“You must not abandon the ship in a storm because you cannot control the winds. … What you cannot turn to good, you must at least make as little bad as you can.” —St. Thomas More
The day after Halloween, I was accosted by holiday decorations and Christmas carols in a store. I should have been surprised by how quickly the season of giving was approaching, but instead, I found myself in a bah humbug sort of mood.
Six weeks later with Thanksgiving and #GivingTuesday behind me, I’m still struggling to find joy and hope as I’m confronted with a flurry of emails, text messages and pop-up solicitations from nonprofits and community-based organizations (many of which I fervently support) touting the importance of a financial donations during the holiday season.
For many people, this can be a rousing call to action; for others, like me, it feels like a deluge of messages intended to overwhelm us during a very busy time juggling personal and professional obligations. While these year-end donations are a critical source of financial support, I think it can also obscure an important truth: that gifts of service can be just as impactful to communities in need.
It may a be little-known fact to those outside the legal community, but attorneys give a significant amount of time and energy over the course of a year doing pro bono work, a practice of volunteering time and expertise in providing free legal services to a nonprofit organization or community in need.
The term “pro bono” comes from the Latin “pro bono publico,” meaning “for the public good.” It’s hard to imagine a time when the need to amass legal support and services was more critical than it is now, if for no other reason than to ensure that the possibility of a public good continues to exist in the zeitgeist.
As attorneys, we take an oath to uphold the Constitution and faithfully practice and comply with the rule of law, the obligations of professional practice and the ethics of legal representation. It’s unfathomable for many of us to witness what appears to be an increasing abandonment of the rule of law in this country, leaving us on a ship that feels less like it’s in a storm and more akin to a Category 5 hurricane.
Over this past year, the flurry of executive actions, memoranda, social media posts, rapid-fire court decisions and vitriolic attacks has eroded people’s faith and trust in the belief of law, justice and fairness to a degree that feels as chilling as what More seems to have experienced in his time.
I run a small project in New York City that provides legal assistance to LGBTQ+ youths and young adults who are low income, living on the streets, in homeless shelters, in the juvenile justice system or in foster care. Nationally, LGBTQ+ people experience homelessness at a vastly disproportionate rate to their population size.
Despite being less than 10% of the population, LGBTQ+ youths make up 40% of all homeless youths in the United States and 65% of all youths experiencing chronic homelessness. These young people are rejected by their families and communities, are more vulnerable to negative health outcomes, and are overly represented in child welfare and juvenile justice systems.
Taken together, those that come through the doors of the Free to Be Youth Project are disproportionately exposed to violence, harassment, detention and arrest, and homelessness.
In the past year, I’ve witnessed countless lawyers step up to offer their services, time and effort because they recognize how great the need is for this community at this perilous time. Whether it’s helping a young person navigating the immigration process to obtain lawful status, drafting a name change petition to ensure that a young queer person is recognized and affirmed for their identity, helping an unhoused youth overcome legal barriers to stable housing, or offering the time and effort for a week of service to support unhoused youths in need, the work continues to make such a tremendous impact.
As one attorney noted, her pro bono work with our project gave her hope that “we can find wins—small and big—in a time when immigration is full of turbulence and turmoil.”
An “eloquence of lawyers” is a collective noun for a group of attorneys. The term originated from Latin, “eloqui,” meaning to speak out, and never has that term felt more apt than for those attorneys challenging the administration’s actions this past year.
The small wins that pro bono attorneys have amassed have large impacts that really speak to those who are speaking out, or stepping up, to give their time and effort.
Legal Services NYC, one of the largest providers of civil legal services, has 4,000 pro bono volunteers from nearly 100 law firms and corporations across the city help New Yorkers facing a range of legal challenges. This past year, the New York City Bar Justice Center worked with over 1,100 pro bono attorneys from firms and corporate legal departments.
Firms like McDermott Will & Schulte have dedicated more than 78,000 hours to pro bono so far this year, and Nixon Peabody has provided more than 26,000 hours in pro bono legal support. These are just a smattering of some of the efforts that attorneys in firms, corporations and private practice in this city, and others, engage in every year.
As a firm that prides itself on increasing equity, access and opportunity to communities in need, Nixon Peabody’s Week of Service event is another example of how attorneys can contribute not just during the season of giving but all year round. By joining with local community partners, like the Free to Be Youth Project, to build self-care kits for unhoused LGBTQ+ youths, they’re shining a light on the needs that stem from homelessness and the added challenge for queer and transgender youths.
And McDermott Will & Schulte embeds its junior associates for one week with community-based organizations like ours to introduce them to the importance and impact of pro bono work.
“We believe that every lawyer has a professional responsibility to provide pro bono services. We are honored to have the opportunity to use our firm’s resources to represent and empower not only individuals who can’t access justice but also the organizations that support them and enrich our communities,” says Sara E. Solfanelli, special counsel for pro bono initiatives at McDermott Will & Schulte.
The hundreds of young people who are helped by the Free to Be Youth Project every year each carry a story within them when they walk through our doors. They exist in a space of trauma, fear and injustice. And yet upon entering a room, they inhabit a space that exudes a strength and courage that is unlike any that I, or the pro bono attorneys who partner with us, have seen in our respective careers.
We are living in some challenging times, where it’s often hard to remember the value that comes from being in the practice of law. I must remind myself, as we navigate in these uncertain times, facing a storm not unlike the one that More described, that we hold our value and belief in community and the collective good tightly in our grip.
The act of serving communities in need and bringing hope is for me, at least, the epitome of creating holiday spirit. It is a reminder that we, as an eloquence of lawyers, have a responsibility to speak out and to engage in work that is for the public good.
Amy Leipziger is the project director of the Free to Be Youth Project at the Urban Justice Center, which works to interrupt the cycles of poverty and criminalization that prevent homeless and street-involved LGBTQ+ young people from living fulfilling lives free from discrimination, abuse and oppression. She is dedicated to representing and advocating around the issues of gender, poverty and discrimination.
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