Upcoming Events

  • GSBA Member Honored at Black History Month Celebration
    Congratulations to GSBA Legislative Affairs Committee Chair, Hester Agudosi, who is being honored at the 2009 Black History Month Celebration hosted by the Morris County Prosecutor’s Office in partnership with the National Organization for Black Law Enforcement Executives (NOBLE). The event is being held on February 9, 2009, from 7:00PM to 9:00PM, at the Administration and Records Building, Freeholders’ Public Meeting Room, 5th Floor, 10 Court Street, Morristown, NJ 07963. Matthew W. Horace, Special Agent in Charge, ATTF, will be the keynote speaker. Ms. Agudosi is being recognized as a distinguished, successful and dedicated professional in public service. If you would like to attend the event, please rsvp by February 2, 2009 to: rsvp@co.morris.nj.us
  • GSBA Gala Committee Call for Award Nominations
    Nominations for the awards that will be presented at GSBA’s 2009 Scholarship Gala on June 6, 2009, at the Hyatt Regency in New Brunswick, are due by Friday, February 6, 2009. Nominations must include the name of the award, the nominee’s resume or CV and a statement in support of the nomination. Please submit nominations for the Oliver Randolph Award, the Roger M. Yancey Award, the Van Y. Clinton Award, the Garden State Bar Award, and the Young Lawyer Award by February 6, 2009, to the Gala Committee via e-mail to Terri Soaries at: tsoaries@its.jnj.com
  • Time is Running Out – Register Now - 100th Anniversary of the NAACP
    The Middlesex County Bar Association is hosting a special program celebrating the 100th Anniversary of the NAACP. GSBA is co-sponsoring this event. The program will be held on Wednesday, January 28, 2009 at 4:30PM at the Pines Manor, 2085 Route 27, Edison. The program will feature legal issues impacted by the NAACP and will include a panel discussion with the Honorable Joseph A. Greenaway, Jr., United States District Court Judge (Moderator); the Honorable Michael A. Shipp, United States Magistrate Judge; Paulette Brown, Esq. (Partner, Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge); Frank Askin, Esq. (Rutgers Law School Professor); and Theodore M. Shaw, Esq. (Columbia Law School Professor and past President of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund). The topics are the Justice System, Employment Law, Education and Voting Rights. The panel discussion will be followed by a reception and dinner program featuring Raymond M. Brown, Esq. (Partner, Greenbaum Rowe Smith & Davis) as the keynote speaker. Governor Jon Corzine will attend the reception. Secretary of State Nina Wells and Middlesex County Legislators and Freeholders will present proclamations and resolutions. Cost to attend is $55 for GSBA members and $10 to attend the pre-dinner seminar only. Deadline for registration is January 26, 2008. To register by phone, call 732-828-3433, ext. 102. To register electronically, send e-mail to jcowles@mcbalaw.com
  • Speed Mentoring/Networking Program
    The New Jersey Women Lawyers Association is hosting a Speed Mentoring/Networking Program for members and non-members. In a fun and exciting “speed dating” format, at tendees will benefit from the wisdom of many extraordinary women who will address and answer questions about mentoring, rainmaking, work/life balance, networking, women’s health issues, financial issues, and more. The panel includes Peggy Sheahan Knee, NJSBA President, Mariellen Dugan, General Counsel of NJ Resources, Paulette Brown, Partner, Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge, LLP, and other experts in their fields. The program will be held on February 2, 2009, from 6:00PM to 9:00PM, at the NJ Law Center, One Constitution Square, New Brunswick, NJ. Dinner and wine will be provided. Cost is $60 for non-members and $50 for members. To register, mail payments to NJWLA, 253 Main Street, Suite 108, Matawan, NJ 07747 or contact Mary Raugh at 973-820-1171 or mraugh@njwla.org
  • Judge Lester’s Retirement Party GSBA members are invited to attend a celebration honoring the retirement of the Honorable Betty J. Lester, J.S.C., on February 19, 2009 at 5:30PM at the Newark Club, One Newark Center, Newark. Judge Lester was the first African-American woman appointed to the bench in Essex County and only the second appointed to the bench in the State. Her tenure on the bench has been a source of inspiration to African-American attorneys statewide. Cost to attend is $85 per person. Checks should be made payable to “the Retirement Dinner for Judge Lester” and mailed to the Honorable Michael J. Nelson, J.S.C., 50 West Market Street, 12th Floor, Newark, NJ 07102. Responses are due by January 30, 2009. Call 973-693-6794 if you have any questions.
  • Black History Month Celebration
    GSBA is co-sponsoring the NJSBA’s Minorities in the Profession Section Black History Month Celebration on February 25, 2009 at 6:00PM at the New Jersey Law Center in New Brunswick. The program features Shavar Jeffries, Counsel to Attorney General Anne Milgram and former Seton Ha ll Law Professor, as the keynote speaker.
  • March 19, 2009 – ABWL’s Honorable Anne Thompson Inn of Court Inaugural Ceremony, 6:00PM, NJ Law Center, New Brunswick
  • April 2, 2009 – New Jersey Women Lawyers Association 2nd Annual Women’s Initiative and Leaders in Law Platinum Gala, The Palace at Somerset Park, Somerset
  • April 17, 2009 – GSBA General Meeting, 6:00PM, NJ Law Center, New Brunswick
  • April 18, 2009 – ABWL Jazz Brunch, 10:00AM, Westin Hotel, Princeton
  • May 14 to 18, 2009 – National Bar Association Young Lawyers Division 6th Annual Retreat, Barbados Bougainvillea Beach Resort, Barbados
  • June 6, 2009 – GSBA 34th Anniversary Scholarship & Awards Dinner, 6:00PM, Hyatt Regency Hotel, New Brunswick
  • September 24, 2009 – GSBA Annual Meeting, 6:00PM, NJ Law Center, New Brunswick

Civil Rights Pioneers Stamp Series
http://www.usps.com/communications/newsroom/2008/pr08_136.htm

The public is welcome to attend the February 21, 2009 National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Board Meeting in New York City, when the Postal Service immortalizes the courage, commitment and achievements of 12 civil rights leaders. The dedication ceremony will take place at 10:15 a.m. in the New York Hilton Hotel and Towers’ Trianon Ballroom, 2nd Floor, 2335 Ave. of the Americas. Art director Ethel Kessler and stamp designer Greg Berger, both of Bethesda, MD, chose to approach this project through photographic montage. Pairing two pioneers in each stamp was a way of intensifying the montage effect.  

Top row of stamps:
Mary Church Terrell (1863-1954)
Throughout her long life as a writer, activist, and lecturer,=2 0she was a powerful advocate for racial justice and women’s rights in America and abroad.
Mary White Ovington (1865-1951)
This journalist and social worker believed passionately in racial equality and was a founder of the NAACP.
J. R. Clifford (1848-1933)
He was the first black attorney licensed in West Virginia; in two landmark cases before his state’s Supreme Court, he attacked racial discrimination in education.
Joel Elias Spingarn (1875-1939)
Because coverage of blacks in the media tended to be negative, he endowed the prestigious Spingarn Medal, awarded annually since 1915, to highlight black achievement.
Oswald Garrison Villard ( 1872-1949)
He was one of the founders of the NAACP and wrote the “Call” leading to its formation.
Daisy Gatson Bates (1914-1999)
She mentored nine black students who enrolled at all-white Central High School in Little Rock, AR, in 1957. The students used her home as an organizational hub.  

Bottom row of stamps:
Charles Hamilton Houston (1895-1950)
This lawyer and educator was a main architect of the civil rights movement. He believed in using laws to better the lives of underprivileged citizens.
Walter White (1893-1955)
Blue eyes and a fair complexion enabled this leader of the NAACP to make daring undercover investigations. Medgar Evers (1925-1963)
He served with distinction as an official of the NAACP in Mississippi until his assassination in 1963. Fannie Lou Hamer (1917-1977)
She was a Mississippi sharecropper who fought for black voting rights and spoke for many when she said, “I’m sick and tired of being sick and tired.”
Ella Baker (1903-1986)
Her lifetime of activism made her a skillful organizer. She encouraged women and young people to assume positions of leadership in the civil rights movement.
Ruby Hurley (1909-1980)
As a courageous and capable official with the NAACP, she did difficult, dangerous work in the South.