John Levy: civil libertarian, ethics-guru, teacher, mentor, and man.

• Author: Barnard, Jayne W.
• Position: Tributes - Law teacher

John M. Levy has worn many hats at William and Mary since he arrived in Williamsburg in 1976. Most recently, he has been indispensable to the development of our famous Legal Skills Program, the leader of our Externship and Clinical Education Programs, the Director of both our "outgoing" and "incoming" international programs, and a highly-valued ambassador to the judges and practicing lawyers of Virginia. He has also been the conscience of the faculty on many occasions when we undertook to do something heartless. He has consistently brought his goodwill and good judgment to many serious, sometimes heartbreaking, situations.

John has made his deepest mark, however, in three very specific areas. The first is in his lifelong commitment to individual liberties and equality as a leader of the ACLU; the second is in his enduring and thoughtful attention to issues of ethics and decency in the practice of law; and the third is in his support and encouragement for those few law school graduates willing to take up the task of representing the poor and otherwise underserved clients that few others want to represent. In all three areas--civil liberties, devising working principles for a legal profession that go beyond bar association platitudes, and access to justice--John has been a true star.

THE ACLU OF VIRGINIA

The ACLU was founded in 1920, in the aftermath of World War I. Its founders had been conscientious objectors during the war, and were now concerned primarily about the growing oppression of workers and immigrants in the post-war world, and about state-sanctioned violence against American Negroes in the South. Though American women had recently received the right to vote, there was really no such thing as women's equality. Equality for gays and lesbians--and even the importance and range of the First Amendment--were not on the ACLU's agenda at the time.

Today, the ACLU has nearly 300,000 members across the country--5000 of them in Virginia. John Levy joined the ACLU as a law student in 1966 and became involved in the Virginia affiliate in 1969. In the late 1980s, he served as President of the Virginia affiliate and served on the national ACLU Board.

Most importantly, since 1990 John has been chair of the Virginia ACLU Legal Panel, which vets citizen complaints for their litigation value. This panel considers hundreds of complaints every year--from prison inmates, high school students, public school teachers, political candidates, community organizations, sidewalk preachers, marijuana promoters, and Ku Klux Klansmen, to mothers whose children have been removed from their home because of the family's religious practices, do-it-yourselfers who want to broadcast a local radio show from their basement in violation of some FCC frequency guideline, and various cranks and zealots. When considering these complaints, the Legal Panel has to sort out the substantive legal issues, the jurisdiction and standing issues, the resource issues (i.e. who will actually handle the case--what volunteers can be found who are willing to litigate a week-long trial in Abingdon?), the public education value of some cases over others, the need in cases for nonlitigation strategy, and the consistency of principle that the ACLU tries, but sometimes fails, to impose. For more than a decade, John Levy has been a meticulous, demanding leader of this challenging, fascinating process.

When I asked John recently to name the four most important cases taken on by the ACLU during his leadership of the Legal Panel, he of course equivocated. But finally, he identified the types of cases that have made this work so rewarding to him. This is what he wrote:

Voting Rights--In the 80s and early 90s, the ACLU made a real difference in the ability of African-Americans in Virginia to participate in the political process. We brought many, many suits challenging redistricting, single member districts and other ways that the State had kept its institutions as white as possible. Religion (Establishment and Free Exercise)--We took endless numbers of Establishment cases, from creches on public property to prayer in schools. "There's nothing wrong with prayer in school," said Board of Commissioners Chairman Robert V. "Bobby" Owens, Jr. "The worst thing that ever happened to this nation is the American Civil Liberties Union--all those lawyers who fight for others' freedoms. Too much freedom is what got this country to the place it is in the first place," Owens said. "The people who took nativity displays off courthouse lawns, to me, they are the devil...