directing MCAD chairman Malcolm C. Webber to allow Legal Aid members to represent complainants before the Commission.

Law students have represented indigent clients in all state courts and in the Federal District Court in Boston for over thirty years.

Students will be given permission to appear before other state commissions one by one, Deanne C. Siemer 3L, president of the Bureau, said last night. She called the state's decision a "major breakthrough."

Richardson's order will propel the Bureau's chief efforts into specialized areas such as fair housing and mental health, she said.

Miss Siemer said that "the kinds of decisions commissions make usually have greater consequence for the individual than court decisions do," particularly in these two fields.

The Office of Economic Opportunity's establishment of 40 neighborhood legal centers in eastern Massachusetts has also contributed to the Bureau's new focus, Miss Siemer said. Fourteen of the centers are in Boston.

Most of the Bureau's 1600 yearly cases deal with routine matters and family problems. Miss Siemer said she hopes that the OEO centers will relieve much of this load, leaving students free to work in specialized areas.