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| Formation | 1998 |
|---|---|
| Type | Nonprofit organization |
Key people | Joanne Doroshow, Executive Director |
| Website | www |
Center for Justice & Democracy (CJ&D) is a non-profit consumer rights organization exclusively dedicated to educating the public about the importance of the U.S. civil justice system and fighting tort reform.
The Center for Justice & Democracy was founded in 1998 by former Ralph Nader staff attorney Joanne Doroshow, with the help of other consumer advocates, including Mr. Nader. In November 2011, New York Law School and the Center for Justice and Democracy formed an affiliation to begin during the fall 2011 semester; during this affiliation CJ&D will be known as the Center for Justice and Democracy at New York Law School.
CJ&D has published numerous studies and White Papers as well as fact sheets on a variety of civil justice issues. CJ&D has presented testimony before Congress and state legislatures, and has helped organize press events advocating the rights of injured consumers and patients. [ citation needed ]
Ralph Nader is an American political activist, author, lecturer, and attorney noted for his involvement in consumer protection, environmentalism, and government reform causes.
Public Citizen is a non-profit, progressive consumer rights advocacy group and think tank based in Washington, D.C., United States, with a branch in Austin, Texas.
Mark Joseph Green is an American author, former public official, public interest lawyer, and Democratic politician from New York City. Green was New York City Consumer Affairs Commissioner from 1990 to 1993 and New York City Public Advocate from 1994 to 2002.
Centre for Democracy & Technology (CDT) is a Washington, D.C.-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit organisation that advocates for digital rights and freedom of expression. CDT seeks to promote legislation that enables individuals to use the internet for purposes of well-intent, while at the same time reducing it's potential for harm. It advocates for transparency, accountability, and limiting the collection of personal information.
The Consumer Federation of America (CFA) is a non-profit organization founded in 1968 to advance consumer interests through research, education and advocacy.
Robert ("Bob") Fellmeth, is a tenured Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law, holder of the Price Chair in Public Interest Law, and executive director of the Center for Public Interest Law and the Children's Advocacy Institute.
Transitional justice is a process which responds to massive human rights violations through judicial redress, political reforms in a region or country, and other measures in order to prevent the recurrence of human rights abuse. Transitional justice consists of judicial and non-judicial measures implemented in order to redress legacies of human rights abuses. Such measures "include criminal prosecutions, truth commissions, reparations programs, and various kinds of institutional reforms". Transitional justice is instituted at a point of political transition classically from war to positive peace, or more broadly from violence and repression to societal stability and it is informed by a society’s desire to rebuild social trust, reestablish what is right from what is wrong, repair a fractured justice system, and build a democratic system of governance. The core value of transitional justice is the very notion of justice—which does not necessarily mean criminal justice. This notion and the political transformation, such as regime change or transition from conflict are thus linked to a more peaceful, certain, and democratic future.
Tort reform refers to changes in the civil justice system in common law countries that aim to reduce the ability of plaintiffs to bring tort litigation or to reduce damages they can receive. Such changes are generally justified under the grounds that litigation is an inefficient means to compensate plaintiffs; that tort law permits frivolous or otherwise undesirable litigation to crowd the court system; or that the fear of litigation can serve to curtail innovation, raise the cost of consumer goods or insurance premiums for suppliers of services, and increase legal costs for businesses. Tort reform has primarily been prominent in common law jurisdictions, where criticism of judge-made rules regarding tort actions manifests in calls for statutory reform by the legislature.
The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, formerly called the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, is an umbrella group of American civil rights interest groups.
The Brennan Center for Justice at New York University School of Law is a nonprofit law and public policy institute. The organization is named after Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr. Generally considered liberal, the Brennan Center advocates for a number of progressive public policy positions, including raising the minimum wage, opposing voter ID laws, and calling for public funding of elections. The organization opposed the U.S. Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United v. FEC, which held that the First Amendment prohibits the government from restricting independent political expenditures by nonprofits.
Theodore H. Frank is an American lawyer, activist, and legal writer, based in Washington, D.C. He is the counsel of record and petitioner in Frank v. Gaos, the first Supreme Court case to deal with the issue of cy pres in class action settlements; he is one of the few Supreme Court attorneys ever to argue his own case. He wrote the vetting report of vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin for the John McCain campaign in the 2008 presidential election. He founded the Center for Class Action Fairness (CCAF) in 2009; it temporarily merged with the Competitive Enterprise Institute in 2015, but as of 2019 CCAF is now part of the new Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute, a free-market nonprofit public-interest law firm founded by Frank and his CCAF colleague Melissa Holyoak. The New York Times calls him the "leading critic of abusive class-action settlements"; the Wall Street Journal has referred to him as "a leading tort-reform advocate" and praised his work exposing dubious practices by plaintiffs' attorneys in class actions.
The American Museum of Tort Law is a museum developed by Ralph Nader, located in his hometown of Winsted, Connecticut. The museum focuses on topics of civil justice and "aspects of the legal system that handle wrongful actions that result in injury". The museum opened to the public in September 2015. It is the first law museum in the United States.
The City University of New York School of Law is a public law school in New York City. It was founded in 1983 as part of the City University of New York. CUNY School of Law was established as a public interest law school with a curriculum focused on integrating clinical teaching methods within traditional legal studies.
Pamela B. Gilbert is an American lawyer and has been a partner of the law firm Cuneo Gilbert & LaDuca, LLP since 2003, where she heads the firm's lobbying practice. Gilbert is a noted consumer rights advocate who has testified before Congress over fifty times and made dozens of appearances in the national print and electronic media. Gilbert leads the Committee to Support Antitrust laws (COSAL), an organization supportive of antitrust legislation.
A private attorney general is an informal term originating in common law jurisdictions for a private attorney who brings a lawsuit claiming it to be in the public interest, i.e., benefiting the general public and not just the plaintiff, on behalf of a citizen or group of citizens. The attorney may, at the equitable discretion of the court, be entitled to recover attorney's fees if they prevail. The rationale behind this principle is to provide extra incentive to private attorneys to pursue suits that may be of benefit to society at large. Private attorney general suits are commonly, though not always, brought as class actions in jurisdictions that permit the certification of class action lawsuits.
Public interest law refers to legal practices undertaken to help poor, marginalized, or under-represented people, or to effect change in social policies in the public interest, on 'not for profit' terms, often in the fields of civil rights, civil liberties, religious liberty, human rights, women's rights, consumer rights, environmental protection, and so on.
David Kretzmer is an Israeli expert in international and constitutional law. He is professor emeritus of international law of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and professor of law at the Transitional Justice Institute at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland. He has been a member of international and Israeli Human Rights organizations, including the UN Human Rights Committee under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, serving as its vice-chairperson in 2001 and 2002. He established the Centre for Human Rights at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and was a founding member of the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, the Minerva Centre for Human Rights, a joint centre of the Hebrew University and Tel Aviv University. He is also a founding member of B'Tselem.
The Consumer Attorneys Association of Los Angeles (CAALA), previously the Los Angeles Trial Lawyers Association (LATLA), is one of the largest associations of plaintiffs lawyers in the United States. Although CAALA refers to itself as a local association, it has almost 3,000 members and is larger than all but six state trial-bar associations. CAALA's annual Las Vegas convention is the largest gathering of plaintiffs lawyers in the United States and its magazine, The Advocate, is the most widely circulated trial-bar publication in the country.
Theresa Amato is an American lawyer, author, social entrepreneur, activist, and the founder, first president and executive director, of the Citizen Advocacy Center. At various times in her career, she has served either as a law clerk, litigator, advisor, counsel, of counsel, in-house counsel, general counsel, manager, adjunct professor, lecturer, executive director, or board member of a variety of nonprofit, for profit, and political entities. Amato is the first woman in U.S. history to manage two high-profile national presidential campaigns outside of the two major parties.
Karen Ruth Ferguson was an American workers' rights advocate. She was the founder and leader of the Pension Rights Center.
