April 2008

Representing Children

In the struggle to bring justice to the disadvantaged, there is no more vulnerable or deserving group than children. Children's law is a rich, untapped mine of legal issues, and it remains a relatively underdeveloped body of law. In many states, either by statute or practice, children are denied a right to counsel. The legal issues facing many children can be numerous: abuse and neglect, immigration, education, delinquency, emancipation, adoption subsidies and other benefits, and children as victims of crimes. Thus, representing a child is a unique opportunity to hone your litigation skills and promote important fundamental rights, challenge the law, establish key precedents, pursue extraordinary writs to the Supreme Court, and contribute to a body of law still in its infancy. If you are interested in representing a child, or are already doing so, here are some quick tips.

Find an Established Program

There are knowledgeable experts and children's legal specialists across the country to help lawyers with child representation, from the initial training and ongoing consultation on the substantive areas of practice, to developing creative legal strategies. To find a pro bono children’s law program in your area, view the Directory of Pro Bono Children’s Law Programs [PDF].

If there is no agency in your area, there are other ways to get involved. You can visit your local juvenile court and speak to the judge about opportunities. Your local legal services office may need volunteers to take some of their children’s law referrals if they do not provide legal representation to children. Additionally, some local or state bar associations have pro bono programs that may not focus exclusively on children, but which may get children’s law cases; you may be able to volunteer to take those cases.

Find Specific Training

Representing children provides some unique challenges, and the law in children’s law cases can be very complicated. Training specific to the representation of children is essential. When representing a child, one learns the importance of developing a trusting relationship with a client. Good interpersonal skills, client interviewing, and a counseling role lead to important facts that inform and inspire creative legal strategies. The law is a powerful tool, and lawyers who assume this responsibility can wield it in unique ways to achieve remarkable outcomes for children.

Utilize Your Unique Skills for Children

Though specific training is essential, the skills you use in your daily practice will assist you in your representation of children. Representing children may involve attending court hearings, examining witnesses, drafting legal memoranda, and negotiating—in short all of the trial skills that you use in your area of expertise. Several areas of children’s law involve adversarial proceedings in which the state has intervened into a family to remove a child from his or her parent’s custody (abuse and neglect), a child charged with a crime (delinquency), or a child facing deportation (immigration). In these adversarial cases, the sharpened skills of a litigator can make a dramatic difference for a child. For example, a child in a deportation hearing faces a prosecutor before a judge and may not speak English. He or she may face abuse or torture if deported to the home country, yet this child has no right to a lawyer. Volunteer lawyers for unaccompanied minors protect these children, and an experienced litigator may save a child’s life.

Be an Advocate Outside of the Courtroom

Some of the issues that children within the legal system face are hidden from public view. Juvenile court proceedings are confidential and so many of the needs of the court system and the children are not seen by those outside of the system. Volunteer lawyers get a unique look at an often troubled system, and can become a voice for needed changes to the community and to legislators. This can be an important and exciting way to have an impact on a system and make changes beyond just the representation of one child.

Seasoned attorneys from prominent firms, solo practitioners, and young lawyers can all have a significant impact on the life of a child through pro bono work. Collectively, pro bono attorneys can elevate the standard of practice, raise expectations, and be a knowledgeable voice for children in the legislature.

Additional Resources:

• » Podcast: The Special Challenges of Representing a Child in Criminal Proceedings
  This podcast episode will help lawyers who represent children understand the basic tenets of representing this vulnerable population.


• » Video: Interviewing the Child Client
  This free training video provides guidance and demonstrations of techniques that help lawyers work effectively with child clients.


• » Video: Make a Difference in a Child’s Life
  This free video describes two different cases and the impact the attorneys have had on the child they represented, and the effect the children had on the attorneys.


• » Children’s Rights Committee
  The Children’s Rights Committee of the Section of Litigation has several free training resources available. Topics include Best Practices for Representing Unaccompanied Minors (immigration), Successful Strategies for Representing Child Sex Offenders (delinquency) and tips for applying Roper v. Simmons in the courtroom (delinquency). The CRLC also has some general resources focused on the complexities involved in the representation of children, including online training focused on working with child witnesses and interviewing and counseling a child client. All of these resources are free. For more information or assistance, please contact the committee director of the CRLC Catherine Krebs at (202) 547-3060 or catherinekrebs@prodigy.net.


• » National Center for Immigrant and Refugee Children

Judith A. Miller
Chair, Section of Litigation