Early life, education and clerkship Born in 1933, Howard was raised in Richmond, Virginia. He graduated from
Thomas Jefferson High School in Richmond. Howard attended the
University of Richmond, graduating first in his class (B.A., 1954). He earned his law degree from the
University of Virginia School of Law, again finishing at the top of his class (1961). He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University, where he read philosophy, politics, and economics. Soon after graduating from law school, Howard was a law clerk to
Justice Hugo L. Black of the
Supreme Court of the United States. When Howard began his clerkship with Justice Black, the balance on the Court had recently tipped toward the liberal side. After years of dissents, Black was now writing for the majority. Howard found himself at Black's elbow when the justice penned some of the
Warren Court's most important decisions, including
Gideon v. Wainwright and
Griffin v. School Board of Prince Edward County. Although his professional experiences are many and varied, Howard considers teaching the center of his academic and professional life. He cares most about his students and is happiest when working with them. In 2013, Howard received the prestigious Thomas Jefferson Award from the University of Virginia. The award commended Howard for advancing, through his character, work, and personal example, the ideals and objectives for which Jefferson founded the University. Howard found in these opinions Black's core belief in three "rules of law"—a rule of law guiding judges in deciding constitutional cases, a rule of law for the people at large, and a rule of law for the body politic—"an open, free society in which people speak their mind, vote their preferences, seek legislative reforms, and have access to the courts to air grievances." Professor Howard has briefed and argued cases before state and federal courts, including the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a regular guest on television news programs; during the Senate Judiciary Committee's hearings on the nomination of
Robert Bork to the Supreme Court, Professor Howard provided gavel-to-gavel coverage for the
McNeil-Lehrer News Program. The media welcomes Howard's ability to distill difficult and lengthy legal materials into simple language.
Foreign constitutions consultant Often consulted by constitutional draftsmen in other states and abroad, Professor Howard has helped constitutional ideas travel. He has compared notes with revisers at work on new constitutions in Brazil, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Romania, Russia, Albania, Malawi, and South Africa. In 1996, the Union of Czech Lawyers awarded him their Randa Medal, citing Professor Howard's promotion of the idea of a civil society in Central Europe; this marked the first time the honor has been conferred upon anyone but a Czech citizen. In 2004, the Greater Richmond Chapter of the
World Affairs Council conferred on him their George C. Marshall Award in International Law and Diplomacy. In 2013, the
Virginia Holocaust Museum and the Virginia Law Foundation bestowed on Howard their Legacy of Nuremberg Award for his "contribution to global standards for the Rule of Law and the prevention of crimes against humanity in the shaping and drafting of constitutions in many lands." Howard has traveled to those countries to discuss how constitutions might fit the realities of post-British, post-American, and post-Soviet empires. He has often hosted legal scholars and constitution makers from around the world at his home in Charlottesville. Indeed, a number of societies adjusting to "the rule of law" owe a debt to the constructive discussions in Howard's garden gazebo or the solarium of his brick Colonial home. In each of these projects, Howard has insisted that his primary role is not to write constitutions but to enlarge the understanding of opinions and choices available to the drafters. Rather than advising drafters to borrow sections from existing constitutions, he has urged them to think through the process themselves. Howard believes the success of a constitution depends on its ability to capture the hopes and aspirations of its people. A constitution cannot create the values on which constitutionalism rest, but the document is nonetheless needed to give voice to the aspirations of democracy. Howard also has warned against treating a constitution as a code of laws that aims to solve all problems. A constitution that remains free of too much detail, he argues, is more likely to endure because it leaves room for organic growth. Howard believes constitutions are more than a letter of instruction for lawyers and judges. He sees them in humanistic terms, ultimately about the people whom they bind and simultaneously describe. == Personal life ==