Law Department
Straight University also offered professional training, including a law department from 1874 to 1886, and its graduates participated in local and national Reconstruction and post-Reconstruction era civil rights struggles. For example, 1876 Straight University Law School graduate, Louis André Martinet, published The Crusader--a civil rights daily, co-founded the Comité des Citoyens (Citizens' Committee), and played a significant role in the Plessy v. Ferguson landmark Supreme Court case.
The Law department is historically notable because blacks and whites were trained side by side. "It is an interesting fact of our 50 law graduates, 35 have been white." The school struggled to provide its law students a proper research library. The students typically met for classes in the law professors offices.
In 1886, Straight discontinued the Law Department and began to focus on the liberal arts, industrial arts, and teacher training.
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