Practice Areas
Practice Areas
Pro Bono/Public Service
Practice Leader: Joseph A. Sullivan
* See our page on Pepper’s role in the “intelligent design” case, Kitzmiller et al. v. Dover Area School District, et al.
The Firm’s Historical Commitment
Pepper Hamilton LLP believes that each of its lawyers should provide pro bono and public interest legal services, as a matter of professional responsibility and in recognition of the great need for these services.
For at least five decades, Pepper lawyers have accepted unpopular and challenging cases, participating in pro bono activities ranging from death penalty litigation to civil rights class actions to individual civil matters for low income, disabled and other people who are disadvantaged. Pepper also has represented hundreds of nonprofit organizations.
Pepper contributes, year after year, thousands of hours of professional time to pro bono matters. Our work benefits the individuals we serve, the public at large, and the development of our lawyers’ skills and sense of professionalism and public service. Firm policy actively encourages partners and associates to provide pro bono legal services.
Dedication to Pro Bono
Pepper takes on pro bono activities with the same care as other matters. As long as there is no conflict of interest, we will analyze the rights of our potential clients, the state of the law and the experience of our lawyers in the area of law at issue.
Once we accept a pro bono project, Pepper pursues it with all of the energy and attention to detail that we apply to our other work. We expect our lawyers to devote as much time as necessary to handle the project successfully.
Whenever an associate handles a pro bono matter, a senior lawyer is assigned to supervise the case. To encourage our associates to take on pro bono projects, the firm credits the hours spent on such matters, along with time devoted to client-billable matters, for purposes of meeting the firm’s budgeted billable hours goal. In addition, we weigh the quality of performance on a pro bono case equally with the work on any other project for purposes of associate evaluation.
The firm’s efforts are managed and supervised by our director of pro bono programs, who also is special counsel with the firm. Pepper’s Pro Bono Committee sets the firm’s overall goals and policies, and advises the director of pro bono programs.
As a firm, we have pledged to devote an amount equal to 3 percent of our billable hours to pro bono work by accepting The Pro Bono Institute’s Law Firm Pro Bono Challenge, and we expect our attorneys to share that commitment.
Sources of Cases and Projects
Pepper receives pro bono referrals from public interest law centers and organizations, other members of the bar, clients and, occasionally, individuals who are aware of our reputation in this area.
We work with or receive referrals from organizations such as the Philadelphia Volunteers for the Indigent Program, the American Civil Liberties Union, Community Legal Services, the AIDS Law Project, the Women’s Law Project, Washington Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, the Support Center for Child Advocates, Volunteer Lawyers for the Arts, Legal Counsel for the Elderly, the Dauphin County Bar Pro Bono Program, the Mercer County (NJ) Bar Association, Delaware Volunteer Legal Services and Detroit Legal Services.
Accepting a New Pro Bono Matter
Every potential pro bono matter, regardless of its source, must be reviewed and approved by the director of pro bono programs or another member of the firm’s Pro Bono Committee.
A potential pro bono matter will be reviewed and evaluated to determine whether, among other things, it (a) presents a conflict with any existing matter in the firm, (b) provides direct legal services to an individual or organization unable to pay for the service and (c) advances law reform or would benefit the public interest. We interpret the latter criterion broadly to accommodate the wide spectrum of our lawyers’ interests and viewpoints.
More About Our Pro Bono Work
* Pro Bono Practice Groups
* Impact Litigation
* Community Economic Development
* Honors and Awards
itzmiller v. Dover Area School District:
The ‘Intelligent Design’ Case
At the trial, Michael Behe, the leading intellectual of intelligent design, was cross-examined with cheerful mercilessness by Eric Rothschild. For six weeks, the courtroom of Judge John E. Jones III was like the biology class you wished you could have taken.Pepper Hamilton LLP served as lead counsel to the plaintiffs in the landmark “intelligent design” case of Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District that was decided in Pennsylvania in December 2005 (Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, 400 F. Supp. 2d 707 (M.D. Pa. 2005)).
Pepper, along with lawyers from the ACLU of Pennsylvania and Americans United for Separation of Church and State, successfully represented in federal court eight families who challenged the Dover policy that included intelligent design in the curriculum. Pepper handled the case as part of its pro bono and public service program.
* Listen to “The Intelligent Design of a High-Stakes Trial Win: A Webinar on Successful Litigation Strategies.” This online event used the landmark 2005 “intelligent design” case to discuss strategies for success in complex cases including using trial themes to persuade, making the complex simple and memorable, crafting merciless cross-examinations, and gaining the edge with technology. The webinar featured Pepper partners Eric Rothschild and Steve Harvey, trial counsel for the plaintiffs in the Dover case, Brown University professor Ken Miller, expert witness for the plaintiffs, and Nina Gussack, the Chair of the Health Effects Litigation Practice at Pepper Hamilton.
* Order your free reprint of the New Yorker’s in-depth article on this landmark case.
An overview of the case and the judge’s decision appear below:
* Overview of the Case
* Judge’s Decision
* Media Attention and Speaking Engagements
* Rothschild and Harvey
* Other Resources
Additional information is available at:
* Facts About the Case
* Pleadings (inluding the judge’s decision of December 20, 2005)
* News Articles (selected items)
* Pepper Speaking Engagements
* Media Inquiries and Speaking Engagement Requests
Overview of the Case
In October 2004, the Dover Area School District in central Pennsylvania was thrust into the national and international spotlight when it became the first district in the country to include in its biology curriculum the concept of intelligent design – the idea that life had to have been created by an intelligent, supernatural actor because it is too complex to have developed through natural processes.
The Dover School Board had voted to require biology teachers at the high school to read a statement to students that asserted that the scientific theory of evolution was just a theory, not a fact, and presented “intelligent design” as an alternative to the theory of evolution.
Parents of students in the school district filed a federal lawsuit in December 2004 challenging the intelligent design policy.
A bench trial took place in the fall of 2005 in Harrisburg, Pa., before the Hon. John E. Jones, III of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Pennsylvania, and ran for six weeks, from September 26, 2005 through November 4, 2005.
Eric Rothschild and Stephen G. Harvey were lead counsel on the Pepper trial team. Also part of the Pepper trial team were Alfred H. Wilcox, Thomas B. Schmidt, III and paralegals Katherine E. Henson and Hedya Aryani, with assistance from associates Christopher J. Lowe, Stacey I. Gregory, Joseph M. Farber, Benjamin M. Mather and Eric J. Goldberg, paralegal Justene G. Hill, and the entire Harrisburg office of the firm.
At trial, Pepper and the rest of the plaintiffs’ team argued that the intelligent design policy was an attempt to bring creationism and religion into the classroom, and they contested the school district’s argument that intelligent design is a valid scientific alternative to the theory of evolution.
The trial is being touted as the first legal test of the constitutionality of teaching intelligent design as science, and the most significant case on religious issues in public school science classes since 1987, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the teaching of creation science.
The Judge’s Decision
Dover’s intelligent design policy was overturned on December 20, 2005, when Judge Jones issued a 139-page opinion, ruling in favor of the plaintiffs. He found that intelligent design is a religious, non-scientific proposition, and that teaching intelligent design in public schools violates the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.
The judge’s opinion reads, in part:
“The proper application of both the endorsement and Lemon tests to the facts of this case makes it abundantly clear that the [School] Board’s ID [‘intelligent design’] Policy violates the Establishment Clause. In making this determination, we have addressed the seminal question of whether ID is science. We have concluded that it is not, and moreover that ID cannot uncouple itself from its creationist, and thus religious, antecedents….As stated, our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach ID as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom... . The breathtaking inanity of the Board’s decision [to adopt the ID Policy] is evident when considered against the factual backdrop which has now been fully revealed through this trial. The students, parents, and teachers of the Dover Area School District deserved better than to be dragged into this legal maelstrom, with its resulting utter waste of monetary and personal resources.” (pages 136–138)
Media Attention and Speaking Engagements
The Dover case has been covered extensively by regional, national and international media, with articles appearing in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the Boston Globe, the Chicago Tribune, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Philadelphia Inquirer, the York Daily Record, the York Dispatch, and many other daily and weekly papers.
Several magazines also have written long essays on the case, including Time (August 15, 2005), Harper’s (February 2006) and The New Yorker (December 5, 2005), which featured a full-page caricature of Mr. Rothschild cross examining the defendants’ lead witness “with cheerful mercilessness.”
Mr. Rothschild and Mr. Harvey have appeared on The News Hour with Jim Lehrer, Lou Dobbs Tonight, National Public Radio, and other U.S. and foreign media outlets to discuss the Kitzmiller case and issues relating to the teaching of evolution.
They also have been invited to speak about the case and related issues by the National Academy of Sciences, the National Science Teachers Association, the National Constitution Center, the Society for the Study of Evolution, major universities, bar associations, and other legal, religious and community groups across the country. They have been sharing the factual and legal background of the case, and discussing whether intelligent design is science or religion, why the teaching of the scientific theory of evolution continues to generate controversy, and how the controversy implicates important issues of religious freedom.
Rothschild and Harvey
Mr. Rothschild and Mr. Harvey are partners in Pepper’s Litigation and Dispute Resolution Department, resident in the Philadelphia office.
Mr. Rothschild concentrates his practice in complex litigation, including product liability law, constitutional and civil rights issues, and fraud and other commercial disputes.
Mr. Harvey concentrates his practice in complex litigation and trial practice, including commercial disputes, consumer class actions, and banking and financial services.
Pepper Hamilton LLP is a multi-practice law firm with more than 500 lawyers in seven states and the District of Columbia. The firm provides corporate, litigation and regulatory legal services to leading businesses, governmental entities, nonprofit organizations and individuals throughout the nation and the world. The firm was founded in 1890.
Other Resources
For more information about intelligent design and the Dover case, please visit:
* ACLU:http://www.aclu.org/religion/intelligentdesign
* National Center for Science Education: http://www2.ncseweb.org.
No comments:
Post a Comment