Senator Ben Cardin on Equal Justice and Supporting Legal Aid

Episode Notes

Transcript

Senator Ben Cardin:

That’s what lawyers are about. We want the system of equal justice under the law, and legislators can do a lot to make that a reality.

Announcer:

Equal access to justice is a core American value. In each episode of Talk Justice An LSC Podcast, we’ll explore ways to expand access to justice and illustrate why it is important to the legal community, business government, and the general public. Talk Justice is sponsored by the Leaders Council of the Legal Services Corporation.

Ron Flagg:

Hello and welcome to Talk Justice. I’m Ron Flagg, president of the Legal Services Corporation and your host for this episode. Today I’m honored to welcome Senator Ben Cardin for a conversation about his career and longtime support for legal aid. Senator Cardin is serving his third term as a Maryland Senator. He’s chair of the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, and he has been a dedicated advocate for issues surrounding healthcare, retirement security, the environment, and small business. Before his election to the Senate, he was the representative of Maryland’s third congressional district, and he also served as chair of the Maryland Legal Service Corporation from 1988 to 1995, Maryland Legal Services Corporation as the largest state funder in Maryland. Thank you for joining me today, Senator

Senator Ben Cardin:

Brian. Good to be with you. I’m sorry I’m a little bit late. These circumstances around the world always interfere with domestic priorities. Yeah. Well,

Ron Flagg:

I hate when life and public affairs interferes with LSC, but I

Senator Ben Cardin:

Understand it. Thank you from your leadership on this. Appreciate it.

Ron Flagg:

Thank you, Senator. Let’s go back in time a bit. What made you want to be a lawyer?

Senator Ben Cardin:

That’s an easy question for me to answer. It was sort of my family’s business. My father was a lawyer, my uncles were lawyers. My brother was a lawyer, so it was sort of in our family to pursue a legal career. I must tell you, when I got to law school, I fell in love with law, just really enjoyed the analytical thinking. I enjoyed the commitment to preserve our rule of law and our system of justice, and I really immersed myself into the roles that lawyers can play in protecting democracies and promoting rights.

Ron Flagg:

And I think you’ve sort of anticipated my next question, but how has your background in law influenced your priorities and work as a legislator?

Senator Ben Cardin:

Well, it’s interesting. I was a legislator before I was a lawyer. I was elected to the Maryland General Assembly between my second and third year of law school. And I remember all my professors complaining about how the law needed be improved. So I got a lot of instructions from my law professors as to what I needed to do as a legislator. So it really did show me that as a legislator, I could help do what lawyers are responsible to do, and that is to strengthen our legal system, to protect the rule of law, to provide opportunities. That’s what lawyers are about. We want the system of equal justice under the law, and legislators can do a lot to make that a reality. So it really was an extension of my values in my law education when I became a legislator and I was able to get things done consistent with those values. And throughout my legislative career, I’ve always made priorities in promoting human rights and equal justice under the law and equal opportunities. And to me, that’s a responsibility that I learned in law school.

Ron Flagg:

Well, that’s a great segue to my next question. You spoke just a year or so ago at the release of our most recent Justice Gap report, and you joined us in our frustration that our nation has not made as much progress as we should on access to justice for the poor. Our Justice Gap report found that low income Americans received no or inadequate legal help for 92% of the civil legal problems that impacted them substantially. Now, as an American, as an attorney and as a member of Congress, what are your core concerns about the justice gap?

Senator Ben Cardin:

Those numbers to shock all of us. If we believe, as I hope Americans believe in equal justice under the law, we are not providing equal justice in the law. Because the other part of that statistic is if you didn’t have adequate legal advice, your chances of successful outcome is very much diminished. So we’re not providing equal justice because so many people are denied that opportunity. One out of six Americans would qualify for legal service help. And if the gap is as big as that report shows, we’re not meeting our obligation. So we’re failing the people of America, but we’re also failing in America’s ability to lead the world. America’s the leader of the free world. America’s the leader of protecting democratic states and the rule of law. And if we’re not taking care of our business at home, it makes it much more difficult for us to be able to be the global leader we need on these values.

Ron Flagg:

So LSE is our funding has increased a bit in recent years, not enough, but moving in the right direction and we’re grateful that civil legal aid receives in the last decade or so bipartisan support in Congress. Now, why do you think lawmakers from both sides of the aisle have come together on this issue when they’re so divided on so many other issues?

Senator Ben Cardin:

Well, first, when you look at the legal profession, it’s hard to identify a lawyer as being a Democrat or a Republican. Lawyers are committed to the principles of representing their clients and protecting our system of justice. And I find that in our state, when I got first involved in legal services in the Maryland Legal Services Corporation that I had support from lawyers that I thought were Democrats, I thought were Republicans. But it made no difference. I was lobbied hard as a legislator to provide help for legal services in Maryland and as a federal legislator to increase the funds for the Legal Services Corporation. And it was always the leadership of theBar Association, not the leadership of the Democratic Party or leadership of the Republican Party. My advice to the legal community, I know how much of a priority we make in legal services. I see that in Maryland by our bar very much engaged in improving legal services from our state bench. The judges do everything they can to protect equal access to justice. I urge you to get involved in the political system on behalf of legal services because if our local judiciary contact your local officials, whether they be state or federal, it’s going to pay off big dividends and bipartisan support for getting these programs adequately funded.

Ron Flagg:

Thank you for that. I second your recommendation. Let’s switch gears for a moment. Access to justice has been a passion of yours long before you reach the Senate. I want to ask you about the Cardin requirement, which is a rule that you helped put into place at your alma mater, the University of Maryland’s Francis King Carey School of Law in 1987. And the requirement is that full-time law students must provide legal services to the poor or people who otherwise lack access to justice in order to graduate. What did you learn from instituting this program back then and what would you say is its enduring impact today,

Senator Ben Cardin:

Ron? That’s one of my most proud achievements I’ve ever had as a legislator, as a lawyer on behalf of legal services. It was to get that requirement in our law. I chaired a study in Maryland on access to legal services, and the findings were, as you have indicated today, the big gap in the ability to provide necessary services to civil needs. And that the outcomes were very much contingent upon having adequate representation. So our commission made many recommendations. We changed the way that we handled IOLTA accounts into making them mandatory. We changed the way we provided some government funding for civil legal services. We did a lot of changes, but the one that I was most proud about to institute in our two law schools, a mandatory requirement for an experience for handling civil legal cases for the poor. And these clinical programs are some of the best in the nation.

Maryland law schools ranked at the top on their clinical programs. They’re providing thousands and thousands of hours of really top-notch legal services in these clinics to individuals who otherwise would not get that service. So they’re providing direct help to people to fill the gap, but more importantly, our law students are getting a sensitivity to their responsibilities to help and pro bono and elsewhere to fill the gap in their professional lives. They may go on to be corporate attorneys or they may go on for some other field other than law as their principal interests, but they always had that experience in these clinical programs and know that they have a responsibility to help fill the gap. They can do it by pro bono, they can do it by their participation in nonprofits. There’s lots of ways you can do it, and I think the clinical program has had a major role in helping Maryland fill that gap.

Ron Flagg:

Another great part of your background is your services chair of the Maryland Legal Services Corporation from 1988 to 95. What other lessons or observations do you have from that lengthy period of service with the largest state funder of legal aid in Maryland?

Senator Ben Cardin:

I think from that experience, the cheer to Maryland Legal Services Corporation, I gained great admiration for those who go into legal services as their career. These are people who are taking a career path that won’t be as lucrative as other career paths that lawyers can take. It doesn’t get you to same prestige at a cocktail reception that you might get from other ways of practicing law, but they are doing the really important work to protect our legal system. Most of our legal service programs could use additional funding, so their caseload is usually heavier than it should be. They work under very challenging circumstances and they provide incredibly valuable help to preserve our legal system. So what I learned, just to admire those that are willing to really step forward and do the lion’s share work to help lower income families deal with the challenges of our legal system that where legal services is absolutely essential. And then I learned how to work together. I think in the Maryland Legal Services Corporation, we brought together all the stakeholders to try to develop strategies that could help fill the gap. And the leadership there to me was incredible. And I had just amazing people that served on the board with me. They’re my lifelong friends.

Ron Flagg:

And of course, among the stakeholders, maybe the primary stakeholders are the people who benefit from those services. And the pandemic has had a huge impact on the legal needs of low income Americans and low income people in Maryland. One of the things that legal services providers have been concerned about, and I know you have as well, is the impact on domestic violence rates, coupling health concerns, economic concerns with stay at home health orders was sort of a perfect storm for domestic violence. Can you tell us about the funding you were able to secure for Baltimore Area services to help domestic violence survivors a couple years back?

Senator Ben Cardin:

Well, Ron, thanks for mentioning that as the United States Senator, as a member of Congress, I get the opportunity to recommend certain congressional directed funding, better known as earmarks. I work very closely with my colleagues of Maryland. We share information, but during covid, we try to find areas that we’re in desperate need, that the regular funding programs were inadequate, where we can make a difference in providing needed services to the people of our community. And one of those efforts was to secure funds for domestic violence victims to provide a safe home of safe environment for victims of domestic violence. So I was proud to be able to do that. In one of those efforts, there were several other opportunities. We had to use Congressional directed funding to provide additional community services that are very much related to what the Legal Services corporations funding goes to try to avoid problems. And we were able to strengthen through these efforts, several of these programs in communities that have a challenge in getting legal service help. So what we try to do is provide direct services for domestic violence victims as well as support greater community services in housing and healthcare and domestic needs in all these areas that would hopefully avoid a legal problem.

Ron Flagg:

Senator Cardin, thanks so much for joining Talk Justice today. More importantly, and really from the bottom of my heart, thank you for your longtime dedication to and leadership of Access to Justice when you spoke at our March, 2023 forum on increasing access to justice. You close by saying, and I’m quoting you now, we’ve left too many people behind in our legal system. It’s time that we take major steps to correct that injustice. I thank you for those statements. You perfectly capture our mission at LSC, and we’re glad to have your support and leadership for this work. Thank you to our listeners for tuning into this episode of Talk Justice, and please subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. Be well.

Announcer:

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