April 25, 2007 "Perspectives on Childhood and the Law" is Subject of May 1 Law Day Program

The Law Library of the Library of Congress and the American Bar Association (ABA) Division for Public Education will commemorate Law Day with a panel discussion on “Perspectives on Childhood and the Law.” The event will be held from 4:45 p.m. to 7:15 p.m. on Tuesday, May 1, 2007, in Madison Hall, located on the first floor of the Library’s James Madison Building, 101 Independence Ave., S.E., Washington, D.C. The program is free and open to the public, but attendees must register in advance at www.abanet.org/publiced/jaworski.html. John Milewski, freelance journalist and former host of “Close Up” on C-SPAN, will serve as moderator for the panel discussion, which will explore several legal questions. These questions include the ways in which legal definitions of childhood and cultural values concerning children, youth and families affect our public policies and laws. Milewski will be joined by panelists Antoinette Sedillo Lopez, associate dean for clinical affairs and professor of law at the University of New Mexico; Stephen J. Morse, Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and professor of psychology and law in psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania School of Law; Karen Pittman, executive director of the Forum for Youth Investment; Judge David Young, 8th Judicial Circuit Court, State of Maryland; and Michael Zuckerman, professor of history at the University of Pennsylvania. Law Librarian of Congress Rubens Medina and ABA President Karen J. Mathis are scheduled to participate in the program and make opening remarks. “Perspectives on Childhood and the Law” is the 7th Annual Leon Jaworski Public Program. The series is devoted to examining the law and lawyers’ role in American culture. Organizational partners for this year’s event include the ABA Standing Committee on Public Education, the ABA Standing Committee on the Law Library of Congress, the Federation of State Humanities Councils and the Law Library of Congress. This program is part of the Library’s annual celebration of Law Day and one of the ABA’s principal national events for the commemoration of Law Day 2007. In the late 1950s, the ABA instituted Law Day on May 1 to draw attention to both the principles and practices of law and justice. President Dwight D. Eisenhower established Law Day in 1958. For more information on Law Day, visit www.lawday.org. The mission of the Law Library of Congress, the de facto national law library, is to make its resources available to members of Congress, the Supreme Court, other branches of the U.S. government, and the global legal community, and to sustain and preserve a universal collection of law for future generations. The Law Library, which is celebrating its 175th anniversary in 2007, holds the world’s largest collection of law books and other global legal resources and provides online databases and guides to legal information worldwide through its Web site at www.loc.gov/law.