Remarks by Assistant Attorney General Tony West at Maryland Legal Aid's 13th Annual Equal Justice Council Recognition Breakfast
May 20, 2010
Baltimore, Maryland

Thank you for inviting me here today. It’s great to see you all. I’m especially glad to join you in honoring the important work of the Maryland Legal Aid Bureau and Equal Justice Council this morning. You provide this community with needed legal services; you secure access to justice by facilitating access to our courts; you provide hope to many who have lost it. In short, you make real the promise Adlai Stevenson spoke of when he observed that “the essence of democracy is the dignity of [the individual].”

As the Assistant Attorney General of the Civil Division, I have a special appreciation for the work you do as lawyers in pursuit of justice. With nearly 1000 lawyers, the Civil Division is the largest litigating component of the Department of Justice. Through our doors flows the greatest diversity of legal issues facing our country today—from protecting national security and defending presidential priorities in court to prosecuting health care fraud and protecting America’s consumers.
And with every issue that crosses my desk I am reminded of what a singular privilege it is to work at an institution where the overriding charge is to do not what is popular, or partisan, or political, but to do what is right.

It is that charge which leads me often to think about the unique legacy we inherit from those who blazed the trails that we now tread. A legacy left to us by names we know—like Clarence Darrow, Thurgood Marshall and Etta Maddox—as well as names we’ll never know: the many who have worked tirelessly, often anonymously, to provide individuals with their measure of dignity—their essence of democracy.

People like the group of individuals who came together almost exactly 100 years ago to launch the Maryland Legal Aid Bureau in Baltimore, embarking on a bold effort to challenge the notion, commonly held back then, that justice for the poor extended only as far as charity by the rich allowed. Because, as one of the organization’s early leaders put it, people should be secure in the knowledge that “their poverty does not necessarily mean they will be in a position of inequality before the law.”

How do we live up to that legacy? How do those of us who are practitioners of the law realize, in our own careers—be they private or public—the promise embodied by those legal pioneers; the same promise exemplified by those receiving Equal Justice Council awards today?

Let me offer three possible replies.
 
First, let us have the courage to serve.

At its best, the American spirit is exemplified by service—the commitment that we make to one another, to stand together. In difficult times it is this commitment that moves the nation forward in acts both good and great. When we “act with one heart and one mind,” as Jefferson said, we move forward as one people.

Of course, you don’t have to be a lawyer to serve. Anyone can serve. And while your service need not be legal, there is no doubt that the need for your legal talents is great.

This reality is underscored by the fact that we meet in a difficult hour for our Nation. While our economy continues to improve, there are still too many working families who are hurting. Too many Americans are still looking for work, especially in communities of color, and those who have jobs are working harder for less. Education is too expensive and as we celebrate graduations for loved ones, we know that for too many graduates, opportunities are too few.

As the federal government’s senior civil attorney, I am reminded everyday that in a civil justice system where you’re five times more likely to prevail with representation than without it, access to justice requires access to quality legal services.
You, better than anyone, know what I’m talking about. Because when budgets tighten, and courthouse doors close, the need for legal services among poor people, immigrant communities and people of color, working families and small businesses trying to make it—that need grows, and often times it is this organization that meets the need.

In some parts of the country today, more than 80 percent of those who need civil legal representation are unable to obtain it. Nationally, half of the eligible applicants for legal assistance from federally funded programs – families who make less than $25,000 – are turned away largely because such programs lack adequate funding. That’s roughly one million cases that are rejected every year.

At the federal level, the Obama Administration has taken steps to close the justice gap. Last year the President requested and Congress approved increased funding to the Legal Services Corporation—the organization created over 35 years ago to help poor families obtain access to the courts when they faced pressing civil legal matters. In addition, the Administration has made progress on lifting certain restrictions that made it harder for legal aid lawyers to do their important work.
In the Civil Division at the Department of Justice, we’re exploring ways to alleviate the lack of counsel for vulnerable populations currently in immigration removal proceedings, like unaccompanied minors and individuals with disabilities.

Moreover, last summer, Attorney General Eric Holder reaffirmed the Justice Department’s commitment to due process by vacating a prior Attorney General Opinion that had disallowed ineffective assistance of counsel claims by individuals in removal proceedings.
 
And earlier this year, the Attorney General launched the Access to Justice Initiative, creating a permanent effort within the Department to enhance the fairness and integrity of our legal system by improving access to counsel by the poor.
Now, while these efforts to increase funding and change policy are important, they are not enough. It will take the private bar, state and local governments, foundations, law schools—it will take you, the Maryland Legal Aid Bureau and particularly those who support you, to help us close this justice gap. We are all, as the Attorney General likes to say, stewards of the Nation’s justice system, and with that comes the responsibility to make this service a part of our life’s work.

Second, we can rise to the challenge set by those who paved the paths we now tread by having the courage to engage. “Becom[ing] a dedicated fighter for…human rights,” Dr. King often told us, “…will make you a better doctor, a better teacher, a better lawyer.”

It is a charge the founders of this organization took to heart. Through two world wars and a Great Depression, these lawyers never wavered in their commitment to the idea that charity did not limit justice. They toiled in the vineyards of our legal system, in fields where the sun didn’t always shine; where the work was hard because the resources were few and the challenges great; and yet they persevered, and now the fruit of their courageous engagement is our inheritance.

In their resilience is a lesson for us. In our busy lives, engaging in our public discourse is a difficult prospect because it often requires personal sacrifice, and sometimes it’s hard to know whether you are making any difference.

But if there is any message that the legacy of those legal aid bureau founders teaches us, it is: don’t give up. We cannot sit on the sidelines, because it’s often lawyers’ voices that are the most resonant in that national conversation about our common agenda.

In times of crisis, lawyers remind us that the rule of law is the foundation of liberty. And in times of hope, those same voices lift us to the possibility that the law can push us beyond the world as it is and closer to the world as it could—as it should—be.
So we must have the courage to be engaged, to take part fully in that national discussion that is moving us closer to realizing the aspirations of this Nation’s most fundamental promises of freedom, opportunity and justice.

Finally, let us have the courage to care.

Dr. King often spoke of the individual who had “ascended to the heights of economic security” but was courageous enough to risk “descend[ing] into the depths of human need.”

The courage to care is not just the courage of heroes whose names are printed in history books, but also that quiet courage we sometimes exhibit in spite of ourselves.
 
It’s the courage we are called upon to exercise unexpectedly, when it’s inconvenient—what King called the “Knock at Midnight”—because it is often the case that caring is most valuable not when it is easy but when it is hard.

It’s the courage of Odella Oliver, a senior paralegal here at the Bureau, whose persistence in demonstrating that the Social Security Administration had been wrong in terminating a client’s benefits ensured that a 10-year-old child suffering from severe mental disability would continue to receive her childhood SSI disability benefits.

Or staff attorney Melissa Kilmer who helped protect an elderly client from falling victim to a simple mortgage fraud scheme that could have resulted in foreclosure of the woman’s home.

Or any of the award recipients we honor this morning whose examples are inviting all of us to be our best selves.

And that is why I am asking you to rise to the challenge of having the courage to serve, the courage to engage, the courage to care, the courage to redouble your commitment to equal access to justice.

Because families facing foreclosure—they need your legal expertise right now. Individuals who’ve just lost their job and health care need your counsel right now. Kids whose families have fallen apart and who face a myriad of choices they don’t understand need your advocacy right now.

I know the impact this economy has had on the private sector. I know the squeeze it has put on those who are responsible for bottom-line revenues and law firm operations but who are nonetheless committed to pro bono.

Yet I also know there are opportunities in this difficult economy. There are opportunities for us to train young lawyers in the art of client service for clients who need service the most; opportunities for us to recommit ourselves to best of our profession and the mission of this organization.

Because in the final analysis, just like so many whose names we admire, our success will be measured not by the number of cases we win, or awards we receive, or the money we make; but by the hearts we touch, the souls we enrich, the doors we open and the lives we change.

Thank you.