National.Lawyers.Guild.GUILD.PRACTITIONER.Student.Competition.2007 Download a copy of the rules and information by clicking here! Founded in 1937, the National Lawyers Guild set out to be the leader in advancing social justice in the courts. Bent on ensuring that “human rights be regarded as more sacred than property interests,” attorneys across the country joined the Guild’s ranks in furtherance of their desire to be people's lawyers. They immediately set to marching, advocating, and arguing for equality, liberty, and justice. Law students have long been a key part of the Guild’s work, but it was not until 1970 that they received full membership status. Today, law students participate at all levels in the organization's committees, projects, and task forces. In recognition of the importance of law students to the organization and in the interest of building and supporting increased student involvement – as well as encouraging their creative, personal, and professional development – Guild Practitioner invites student members to submit entries for its first ever Law for the People Student Competition Issue. Description: To further the goal of integrating and expanding both law student membership and participation within the National Lawyers Guild, we welcome all student members to participate in an open-format contest for student work to be published in Guild Practitioner, the Guild’s scholarly journal. The competition commences October 1, 2007 and will close December 31, 2007. Topic: The theme of the competition is "Law for the People." That’s it. Some questions that may help you focus your thoughts include: What does it mean to be a people’s lawyer? What should the role of the NLG be in people’s movements? What has it been historically? Should it change? How is it failing? How is it succeeding? Have you participated in Guild work, committees, delegations, and other activities? How do we address both ongoing and emerging social justice issues through law? The Guild has played a unique role in legal history – what do our political, theoretical, and social ruminations mean today? At what point do thoughts and conversations translate into action? In a world where debt looms and our values are reduced to pithy email signatures, how do we free ourselves from the foci of books and billable hours? Can we still “do justice?” Is there still space for radical lawyering? Prizes: All entrants whose pieces are selected for inclusion in the issue will receive a one-year honorary membership in the National Lawyers Guild. In addition, three (3) entrants whose pieces are evaluated as among the best of all submissions will receive free registration to the 2008 Law for the People Convention.* Deadline: 5pm Eastern Standard Time, Monday, December 31, 2007. Eligibility: The competition is open to all individuals who are law student members of the National Lawyers Guild at the date of submission** and who have not been previously admitted to practice law in the United States. Admission to practice after submission of the paper is not disqualifying. The intent is that this competition result in an all-student issue of Guild Practitioner. Format and Contents: As stated in the description, this contest is open-format. Fiction and nonfiction, poems and philo-lego-socio-sophical papers, as well as political cartoons, comic strips, scholarly articles on topics and with viewpoints consistent with Guild work, photographic statements and biting social commentary will all be given equal weight during the evaluation process. We ask that your submission not have been previously published. Publishing your piece elsewhere subsequent to its original printing in Guild Practitioner is of course supported. All submissions must have a title. In case you are wondering, “Untitled” counts as a title (though, arguably, not a very good one). If submitting artwork, media and description/ dimensions must be expressly stated. We regret that films, audio, and slides cannot be accepted. If you are forced to scale your work down to submit via email and you are selected for publication, we may contact you to request a CD of the original file. Please plan to be able and available to meet this request. All writing pieces should be double spaced and not exceed 10,000 words. Legal and other non-fiction writing pieces must include citations of law review quality conforming with The Bluebook: A Uniform System of Citation, current edition. Entries falling outside of what may be construed as writing must be accompanied by an artist’s statement. No exceptions. Submission: All pieces must be submitted electronically. Please email your entry to Míchel Martinez and David Gespass at fiat.justitia.07@gmail.com. Submissions must be received by 5pm Eastern Standard Time on December 31, 2007. Please include a cover page with the following information: author's full name, address, email address, phone number(s), law school and graduation month/year; a brief discourse on the author – notes on his or her life, education (legal and otherwise), hobbies, personal best Atari scores, nicknames, etc.; and an abstract of 100 words or less. Should you have any questions at all, please feel free to call Míchel Martinez at (212) 679-5100 x12 or to email her at studentorg@nlg.org. Thank you for your interest in the 2007 Guild Practitioner Student Competition. We look forward to receiving your entries. Radically yours, Míchel Angela Martinez David A. Gespass * The site of the 2008 Convention is yet to be decided. We regret but understand the possibility that those top three (3) selected for free admission to the convention may ultimately be unable to attend. Please note that there is no cash substitute for either convention registration or membership. We hope to see everyone in 2008! ** Please contact the national office and your local chapter to be sure that you are a current Guild member!