JSPAN Social Justice Award Honors Langer, Grogan & Diver, P.C

Langer, Grogan & Diver, P.C. is being honored for its dedication to law in the public interest and commitment to fostering commitment to the public interest among future generations of attorneys. The firm established the Langer, Grogan & Diver, P.C. Fund for Social Justice to support public interest law in the Delaware Valley and the Langer, Grogan & Diver Fellowship in Social Justice which provides public interest fellowships to graduates of the University of Pennsylvania Law School during their first year practicing law. The firm has also established a fellowship at HIAS and Council Migration Services of Philadelphia.

Please join JSPAN on November 21 as we recognize Langer, Grogan & Diver, P.C., recipient of the JSPAN 2011 Social Justice Award. If you have an invitation, please RSVP as soon as possible. For more information and to learn about financial sponsorship, contact JSPAN Executive Director Ruthanne Madway at (215) 546-3732 or rmadway@jspan.org.

Considered a national leader in the movement to end genocide in Sudan, Ms. Messinger has been called upon several times to advise President Obama about creating a sustainable path toward peace in that country. In recognition of her leadership, she has served on the Obama administration's Task Force on Global Poverty and Development. She is also involved in faith-based efforts to secure human rights around the world.

American Jewish World Service, November 5, 2011
By Adina Roth

Parshat Lech Lecha opens with God's command to Avram to leave everything that he has known-his birthplace, family and the pagan culture he grew up with-and move to a land "asher arekha-that I will show you."[1] Avram is asked to leave behind familial binds and unwanted value systems and embrace an unknown future in order to create a new world. The Sefat Emet, a 19th-century Chasidic rabbi, suggests that Avram's departure from the familiar to the open-ended will enlarge his vision, indicating that the root of the word arekha is "resh-aleph-heh"-to see.[2]

Avram, with his vision of monotheism, becomes an agent for change in the Torah, and his task to move-"lech lecha"-becomes a compelling model for tikkun olam today. With its emphasis on departure, the lech model challenges us to leave behind all unjust systems in order to create a better world. For example, this approach is what drives the Occupy Wall Street movement, with its calls to reject business models that perpetuate disempowerment and inequity and replace them with new, more equitable practices. As a model for social change, lech creates distance between a corrupt reality and a more hopeful vision. Read More

Ken Myers: We are together to discuss Occupy Philadelphia which is happening right here. Is this a political event with a capital P, or is it something else?

Nate Kleinman: I would say at this stage it is the beginning of a social and possibly political movement. It is impossible to predict where it is going to go. Nobody has the power to decide where it is going to go on their own. The group makes decisions through, as much as possible, consensus. When we vote on things if we cannot come to consensus we decide with a supermajority. And so it really requires a long process of consensus building.

Myers: You mentioned that in the evening, typically at seven 0' clock you have what you call the General Assembly. So everybody gets out and shares ideas?

Kleinman: Everybody who lives here and people from elsewhere all come together. We make announcements about things that are coming up. Various working groups, of which at this point there are probably 20 or 25, report back to the full Assembly. They talk about what they are doing, what ideas they are having, what they are planning, they say when they meet and reiterate that everyone is invited. Every working group is open to all, and anyone can start one.

The General Assembly and that whole process was started on Occupied Wall Street and this is modeled after it. There are General Assemblies happening all over the country. There is one meeting today in York, Pennsylvania. There is going to be one in Stroudsburg, there is one in Norristown today, not to mention of course the bigger cities in every state across the country.

Myers: Do you see a tendency within this group to try to create a fourth political party (I say that because I give the Tea Party credit for being one)?

Kleinman: I am not sure. I think how this movement exercises its power in the political arena is still very much up in the air. But I have heard a lot of ideas, there was a lot of talk about it, and I think eventually we will come to consensus on a way forward . It seems likely to me that it will attempt to influence the political process. Some people want to run candidates for Congress next year in every single district in the country. That would certainly be something I would support because I think it's not just Republicans that need to be asked, there are plenty of Democrats who could use a good challenge.

To read the letter click here.

To learn more and read the letter posted on the JSPAN website,click here.

Salon, October 29, 2011
By Justin Elliott

There has been no shortage of headlines this week about the growing income and wealth inequality in the United States. A new study from the Congressional Budget Office, for example, found that income of the top 1 percent of households increased by 275 percent in the 30-year period ending in 2007. American households at the bottom and in the middle, meanwhile, saw income growth of just 18 to 40 percent over the same period

But less attention has been paid to the fact that not only are the numbers bad in America, they're particularly bad when compared to other developed nations. A new report by the Bertelsmann Foundation drives this point home. The German think tank used a set of policy analyses to create a Social Justice Index of 31 developed nations in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The United States came in a dismal 27th in the rankings.

To read the letter, click here.

Information about JSPAN policies and positions on a woman's right to choose can be found at the Policy Center on this topic athttp://www.jspan.org/p/50. Eds.

A constitutional amendment facing voters in Mississippi on Nov. 8, and similar initiatives brewing in half a dozen other states including Florida and Ohio, would declare a fertilized human egg to be a legal person, effectively branding abortion and some forms of birth control as murder.

With this far-reaching anti-abortion strategy, the proponents of what they call personhood amendments hope to reshape the national debate.

"I view it as transformative," said Brad Prewitt, a lawyer and executive director of the Yes on 26 campaign, which is named for the Mississippi proposition. "Personhood is bigger than just shutting abortion clinics; it's an opportunity for people to say that we're made in the image of God."

Many doctors and women's health advocates say the proposals would cause a dangerous intrusion of criminal law into medical care, jeopardizing women's rights and even their lives.

The amendment in Mississippi would ban virtually all abortions, including those resulting from rape or incest. It would bar some birth control methods, including IUDs and "morning-after pills," which prevent fertilized eggs from implanting in the uterus. It would also outlaw the destruction of embryos created in laboratories.

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