Happy 30th Birthday Alliance for Justice!

Hundreds of supporters gathered today to celebrate 30 years in which Alliance for Justice has been leading the fight for a more equitable society on behalf of a broad constituency of environmental, consumer, civil and women’s rights, children’s, senior citizens’ and other groups.

The Vision for Justice luncheon featured keynote speakers Dahlia Lithwick, Senior Editor and Legal Correspondent for Slate, and Gara LaMarche (remarks), President and CEO of The Atlantic Philanthropies. Elmy Bermejo, Director of the Latino Issues Forum, was Master of Ceremonies, and of course, Nan Aron, President and Founder of Alliance for Justice gave remarks.

Dahlia Lithwick’s speech looked at President Obama’s use of “empathy” as a qualification for judicial nominees. She defended the term and asked progressives to see it not as something that looks soft and squishy, the opposite of rigor and objectivism. We should embrace the term since it does not mean bias, it does not mean sympathy, it simply means being able to “stand in somebody else’s shoes and see through their eyes.” We recommend her excellent column on this topic in Slate.

Gara LaMarche spoke eloquently about the situation of our courts in this country and encouraged all of us to help “the arc of the moral universe bend towards justice” by fighting every day against injustice.

Watch AFJ’s 30th anniversary video presentation, or if you’d like to say Happy Birthday to AFJ, click here.