Louis Oberdorfer

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Louis Falk Oberdorfer (born February 21, 1919 in Birmingham; died February 21, 2013 in Washington D.C.) was an Assistant U.S. Attorney General and District Court Judge.

Oberdorfer was the son of A. Leo Oberdorfer, an attorney and author, and Stella Falk Oberdorfer. He graduated from Dartmouth College in 1939, then attended Yale Law School for two years before he was drafted to serve in the Army in World War II.

After his discharge, Oberdorfer returned to Yale, graduating in 1946. He then clerked for Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black, a friend of his father's, for a year before joining the Washington D.C. firm of Paul, Weiss, Wharton & Garrison as a tax attorney.

At the invitation of Byron White, Oberdorfer joined Robert Kennedy's Justice Department in 1961 as an Assistant Attorney General in the Tax Division. The position afforded him opportunity to also apply his time to Civil Rights issues.

In 1965 Oberdorfer left the department to return to private practice with Wilmer, Cutler & Pickering. He represented Jacqueline Kennedy in her dispute with William Manchester over his publication of interviews with her in his book The Death of a President.

Oberdorfer was a founder and co-chair of the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law. He served as president of the District of Columbia Bar Association in 1977-1978.

Oberdorfer was appointed by President Jimmy Carter to the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in 1977. As a judge, he opposed mandatory sentencing policies, especially with respect to drug offenders. He also authored a dissent in a ruling preserving the omission of congressional representation for residents of the District.

He assumed status as a senior judge in 1992. He also taught part-time at Georgetown Law Center from 1993 until his death, which occurred on his 94th birthday.

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