ELIZABETH FINN JOHNSON | May 10, 2018
Board Member Elizabeth Finn Johnson always wanted to work for the ACLU. But after finding herself in a corporate job, AVLF reignited her passion for pro bono service.
It seems to me that fighting for access to justice for those in our nation who are so often denied it is in my blood.
When my mother was nearly 9 months pregnant with me, she picketed at a segregated Woolworth’s lunch counter in Durham, North Carolina. When my family lived in New Haven, Connecticut in the mid-1960s, my father was arrested for picketing at an absentee slumlord’s home, advocating for better living conditions for the poor. Our phone was tapped by the New Haven police, and the FBI had a file on my father for receiving so-called “Jewish” magazines. When I was 10 years old, I joined my family to march on Washington against the Vietnam War.
So going to law school seemed a natural thing for me, and I went with the intention of becoming a lawyer for the ACLU. And then I ended up working for The Coca-Cola Company as an employment lawyer, defending the Company against discrimination claims. Life is weird.
I have represented survivors from every walk of life – from business women with Ivy League degrees to immigrant women scared of our system to single mothers struggling to escape abuse while wondering how they will pay rent and feed their children.
But it was while at Coke that I truly became engaged in the pro bono work that has satisfied and sustained me and, since my retirement from the Company in early 2015, has become the core of my legal work. I was fortunate to chair the Company’s Pro Bono Committee for a decade, and in that capacity, I had the chance to do work with a number of the amazing organizations doing important work in this city. That is when Atlanta Volunteer Lawyers Foundation took over my heart.
While the first AVLF program I worked in was Wills on Wheels (no longer in existence), somewhere along the way, I started representing survivors of intimate partner violence. After more than a decade doing that work, I know that AVLF’s Safe and Stable Families Project, including the work of the Safe Families Office, is more important than ever.
I have represented survivors from every walk of life – from business women with Ivy League degrees to immigrant women scared of our system to single mothers struggling to escape abuse while wondering how they will pay rent and feed their children.
Intimate partner violence knows no race, class, creed, age, gender or orientation. One in three women and one in four men will suffer abuse at the hands of an intimate partner in their lifetimes. Three women die every day in this country at the hands of an intimate partner. While I am angered and outraged by the violence my clients experience, I am inspired every day by the courage and strength I see in these women whom I have had the privilege to represent in taking a stand against that violence.
Access to justice for all is the responsibility of all of us, but especially of lawyers. Lawyers have a unique opportunity to ensure that everyone is entitled to equal protection under the law and equal access to justice, and I believe that lawyers MUST do this work.
But my involvement in AVLF has been more than having the opportunity to volunteer. I joined the Board in 2009, served as President in 2014, and if I can, will serve on this Board until I die. The staff motivates me to do more and to do it better, and I am constantly amazed at the level of expertise they bring to this organization.
Access to justice for all is the responsibility of all of us, but especially of lawyers. Lawyers have a unique opportunity to ensure that everyone is entitled to equal protection under the law and equal access to justice, and I believe that lawyers MUST do this work.
AVLF makes that work possible and easy in a variety of ways, from our work with tenants in our Safe and Stable Home Project to our Safe and Stable Families Project. Indeed, AVLF’s mission – to create safe and stable homes and families by inspiring attorneys to fight for equal justice – pretty much sums it up for me.
AVLF is a group of Hortons – you know, from Dr. Seuss’ Horton Hears a Who. We all know the story of how Horton the elephant saves the tiny village of Who-ville, though he is ridiculed, pilloried and essentially imprisoned for his insistence that a person is a person, no matter how small.
Looking at the story through adult eyes, it is about fighting for equality and standing up for those who are disenfranchised. AVLF lets me be a Horton, too, and I could not be more proud and grateful for this opportunity. I invite you to join us – be a Horton. You will get so much more than you give.
Want to get involved with AVLF? Volunteer or donate today.