Justice
By its example and through its foreign policies, the U. S. plays a leadership role in addressing human rights abuses globally. However, its credibility and moral authority is undermined when human rights abuses continue its own back yard. The U. S. criminal justice system violates basic tenets of international human rights law and the U.S. Constitution by routinely imprisoning the mentally ill and the drug addicted without providing rehabilitative services, failing to provide adequate legal representation to low-income people, widely discriminating on the basis of race and income, dispensing one-size-fits-all mandatory prison sentences rather than individualized justice, and imposing the death penalty against juveniles and people who are overwhelmingly poor, minorities or suffering from deficits of education, mental disease or severe childhood abuse. The Fund seeks initiatives to reform public policy in these areas.*
American Bar Association Fund for Justice and Education - $7,500
To publish a report on indigent defense, including findings and recommendations for reform, the result of a series of public hearings around the country to determine shortcomings in the quality of lawyers provided to low-income people.
Center for Constitutional Rights - $51,000
For the Civil Liberties Defense and Education Project, focusing on security-versus-liberty issues post-9/11, through litigation, public education, media outreach, conferences, publications, and training to immigrant communities.
Columbia University and NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc. - $189,656
For research regarding wrongful executions in the U.S., to promote death penalty reform.
Columbia University Law School - $27,000
For research to examine trends in the use of the juvenile death penalty, in preparation for the U.S. Supreme Court’s consideration of the issue in Roper v. Simmons.
Families Against Mandatory Minimums Foundation - $50,000
For work against mandatory minimum prison sentences and in favor of individualized sentencing, through public education, media advocacy, policy briefings, policy books, grassroots mobilization, and appellate litigation.
Georgetown University/The Constitution Project - $60,000
For the Sentencing Initiative, a blue-ribbon committee of high level experts and leaders in criminal justice and prosecution researching and crafting sensible responses to Supreme Court decisions in Blakely, Booker and Fanfan.
National Legal Aid and Defender Association - $151,187
To update and put on-line a manual for public defense agencies to evaluate themselves against national standards.
University of Baltimore - $45,000
For promotion of the book “Veering Right: How the Bush Administration Subverts the Law for Conservative Causes.”
Vera Institute of Justice – $100,000
To document the extent and type of racial disparities caused by prosecution policies and practices, to develop protocols for reducing disparities, and to disseminate them and teach replication in prosecutors’ offices around the country.
* No unsolicited proposals
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