Henry Harold Kennedy Jr.

Nominated by President Clinton, Judge Kennedy has served as a U.S. District Judge in Washington, D.C. since October of 1997. He came to the federal bench directly from the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, where he was a judge for the previous 17 years. Judge Kennedy’s first judicial post was as a United States Magistrate for the District of Columbia from 1976 to 1979. Prior to that, he was an Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, which is where he began his legal career after being admitted to the bar in December 1973.

Judge Kennedy received his J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1973 and his undergraduate degree in 1970 from Princeton University. He has since served on the University’s Board of Trustees. While at Princeton, he studied at the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. He was also a founder of Community House, an extracurricular program that gives Princeton students the opportunity to be of assistance to the broader Princeton community.

An avid competitive tennis player, Judge Kennedy was a nationally ranked amateur and won four American Tennis Association championships. He has been a member of the boards of organizations that encourage young people to participate in tennis, including the Washington Tennis and Education Foundation and the Junior Tennis Champions Center.

Judge Kennedy was born in Columbia, South Carolina in 1948. He moved with his family to the District of Columbia when he was nine years old, and subsequently attended Coolidge High School.

Judge Kennedy is married to Altomease Rucker Kennedy, an attorney in private practice in Washington and a published novelist. They have two children, Morgan and Alexandra, both of whom are Princeton graduates. Morgan is also a graduate of Harvard Law School. Judge Kennedy’s younger brother, Randall, likewise a Princeton graduate, is a professor at Harvard Law School and respected legal scholar and author.