A Message From GSBA President
Geraldine Reed Brown
April 2008
Dear GSBA members:
Here are some of those activities in which the GSBA has been engaged in 2008:
- At the March general membership meeting we had updates and reports from our various Committees, a presentation by NJ LEEP, a presentation by New Jersey Families Against Mandatory Minimums. We also had an information report about a possible collaboration with the Association of Black Women Lawyers in connection with a new Inn of Court.
- We were represented at the Governor's Black History Month celebration
- We co-sponsored with other minority bar associations a meeting with Chief Justice Rabner at the New Jersey Law Center
- We supported and were represented at Minority Student Program 40th Anniversary Banquet, Rutgers School of Law-Newark
- We attended the New Jersey State Bar Foundation 50th Anniversary Reception.
- We attended the Women's Leadership and Advocacy Conference, presented by the Hispanic Bar Association.
- We helped facilitate the meeting of minority law students with Chief Justice Rabner at the Hughes Justice Complex in Trenton
- We are supporting and will be represented at the Association of Black Women's Lawyers scholarship event.
- We continue to enhance our web site with links of interest, upcoming events, Black History month materials, Women's History month materials, National Bar Association materials, etc.
- We are working with our event planner, Mary V. Jones, on finalizing all arrangements for our annual scholarship fundraising event, the 33rd Annual Gala to be held on June 14, 2008 at the Hyatt Regency in New Brunswick.
- We continue to give attention to matters of concern, including equal justice under law and judicial appointments.
I want to thank those GSBA members who are chairing our Committees, working on programs, attending our General Membership Meetings, and contributing time, talent, and financial support through paying their membership dues.
In looking at our members, it is clear that we are represented throughout the profession. Our ranks include judges, law professors, lawyers in the public sector, lawyers in private practice, lawyers in firms, law students, and lawyers in corporations. But regardless of where we are, I think as lawyers we share some common themes and common dreams.
In its simplest form one of those common themes and dreams is this: In some way, every day, we all strive to pursue our own definition of greatness in both our law practices and in our life practices. In his book, Everyday Greatness, Stephen Covey includes an observation I really like, made by a Nobel Prize-winning poet: "I have on my table a violin string. It is free. But it is not free to do what a violin string is supposed to do-to produce music. So I take it, fix it in my violin and tighten it until it is taut. Only then it is free to be a violin string." The poet observes: By the same token we are free when our lives are uncommitted, but not to be what we were intended to be. Real freedom is not freedom from but freedom for." I hope that each of us will string together a legal symphony of success, a concerto of camaraderie, so that we can also lift every voice and sing a new song, celebrating our past, and proclaiming our future as contributors to the profession. If we conceive, then believe, we can achieve and accomplish more together than any of us can accomplish separately.
In his latest book, Leadership Gold, John C. Maxwell gives 16 definitions of Leadership. Maxwell says Leadership:
- Is the willingness to put oneself at risk.
- Is the passion to make a difference with others.
- Is being dissatisfied with the current reality.
- Is taking responsibility while others are making excuses.
- Is seeing the possibilities in a situation while others are seeing the limitations.
- Is the readiness to stand out in a crowd.
- Is an open mind and an open heart.
- Is the ability to submerge your ego for the sake of what of what is best.
- Is evoking in others the capacity to dream.
- Is inspiring others with a vision of what they can contribute.
- Is the power of one harnessing the power of many.
- Is your heart speaking to the hearts of others.
- Is the integration of heart, head, and soul.
- Is the capacity to care, and in caring, to liberate the ideas, energy, and capacities of others.
- Is the dream made reality
- Is above all, courageous.
I hope that each of us will aspire to be a leader in the law and a leader for the GSBA. Someone once said "The hardest arithmetic is that which enables us to count our blessings." None of us would need a calculator to do the simple arithmetic that we can be a blessing for one another, and I am blessed to be your GSBA President.
