ATTENTION: Assignment Desks

11 April 2002
Contact: Janet Gilmore, Media Relations
(510) 642-5685

WHAT:
"Reparations for Slavery and its Legacy," a two-day symposium exploring the case for reparations and lessons from other reparations movements.

The program is being held by the Center for Social Justice at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law (Boalt Hall).

A panel of attorneys, legal scholars, academics and advocates of slavery reparations will discuss the issue from historical, legal, political and psychological perspectives. Panel discussions will include the case for reparations in Congress and the courts, and future strategies.

WHEN:
Friday and Saturday, April 12-13. The conference begins Friday at 4 p.m. and ends Saturday at 5 p.m.

WHERE:
Booth Auditorium, Boalt Hall, UC Berkeley.

WHO:
Among the participants will be:

* Randall Robinson, author of the "The Debt - What America Owes to Blacks," who will open the conference, speaking on "What America Owes to Blacks and What Blacks Owe to Each Other." Robinson is a lawyer and human rights advocate who is past-president of the Washington-based TransAfrica, established to promote enlightened U.S. policies toward Africa and the Carribean.

* Angela Harris, law professor, Boalt Hall. Harris teaches criminal law, gender and the law, race and American law, and the law and social justice.

* Kristen Wells, minority counsel, Judiciary Committee, U. S. House of Representatives

* Dale Minami, a partner with Minami, Lew & Tamaki. Minami served as lead counsel for the legal team that successfully reopened the landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases of three individuals of Japanese heritage, overturning their convictions for refusing to be interned during World War II.

BACKGROUND:
For more information on the conference, go to http://www.law.berkeley.edu/institutes/csj/Reparations.html