The firm’s diversity initiatives extend outside the firm to reach the legal profession and the communities in which we work and live. Our lawyers are active in a number of affinity bars, including the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association, the Hispanic National Bar Association, the National Bar Association, the Greater Washington Area Chapter of the National Bar Association, GAYLAW and the National Lesbian and Gay Law Association, the National South Asian Bar Association, the Vietnamese American Bar Association, and the Women’s Bar Association of the District of Columbia. The California office participates in the California Minority Counsel Program, which is made up of California law firms, corporations, public agencies, and bar associations, and dedicated to promoting diversity in California’s legal community. The firm has also actively supported the Minority Corporate Counsel Association since its founding ten years ago.

The culture at Crowell & Moring supports and encourages all attorneys to participate in their communities. For example, Crowell & Moring attorneys currently hold positions such as Board member of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (Karen Hastie Williams),  Operating Committee member of the Whitman Walker Clinic's Legal Services Program (Loraine B. Halloway), and General Counsel of the Equal Rights Center (George D. Ruttinger).

Every year, Crowell & Moring grants three “Diversity in the Legal Profession Scholarships,” totaling $25,000, to help defray the costs of legal education for diverse law students attending law school in Washington, D.C. The firm also sponsors two Howard University School of Law students each summer who have elected to work for public interest law organizations (including the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless and the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund).

Many of the firm’s non-legal community activities actively promote diversity, such as our California office’s Educational Outreach Program at Sierra Intermediate School to serve the predominately Latino students who attend the poorest middle school in Orange County, California. (Click here to watch a CBS news clip describing the Sierra program). In D.C., lawyers tutor Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter High School students from the predominately African-American and low-income Anacostia neighborhood in the District. In addition, since 2001, the D.C. office’s Firm Life Committee has provided volunteer and in-kind services to the Edward Mazique Parent Child Development Center in D.C., a nonprofit organization that provides preschool education and day care and parental education for low-income families, most of whom are diverse. Crowell & Moring also regularly contributes financially to charitable legal organizations that promote diversity, such as the Asian Pacific American Legal Resource Center, Ayuda, Inc., CASA of Maryland, Inc., Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, National Women’s Law Center, the Washington Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs, the Whitman Walker Clinic Legal Services Program, and Women Empowered Against Domestic Violence.

The firm’s extensive pro bono program regularly includes representations with important implications for diversity and civil rights, including work on behalf of minorities, immigrants and other victims of discrimination. Recent significant representations include:

• filing of an amicus brief in the U.S. Supreme Court on behalf of a group of U.S. Senators, including Sens. Kennedy and Obama, in support of two public school districts in Seattle and Louisville and their voluntary efforts to avoid racial isolation and maintain integrated primary and secondary schools;
• advocacy on behalf of a former member of the military who was not hired as a city police officer because she had been discharged under the so-called “Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell” policy;
• representation of an equal rights advocacy organization and disabled individuals in litigation against a restaurant chain that discriminated against persons with disabilities by failing to provide wheelchair accessible entrances, accessible restrooms, and parking;
• representation of several Mexican immigrants on appeal of a trial decision in their favor against a painting subcontractor who had failed to pay for their work, in a case dealing with the employment rights of undocumented workers;
• representation of several refugees with asylum claims based on persecution or abuse because of sexual orientation, or based on gender-related issues such as genital mutilation; and
• representation of an equal rights advocacy group in challenging a housing developer’s failure to comply with the Fair Housing Act’s requirements for accessible housing.

Click here for more on Crowell & Moring’s award-winning pro bono program.

Crowell & Moring is pleased to have been recognized by awards and rankings that reflect our commitment to diversity. For example, at various times since 2004, we have been:

• a semi-finalist for the Minority Corporate Counsel Association's Thomas Sager Award recognizing law firm diversity efforts;
• ranked in Multicultural Law Magazine’s “Top 100 Firms for Diversity”;
• named one of the top 50, or “A-List,” firms by American Lawyer, which ranks the largest 200 law firms in the U.S. as they score in a combination of areas, including diversity, pro bono, revenue per lawyer, and mid-level associate satisfaction;
• ranked by Vault.com as one of the top 20 firms in the nation on GLBT issues and women’s issues, as well as for pro bono, overall prestige, best 20 firms to work for, quality of life, associate/partner relations, hours, overall satisfaction, best office space, and one of the top firms in the Washington, D.C. region;
• named one of the “Top 50 Places to Work” in D.C. two years running by the Washington Business Journal;
• awarded the D.C. Bar's Constance Belfiore Quality of Life Award.

Click here for more on Crowell & Moring’s rankings and awards.