UPCOMING
EVENTS
Building
a Win-Win Immigration Platform
and Creating Multiracial Alliances
Saturday, July 19, 2008
Preservation Park, Oakland
Building
upon the success of our 2007 forum, "Immigration and the
Black Community: Conflict or Common Interest?", the vision
behind this conference is to develop a platform for comprehensive
immigration reform that also incorporates the needs and concerns
of native-born communities of color and economically disenfranchised
communities. We also see the process of developing this platform
as an opportunity for multiracial alliance building and breaking
down the racial tensions and stereotypes that too often divide
our communities. Accordingly, we will incorporate community
dialogue and trust-building exercises directly into the conference
agenda. Read
about last year's event.
3rd
Annual Equal Justice Society Gala
Friday, December 5, 2008
The Regency Center, San Francisco
Following
an inspiring awards program, this year's celebration will once
again feature a performance by the band formerly known as DAWG
with Brad Seligman on vocals and lead guitar, Bill Tamayo on
keyboard, Jim Bresler on bass, Jason Ravitz on drums, and Eva
Paterson singing back up vocals. Once again, all will be welcomed
to "shut up and dance" to the band and then a DJ.
Read
about last year's event.
2007
Fall Symposium
“Reclaiming and Reframing the Dialogue
on Race and Racism”
A Symposium Questioning the Social and
Legal Assumptions About Racial Discrimination
and Exploring Strategies to Advance
Racial Justice November
1-2, 2007
Thelton E. Henderson Center for Social Justice
UC Berkeley
School of Law, University of California, Berkeley
Co-Sponsored by The Equal
Justice Society and the University of Hawai’i http://www.law.berkeley.edu/centers/csj/symposia/index.html Recent
scientific studies have demonstrated the fallacy of many of our social and legal
assumptions about racial discrimination. Such findings have also contradicted
the notion that equal opportunity can be achieved by colorblindness. Keynote
speakers Monique Harden (Advocates for Environmental Human Rights) and Professor
Jerry Kang (UCLA School of Law) will lay out frameworks of analysis and panelists
will present concrete strategies for influencing litigation, media representations,
and generational linkages that will allow activists and attorneys to tackle ongoing
racism in the United States. Panelists
include:
* Maria Blanco, Chief Earl Warren Institute for Race, Diversity, and Ethnicity,
U.C. Berkeley School of Law
* David Chiu, Chief Operating Officer, Grassroots
Enterprises
* Professor Lia Epperson, Santa Clara School of Law
* Lucas
Guttentag, Director, ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project
* Lisalyn Jacobs, Vice
President, Government Relations, Legal Momentum
* Professor Pamela Karlan,
Stanford Law School
* Bill Kennedy, Legal Services of Northern California
* Professor Timothy Patrick McCarthy, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard College
* John Trasviña, President, Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational
Fund (MALDEF) |
| | YOU'RE
INVITED TO
Equal
Justice Society-Chicago
"Harriet
Tubman and Jazz" by the Marcus Shelby Quintet featuring Faye Carol |
|
Co-sponsored
by Northwestern University's Black Alumni Association October
12, 2007
7:00 PM
Jay Pritzker Pavilion, Millennium Park
201 E. Randolph
Street, Chicago (map) Tickets:
$50 | Please purchase by Oct. 11 online San
Francisco jazz composer and bassist Marcus
Shelby will present excerpts from his oratorio for orchestra and vocal ensemble
"Harriet Tubman: Bound for the Promised Land." This
program, titled "Harriet Tubman and Jazz," includes an historical perspective
on Harriet Tubman, her relationship to the history of jazz, and a live presentation
of the oratorio reduced for jazz quintet and one vocalist -- the remarkable Faye
Carol. Proceeds
will benefit the Equal Justice Society,
a national advocacy organization advancing social and racial justice through law
and public policy, communications and the arts, and alliance building. EJS facilitates
strategic discourses throughout the United States, among multiple disciplines
and constituencies with an interest in achieving racial equity. Together,
we can transform society into one where race is no longer a barrier to opportunity. Purchase
tickets by Oct. 11 online
| Immigration
and the Black Community:
Conflict or Common Interest? Presented
by the Equal Justice Society and Black Alliance for Just Immigration
Co-Sponsored
by Latino Issues Forum, Greenlining Institute
and Centro Legal de la Raza Tuesday,
July 31, 2007
Oakland Museum of California, 1000 Oak St, Oakland, CA
Reception 6 p.m., Program
7 p.m.
Followed by Open Discussion/Reception
RSVPs are now closed,
but we welcome walk-ins!
If
you are already planning to attend and would like to submit questions in advance,
please
fill out this form. Given the limited time, we may not be able to use all
the submitted questions. We will provide for audience questions at the event.
The
Oakland Museum of California is located at 1000 Oak Street (at 10th Street), near
Lake Merritt, in Oakland. Oak is a one-way street, going north. The entrance to
the parking garage is on Oak between 10th and 12th Streets. PLEASE
NOTE that the entrance to the Museum is at the corner of 10th and Fallon. The
gates will be closed. However, there is a door located on the left side
of the gate. Guests are asked to walk down the stairs and ring the buzzer on the
door and ask security to let them in for the Equal Justice Society event. Garage
parking is free. If you park in the garage, follow the signs to the museum entrance
from within the garage -- you will not have to walk to 10th and Fallon to get
in to the museum. For
directions to the Museum via mass transit, use the interactive trip planning service
at transit.511.org.
A Google Map of the Museum location is here.
A PDF with written directions to the museum can be downloaded
here.
A
counter-demonstration in favor of immigration lined the sidewalks of Crenshaw
Boulevard on June 23, 2007. LAPD officials called the nearly 500 protestors an
"illegal assembly.” Ted Hayes, rally organizer and homeless advocate,
had a permit to hold a rally he called "Choose Black America - Not Amnesty
- Not Illegal Immigration" in the Leimert Park. However, anti-rally demonstrators
surrounded the perimeter and no one was able to enter the park. (Photo by Anne-Marie
McReynolds) | Our
country is experiencing increased conflicts between Blacks and Latinos:
- In Austin, a group
of men assaulted the driver of a car that accidentally hit a child. The passenger
of that car was killed while trying to intervene.
- In
Los Angeles, gangs target youth of the other communities - and each other.
- Black-Latino
political alliances are straining in rapidly changing communities.
This
growing tension between Latino and Black communities stems from many sources
— including the right wing offensive against civil rights law that seeks
to drive a wedge between different communities engaged in a common struggle for
equality. Karl Rove and others are expert at distracting the public. Recall that
the recent focus on immigration was not on the radar of the current Administration
until the scandal broke about wireless surveillance. In the blink of an eye, public
attention was redirected to immigration and increased tensions surfaced between
communities fighting for social equality. We
invite you to an informative, open and frank discussion of the relationship between
immigration, civil rights, tensions between the Latino and African American communities,
and social justice. Our
discussants include:
- Eva Paterson (President, Equal Justice Society)
- Reverend Phil Lawson (Black Alliance for Just Immigration)
- Prof. Bill
Ong Hing (Law Professor, UC Davis)
- Nora Vargas (Executive Director, Latino
Issues Forum)
- Larisa Casillas (Director, Bay Area Immigrant Rights Coalition) In
the wake of the recent discussions of immigration reform and recent Supreme Court
cases that directly bear on the future of racial justice, Latino immigrant and
African American communities must decide how to best alleviate the barriers to
opportunity we face. |
PROMO
ROLLBACK
CAMPAIGN SUMMER HAPPY HOUR
FOR SUMMER ASSOCIATES/LAW CLERKS/INTERNS
Hosted by the National Campaign To Restore Civil Rights,
the Equal Justice
Society and Morrison & Foerster Wednesday,
August 2, 2006
6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
Location provided upon RSVP
Event is free, but RSVPs required due to space limitations. Summer
associates, law clerks and interns from non-profit law firms and firms committed
to progressive social justice are invited to attend a special happy hour to learn
more about the Rollback Campaign. This
progressive, nonpartisan campaign (www.rollbackcampaign.org)
connects people and groups deeply concerned about the erosion of our nation's
civil rights in the federal courts. Morrison
& Foerster is providing drinks and light hors d'oeuvres. Our
guest speaker will be Eva Paterson, co-founder and president of the Equal Justice
Society, a national advocacy organization that promotes social justice and racial
equality through the strategic use of law and public policy, communication and
the arts, and alliance building. The
event is free, but RSVPs are required. Please send an email by Monday, July 31,
to Melyssa Mendoza at EJS (mmendoza@equaljusticesociety.org)
that includes your full name, the name of your firm and a phone number. We reserve
the right to limit the number of attendees at this event. For
more information about the organizations hosting this event:
Rollback Campaign
- www.rollbackcampaign.org
Equal Justice Society - www.equaljusticesociety.org
Morrison & Foerster
- www.mofo.com
First Annual Equal
Justice Society
Judge Constance Baker Motley
Civil Rights Fellowship Luncheon
Portrait by Timothy Greenfield-Sanders
— "Now
I can relax."
Said Judge Motley, after hearing about the Equal Justice Society — Thursday,
June 1, 2006
11:00 a.m. - Pre-Event Reception
Noon - Lunch and Program
Far East Café
631 Grant Avenue, San Francisco Featuring
a candid conversation on civil rights and race relations with: Charles
J. Ogletree, Jr., EJS Board Chair
Professor of Law, Harvard Law School James
J. Brosnahan, EJS Board Member
Senior Partner, Morrison & Foerster Moderated
by Margaret Russell
Professor of Constitutional Law
University
of Santa Clara School of Law And
featuring a performance by
Aundré the Wonderwoman Luncheon
Co-Chairs:
William F. Alderman
James
J. Brosnahan
Raymond C. Marshall Proceeds
from the event will be used to fund the Equal Justice Society's new Constance
Baker Motley Civil Rights Fellowship. Under the supervision of staff attorneys
for one year, the Fellow may lead new research, advocacy, coalition building and
public education efforts related to transforming anti-discrimination law and policy. — About
Constance Baker Motley
Source: Columbia
University
"When
I went to law school, nobody heard of civil rights." In
her fifty-plus years as a jurist, Constance Baker Motley (1921–2005) has
had a major impact on ending racial discrimination. As the NAACP Legal Defense
Fund's associate counsel, she participated in writing the briefs for Brown
v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kan., et.al., the landmark 1954 U.S. Supreme
Court case that ended school segregation. From
October 1961 to the end of 1964, Motley won nine of the 10 civil rights cases
she argued before the Court, including James Meredith's successful suit to attend
the University of Mississippi. She went on to break down other gender and race
barriers as the first African-American woman elected to the New York state senate
(1964) and to the Manhattan borough presidency (1965). Appointed
to a judgeship for the Southern District of New York in 1966, she became the first
African-American woman on the federal bench and, in 1982, the first African-American
woman to serve as chief judge. Motley assumed senior judge status in 1986, and
in 2001, President Bill Clinton awarded her the Presidential Citizens' Medal in
recognition of her achievements and service to the nation.
After
graduating from New York University in 1943, Motley took a well-paying job with
a wartime agency that aided the dependents of servicemen. A year later, she turned
down a promotion to attend Columbia Law School. "That's the dumbest thing I ever
heard, a complete waste of time," her supervisor told her. "Women don't get anywhere
in the law." While
still a law student at Columbia, Motley met Thurgood Marshall, the NAACP's legal
director, who offered her a job as a law clerk in the organization's New York
office. After receiving her law degree in 1946, Motley became a full-fledged member
of the NAACP's legal staff. In April 1995, she returned to Columbia to receive
the Florence E. Allen Award, given by the New York Women's Bar Association and
named after the woman Motley said was her role model as a female judge. In February
2004, Motley came back to Columbia Law School for an event marking the 50th anniversary
of Brown v. Board of Education.
See
other past events |
