Bringing Human Rights Home Lawyers' Network

The "Bringing Human Rights Home Lawyers' Network" encourages U.S. compliance with international human rights law, including through the U.N. and Inter-American Human Rights systems and the development of strategies to use human rights law in U.S. courts and domestic policy-making and debate.

The Network's 390 members are drawn from domestic social justice organizations, the U.S. programs of international human rights groups and law school human rights programs. HRI convenes the Network through semi-annual meetings and provides coordination on projects as needed.

Based on the principle that all rights are interdependent, many of these strategies crosscut different rights-based movements and respond to a growing need among domestic public interest lawyers to work together to meet common threats, such as the across-the-board attack on federal rights and the roll-back of federal social safety nets. As part of its work to develop the use of U.N. and regional mechanisms by domestic activists, HRI worked with the U.S. Human Rights Network to coordinate and provide technical support for domestic organizations interested in participating in the review of U.S. treaty compliance by the UN CERD Committee.

The BHRH Lawyers' Network serves as a forum for information sharing, strategic discussions and relationship building. The Network held its  Spring 2010 Network Meeting on May 25, 2010. The meeting was preceded by an international legal research training session with Kyle Courtney, Reference/Electronic Services Librarian at Northeastern University School of Law.  We are pleased to share Kyle's PowerPoint presentation and research training outline.

The Fall 2009 Network meeting was held on October 8, 2009. Attending members included representatives from law school human rights programs, international human rights groups and civil rights groups. The meeting was followed by a panel on Human Rights and Detention featuring Sir Nigel Rodley and a number of U.S. attorneys working on different aspects of detention.

The Network also held its annual meeting with staff of the Inter-American Commission for Human Rights (IACHR) on October 26, 2009. The newly formed Inter-American Working Group also met with representatives of the U.S. State Department for the first time.
HRI continues to grow the Lawyers' Network membership. If you would like to join the Network and the new listserv, please contact Vicki Esquivel-Korsiak at vesqui@law.columbia.edu.