STEP FORWARD - Shriver Center

By Marcia Henry,  Senior Attorney-Senior Editor

The inaugural issue of Civil Right to Counsel Update  is now available. To be published quarterly, the Update will report on all aspects of advocacy to achieve recognition of a right to counsel for low-income people in civil cases that affect basic human needs. In criminal cases, a right to counsel has long been recognized any time a defendant faces even a brief period of incarceration. But no parallel right exists in civil cases, despite consequences-like permanent loss of custody of a child, or loss of safe and subsidized housing, or denial of health care-that can be at least as devastating. (more…)

By Richard P. Weishaupt, Guest Blogger 

What would a blog on ethics and legal aid discuss? While some might argue tongue in cheek that the terms are an oxymoron, most legal aid lawyers and other advocates are very concerned about being ethical in both the professional and the moral sense. This blog aims to be a practical guide to the Rules of Professional Responsibility and a forum for discussion of some of the more difficult problems that legal aid lawyers face. Too often the ethics training we experience as part of our continuing legal education requirements is geared to a practice that bears little resemblance to our day-to-day challenges. (This blog appears as a column in Clearinghouse Review: Journal of Poverty Law and Policy, published by the Shriver Center.) (more…)

By Martin Stainthorp, Communication Programs Associate

Every year millions in the United States are forced to navigate through serious civil legal disputes on their own, without the help of a lawyer. The consequences can be severe-eviction, loss of child custody, deportation, among others. But many-unable to afford an attorney or obtain free legal services, and with no right to have an attorney appointed-have no choice but to represent themselves. (more…)

By Ilze Hirsh, Vice President of Communication Programs

Young lawyers enthusiastically joining legal aid programs committed to economic justice and social change may be disappointed to discover that senior management seems as resistant to change as the governmental structures and systems that keep people living in poverty. Legal aid programs need to ensure young lawyers’ meaningful participation in advocacy decisions and must support leadership development. The looming leadership vacuum resulting from the retirement of many experienced advocates puts at stake the future of the movement to end poverty. Now is the time for initiating a smooth yet critical transition to new leadership.

The March-April 2008 issue of Clearinghouse Review features two articles on this topic, authored by the Leadership Institute Fellows and Ross Doloff, training director of the Center for Legal Aid Education. Doloff urges the antipoverty advocacy community to foster more affirmative litigation and community lawyering in its programs.

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