Obama’s Legal Career Wasn’t All About Civil Rights

During his four-year career as a Chicago lawyer, Barack Obama did indeed handle a number of civil rights cases.

But in addition to the legal work he highlights in his initial autobiography and on the presidential campaign trail, he also handled a number of more routine cases, such as real estate transactions, minor litigation and incorporation matters, reports the Los Angeles Times.

Newly graduated from Harvard Law School, Obama completed his autobiography, Dreams from My Father, and took a job at a 13-attorney law firm then known as Davis, Miner, Barnhill & Gallard which had a reputation for civil rights work. "The law firm says Obama logged 3,723 billable hours during his tenure from 1993 to 2004, most of it during the first four years," the Times recounts.

Judson Miner says Obama "was doing the work that any first-year or second-year associate would do. In litigation, he was doing basic research and writing memos."