We were proud to join a diverse gathering of lawyers at the Bay Area Lawyer Die-in for Racial Justice. Attorneys, law students, professors and allies, from all different paths of legal work, joined to protest police violence and racial profiling of communities of color.
The symbolic “die-in” took place on the steps of the California Supreme court in San Francisco, and was an act of solidarity with national and local protests that have taken place to affirm that Black lives matter. We lay on the courthouse steps for 15 minutes: 4 minutes for the 4 hours that Mike Brown’s body lay out after he was shot and 11 minutes for the 11 times that Eric Garner said, “I can’t breathe.” It was moving to stand — and lie down — in solidarity with a group that spanned from seasoned attorneys who have paved the path for so many law students who will be the next generation of leaders.
The following organizations joined us in supporting this action:
ACLU of Northern California, Alameda County Bar Association, All of Us or None, Alliance for Justice, American Constitution Society Bay Area Lawyer Chapter, Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Asian Law Caucus, Asian Americans Advancing Justice – Los Angeles, Chinese for Affirmative Action (CAA), Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF), East Bay Community Law Center, Equal Justice Society, Equal Rights Advocates, Impact Fund, La Raza Centro Legal, Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, Legal Services for Children, Legal Services for Prisoners with Children, The National Center for Lesbian Rights, National Center for Youth Law, National Housing Law Project. National Lawyers Guild San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, The Public Interest Law Project, San Francisco Public Defender’s Office, Thelton E. Henderson Center for Social Justice, UC Berkeley Law – Law Students of African Descent, UC Hastings Asian Pacific American Law Students Association, UC Hastings Black Law Students Association, UC Hastings La Raza Law Students, W. Haywood Burns Institute, and Western Center on Law & Poverty
