ABA 'will bend the moral arc towards justice,' President Bob Carlson says

• Author: Lorelei Laird
• Pages: 65-65

2020 REGULAR STATE DELEGATE

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ABA Notices

MARCH 2019 ABA JOURNAL || 65

PHOTO COURTESY OF ABA MEDIA RELATIONS

Your ABA

The ABA sets the go ld standard for t he

American legal profession, ABA President

Bob Carlson to ld the ABA House of

Delegates at the ABA Midyear Meeti ng in

Las Vegas—and it will never stop champion-

ing due process a nd the rule of l aw.

Carlson, a shareholder at Corette Black

Carlson & Mickels on in Butte, Mo ntana,

said the ABA’s forte is its u nited voice for

American lawyers—even if sometimes the

association is “a very large, raucous fam-

ily.” Even lawyers wh o aren’t membe rs are

touched in some w ay by the ABA, h e said,

via law school a ccreditation, th e ABA Model

Rules of Professiona l Conduct, the advocacy

work of the ABA Gover nmental A airs

O ce or membership in the bar groups wi th

delegates in the House.

“We share values as lawyers no mat ter

where we’re from, no mat ter what kind of

law we work in or wh at our politics m ay be,”

he said.

Politics was a theme in

Carlson’s speech, start-

ing with a referenc e to the

government shutdown that

ended Jan. 25 . He thanked

the government employees

who went without pay, par-

ticularly those in public safety

roles who worked wit hout

pay for more than a month,

and he urged Con gress and

President Donald Trump to

prevent another shutdown.

“Failure to fund ou r federal

courts and institutions of

justice is an at tack on due

process and the r ule of law,”

he said to applause.

Carlson touted th e ABA’s

work on issues rela ting to the cour ts and the

rule of law, particularly in immigration. He

also approvingly quoted Chief Justi ce John

G. Roberts Jr., who said in November that

we do not—as Trump ha d suggested—have

“Obama judges or Trump judges,” but a

dedicated group o f judges doing t heir best to

dispense justice.

“At times, it seems that compromise is

beyond reach, an d our great exper iment

in democracy will fail. But our institutions

have helped us weat her political s candal and

extremism,” he sa id. “In the end, the rule of

law has prevailed.”

Carlson also tou ted several of the ABA’s

initiatives—fi rst and foremost, p ro bono

work. Public ser vice is crucia l, he said, a nd

the ABA o ers many opportunities to pro-

vide pro bono, i ncluding the Di saster Legal

Services Prog ram—a project of the Young

Lawyers Divis ion—Pro Bono Week and the

ABA Standing Com mittee on Pro Bon o and

Public Service.

Another initiat ive that got a ment ion is the

ABA’s Working Group to Advance Well-

Being in the L egal Profession, a n attempt to

address the consi stently high rates of mental

health and substance abuse problems in the

profession.

Carlson urged t he audience to ta ke advan-

tage of resources t he ABA o ers and ra ise

awareness of the p roblem because “we can-

not a ord to lose th is battle.”

Carlson also p aid tribute to Joh n Bouma,

a member of the House of Delegate s who

died in Januar y. Bouma serve d as chair of the

Snell & Wilmer l aw fi rm for 32 years .

Carlson closed by promising that the ABA

will always spea k out when lawye rs are under

attack.

“It will do th is from a position of strength,

bolstered by the wor k done in this H ouse,”

he said. “We wil l bend the mora l arc towards

justice.” Q

ABA ‘will bend the moral arc towards justice,’

President Bob Carlson says By Lorelei Laird

ABA President Bob Carl son