Integrating the Access to Justice Movement

Last fall, advocates of social change came together at the A2J Summit at Fordham University School of Law and discussed how to galvanize a national access to justice movement—who would it include, and what would or should it attempt to achieve? One important preliminary question we tackled was how such a movement would define “justice,” and whether it would apply only to the civil justice system. Although the phrase “access to justice” is not exclusively civil in nature, more often than not it is taken to have that connotation. Lost in that interpretation is an opportunity to engage in a broader, more holistic conversation about what justice entails and what is required to gain access to it

Building the Access to Justice Movement

There are innumerable individual problems of access to civil justice. Civil justice, or its absence, will often determine whether people can keep their homes, their family relationships, their health and well-being, their actual safety, their jobs, and their opportunity for a fair resolution of so many more of the challenges that life presents. There are presently many important efforts that enable people to obtain justice, both through the direct provision of legal services and through the broader pursuit of systemic reforms, such as securing and expanding civil rights to counsel, expanding roles for non-lawyers to empower individuals and communities, making the civil justice system work better for people without legal assistance, and ending excessive court-imposed fines and fees. Is it possible to identify common themes and threads running through the access to justice problems, the direct efforts to help individuals, and the pursuit of a broader reform agenda? Can there be an access to justice “movement” capable of galvanizing public outrage and energy, as the racial justice, criminal justice, immigrants’ rights, Me Too, and other modern movements are doing in their attacks on inequality, poverty, and other manifestations of injustice

The Indycamp : Demonstrating Access to Land and Access to Justice

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Connecting the dots: supporting the recovery and reintegration of children affected by sexual exploitation

The child protection sector lacks a robust evidence-base conveying what effective support during the recovery and reintegration process for children affected by CSE looks like. This report starts to collate evidence on what appears to be important to children who have experienced sexual exploitation. Recognising the current gaps in knowledge, this report represents a first attempt to start ‘connecting the dots’ between primary data and existing literature to help states and service providers better respond to the needs of children affected by CSE

Welcoming Remarks: The Paris Bar: Access to Justice and Access to Legal Advice

Francis Teitgen, Batonnier of the Paris Bar Assocation, gave welcoming remarks on April 7, 2000, and discussed France\u27s system for provision of legal aid services. He began by describing the history of legal aid in France. He then discussed the role of the Paris Bar Association in providing access to legal representation to those who could not otherwise afford it. Mr. Teitgen then discussed the process by which incarcerated individuals access lawyers. He also described a free legal consultation system run by the Paris Bar. He concluded by discussing new initiatives the Paris Bar is spearheading to increase access to justice for indigent populations

Welcoming Remarks: The Paris Bar: Access to Justice and Access to Legal Advice

Francis Teitgen, Batonnier of the Paris Bar Assocation, gave welcoming remarks on April 7, 2000, and discussed France\u27s system for provision of legal aid services. He began by describing the history of legal aid in France. He then discussed the role of the Paris Bar Association in providing access to legal representation to those who could not otherwise afford it. Mr. Teitgen then discussed the process by which incarcerated individuals access lawyers. He also described a free legal consultation system run by the Paris Bar. He concluded by discussing new initiatives the Paris Bar is spearheading to increase access to justice for indigent populations

Family Law and the New Access to Justice

This Article explores whether the optimistic prospect suggested by this experience—of reform that promotes rather than inhibits access-to-justice values—is inherently limited to family law. Does the experience with family court reform offer insights that transfer to other contexts, or is family law simply too exceptional? On the one hand, family law disputes are unique in some truly important ways. It is difficult, for example, to conceive of a convincing analogue for postdivorce parenting, and what we mean by “justice” can be fundamentally different for domestic-relations litigants than for others. On the other hand, reform in family court has been driven in part by concerns about cost and speed that are hardly unique to domestic-relations litigants. This Article suggests that some features of family court reform may transfer to other contexts. Chief among these features is an emphasis on triage rather than standardization as the touchstone of a fair and effective specialized court.This Article first sets out the view from family court, describing the reforms that are taking root and arguing that they serve access-to-justice values. It then assesses whether the core attributes of family law make the field too exceptional for these reforms to have any transferable application toother contexts. Having established that domestic-relations litigants and the institutions that serve them are concerned about reducing cost and increasing speed, this Article observes that these objectives no doubt transfer to other contexts, and so it is worth focusing on some of the essential qualities that family court reformers have used to balance efficiency and individualized justice

A Perspective from the Judiciary on Access to Justice

I decided early in 2009, upon becoming Chief Judge and the steward of the justice system in New York, to focus my energy on ensuring that everyone gets their day in court. Regardless of how a person looks or where he or she was born, and regardless of whether or not a person has resources or power, justice cannot be about the color of your skin or the amount of money in your pocket. Justice must mean that when people are fighting for the necessities of life, for the roof over their heads, they must get the legal assistance that they need, and the scales of lady justice will be exquisitely balanced. Learned Hand’s famous quote—“thou shall not ration justice”—is the one cardinal rule of our democracy. The constitutional and moral mission of the judiciary is equal justice. This is what we do as judges going back to biblical times: “Justice, and only Justice shall you pursue;” “both low and high, Rich and poor together.” If, as judges, we do not fulfill this commitment, we might as well close the courthouse doors. That focus generated so many things that I am proud of in New York, and that as leaders in the access to justice movement, we can all be proud of

Race, Class, and Access to Civil Justice

After many years of inattention, policymakers are now focused on troubling statistics indicating that members of poor and minority groups are less likely than their higher-income counterparts to seek help when they experience a civil justice problem. Indeed, roughly three-quarters of the poor do not seek legal help when they experience a civil justice problem, and inaction is even more pronounced among poor blacks. Past work on access to civil justice largely relies on unconfirmed assumptions about the behavior patterns and needs of those experiencing civil justice problems. At a time when increased attention and resources are being devoted to questions of racial and socioeconomic access to civil justice, it is critical to understand the underlying causes of the disparities in justice utilization. This Article uses original, empirical data to provide novel explanations for these puzzling inaction statistics. The data reveal previously undetected connections that are crucial for creating effective access to justice policy. The Article shows how negative past experiences with, and perceptions of, the criminal justice system play a crucial role in decision-making about seeking help for civil justice problems. Further, this Article is the first to explore racial differences in civil justice utilization among the poor, and to explain how degree of trust is a key explanation for these racial differences. Based on the findings, the Article proposes a paradigm shift in how to shape access to justice policy