Combined Efforts = Shared Benefits
Bill Neukom. Photo by Paul Berg
In my first four months as president of the American Bar Association, various problems with the rule of law in our country have emerged. Torn from the headlines, these examples show that the rule of law is a critical concern in our country.
The ABA has spoken out about these and other issues, but they illustrate the need to build broader support and to develop new tools and resources to strengthen the rule of law.
We learned about secret Justice Department memos that authorized the CIA to torture detainees during interrogations, despite United States and international law and the U.S. military’s opposition to mistreating prisoners. The ABA argued that such abuses not only undermine the rule of law but also are ineffective at obtaining information and increase the likelihood that our soldiers will be mistreated abroad.
In September, the U.S. Senate narrowly failed to reverse a law that stripped detainees at Guantanamo Bay of habeas corpus rights. The ABA supports the great writ because it is a cornerstone of the rule of law. And championing the rule of law—not weakening it—is the best long-term strategy to bring stability to our world and reduce the threat of terrorism.
HIGH-PROFILE ISSUES
Closer to home, ABA studies released in October found that the death penalty processes in Ohio and Pennsylvania cannot assure fairness and accuracy. Earlier reports in Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Indiana and Tennessee yielded similar results. Death row inmates across the country wrongly have lost years of their lives to weaknesses in the rule of law such as inadequate access to competent counsel, poor handling of DNA evidence, insufficient resources for lawyers to investigate and defend capital cases, and a host of other problems.
We have responded to these high-profile issues, as well as rule of law problems we address every year, such as increasing access to justice, removing partisan influence from judicial selection and teaching our youth about civics. We made some progress relating to access to justice by helping to pass legislation that will forgive law school debt if lawyers take public interest jobs, including representing low-income people. But we can and must do more about these and other weaknesses in the rule of law.
We cannot go it alone any longer. We will be more effective with the help of a broad cross section of our communities, and our communities will benefit if we come together around our common interest in the rule of law. That is why, through the World Justice Project, we are engaging representatives of various disciplines and professions to join a diverse coalition to advance the rule of law. We have had multidisciplinary meetings in several states (with many more in the works), with national leaders in the United States and with leaders from around the world.
To help us broaden support for rule of law issues in our communities, we need information that shows why we all should be concerned about the rule of law. And, moving forward, we need new tools that will help us leverage our scarce resources more effectively. The World Justice Project is addressing these needs through high-level scholarship examining the relationship between the rule of law and functioning communities, and through development of a rule of law index that will assess communities’ adherence to the rule of law and identify areas in need of improvement.
Bar associations and lawyers do admirable work to advance justice, and we should be proud of our efforts. But by engaging a cross section of our communities, we will reveal a side of our profession that too few people see: our belief in public service. More important, we will be more effective strengthening the rule of law working with others than working alone, and everyone in our communities will benefit.
