Equal Justice Works Mobilizes the Next Generation of Public Interest Lawyers

Posted by Aaron Pickering, Senior Communications Specialist at Equal Justice Works, an organization that mobilizes the next generation of lawyers committed to equal justice. Aaron blogs at the Equal Justice Works blog.

My eyes lit up when Idealist’s Amy Potthast emailed me about Nonprofit Career Month. A whole month dedicated to public service? Count me in.

Aside from being a nonprofit employee myself – I work in communications at Equal Justice Works – I spend most days supporting and promoting the work of public interest attorneys and volunteers working at nonprofit organizations across the country to defend the people with few resources and connections. Nonprofits truly do touch all corners of the United States (check out this map to see how) and have a huge impact on the lives of others.

Take the Equal Justice Works Summer Corps program for example, an internship program for law school students exploring public interest work. In 2008 alone, 333 law students performed over 120,434 service hours at 234 nonprofit public interest organizations across the United States. How does this translate into direct service? Put it this way: 42,237 individuals and families received much-needed legal assistance in one summer. Talk about having an impact.

You can be sure that the impact of these law students will continue far beyond the reach of just this program. They represent the next generation of service – they are our future nonprofit leaders. One such leader is Morgan Williams, who served as a Summer Corps member after Hurricane Katrina and was awarded a post-graduate Equal Justice Works Fellowship in 2007. Recently, he was named General Counsel of the Fair Housing Action Center of New Orleans. Watch a video about his project on Youtube.

Morgan and the dozens of other attorneys that serve each year as AmeriCorps Legal Fellows and Equal Justice Works Fellows inspire me every day. They are role models for others launching nonprofit careers and are living proof that yes, working as a public servant requires talent, compassion and skill. But it also yields great rewards.

Listen to their stories on EJW's Youtube Channel and read about the Summer Corps experience on the Equal Justice Works blog.

What is public interest law?

Many people know that they want to change the world, but they aren’t sure how to do it. Some become social workers, teachers, or doctors. Others become lawyers. One guy I know, Dennis Hseih, even started out as a doctor and then became a lawyer. During medical school, Dennis witnessed gross injustices and hardships facing patients and he decided to become a lawyer in order to bring large-scale, systemic change to a flawed justice system.

So, to answer the question – what is public interest law? Public interest law means bringing justice to those who need it most. Public interest lawyers defend the poor and most vulnerable in our communities: the single mother and children at risk of homelessness due to foreclosure; the client, wrongly convicted, who has spent years in prison for a crime she didn’t commit; the disabled student who can’t go to school because the building is not handicap-accessible. Whatever issues, it is the role of the public interest lawyer to intervene and ensure that this person has the same right to justice as those more fortunate.

Public interest law is an ever-evolving and complex field. To learn more about the work of public interest attorneys, go to Equal Justice Works.