Nan Aron

Last updated
Nan Aron
Nan Aron - 2019.jpg
Born1948 (age 7475)
Education Oberlin College (BA)
Case Western Reserve University (JD)
OccupationLawyer

Nan Aron (born 1948) is an American lawyer [1] and the founder and president of Alliance for Justice (AFJ), a liberal judicial advocacy group in the United States. [2] [3] [4] Staunchly progressive, Aron has been a noted opponent of conservative judicial nominees in the United States. [5] [6] She repeatedly called for former Presidents Bill Clinton [2] and Barack Obama to be more aggressive in nominating progressives to the bench, [7] and during George W. Bush's presidency, urged the Democrat-controlled Senate to consider Bush's nominees closely. [2] [8] She is considered a key player in confirmation hearings for judicial nominees, [2] and, in 2005, was called "the Madame Defarge of liberal court watchers" in the Wall Street Journal . [5] [9]

Contents

Career

Aron received her B.A. in sociology and Chinese from Oberlin College and her J.D. from Case Western Reserve University School of Law. [9] [10] Prior to founding Alliance for Justice, Aron worked as a staff attorney for the ACLU's National Prison Project. [9] [10] [11] Aron went on to serve as a trial attorney for the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, [9] where she litigated race and sex discrimination cases against companies and unions in federal and district courts. In 1979, Aron founded the Alliance for Justice, [9] and began investigating judicial nominees during Ronald Reagan's presidency. [2] She established the Alliance's Judicial Selection Project in 1985. [5]

Aron has taught at Georgetown and George Washington University Law Schools, and serves on the Dean's Advisory Council at American University's Washington College of Law. [12]

Aron authored Liberty and Justice for All: Public Interest Law in the 1980s and Beyond in 1989, [13] [14] which the Harvard Law Review said was "[s]ure to evoke a new pledge of allegiance to public interest law", [15] as well as Justice in the Making—A Citizen's Guide in 1993 with Alliance for Justice. [12]

Aron referenced overcoming the dual challenges of being a woman and a Jew in the State Department in 2004. [10]

Personal life

Aron was born in a Jewish household in 1948 in New York City. [10] She is married to psychiatrist Bernard Arons; they have three children. [9]

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References

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