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Champions of Justice Quotes
"My law school required that applications for admission include an essay about why the applicant wanted to be a lawyer. Thirty years ago, I wrote that I wanted to be a lawyer so that I could help people. I explained that I would be the first lawyer in my extended family, and that as a part of the African-American community, I grew up hearing about lawyers who took families' homes if their legal fees weren't promptly paid and banks that made folks in my community pay 50% down to get a loan to buy a home, even though others in other communities were not required to do so. I wrote then that I wanted a position and a platform from which I could combat such fundamental unfairness and make positive changes in peoples' lives. Fortunately, I was accepted into law school anyway.
Thirty years later, my answers to that question remain unchanged. As I happily inform anyone who asks why I remain a legal services attorney, it is because doing so has provided me a position and a platform from which I can make my own small contributions toward creating a more just society, and toward giving my clients, their families and their communities a fairer chance to achieve the American dream. It also gives me great comfort that whenever my wife or daughter is asked what I do for a living, they always say: 'He's a lawyer . . . but he's one of the GOOD ones.' "
-Evan G. Lewis, 2008 recipient
Legal Aid of North Carolina
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