PASSIONATE ADVOCATE.

• Author: McNally-Levine, Laura

Passionate Advocate: The definition of Judith P. Lipton's career here at Case Western Reserve University School of Law. No matter the case, project, or issue, Judy was always a passionate advocate who you wanted on your side. During her thirty-six-year tenure here, she tirelessly advocated on behalf of students, staff, and faculty at the law school and across campus, as well as on behalf of the Milton A. Kramer Law Clinic Center's clients. She served as Co-Director of the Milton A. Kramer Law Clinic Center, became our first Chaired Clinic Professor when she became the Honorable Blanche E. Krupansky and Frank W. Vargo, Jr. Professor of Law, and also held the position of Associate Dean for Experiential Education.

We want our students to learn how to become passionate advocates for their clients. And a part of my lesson plan would include Judy as Exhibit A. As a result of a multi-decade career at one law firm, one thing is guaranteed: clients will always know where to find you when they need you. If Judy could not help them because they had a civil or health-law issue and she was teaching in the Criminal Justice Clinic, she would come down the hall and knock on my door. The next thing I knew is that I would have a new case!

Over the years, Judy and I represented many of the same clients, we worked together through the legal and non-legal issues our clients were facing, and had each other's backs when we were fighting uphill battles to get services and support for clients who could not navigate the legal system alone. To maintain one's luster as an advocate, you have to have a support system. Judy maintained that system by a pattern of door-to-door visits and, if the weather was right, a "Judy walk." I will miss those walks.

Judy has often sung others' praises regarding the creation and success of our experiential education program, but we would not be leading the way in experiential education without her passionate advocacy. First and foremost, Judy believed in experiential education as an important component of a well-rounded law-school curriculum. She...