Washington Lawyer - June 2020 - 31

FEATURE

Additionally, using technology to expand the scope of legal help grew
under Sandman's watch, with grants that legal aid groups in rural and
remote places could use to help recipients navigate legal processes.
Connected to that, says Flagg, was Sandman's outreach to new audiences. "He recognized that he had to speak in plain English, directly,
without acronyms and without jargon." Flagg jokingly calls it AANI:
Abolish Acronyms Now Initiative.
On a serious level, Sandman's ability to grip an audience's attention with
his passion for justice made him a popular speaker, one that brought him
to 47 states in his years as LSC president. When Sandman first took over,
he "had much to do with reestablishing connections" with the 132 different grantee organizations that "were feeling very disconnected from
headquarters and wondering what value we were providing," says Levi,
the LSC board chair.
"He's a remarkable speaker," Levi says. "Once our grantees figured that out,
he was in high demand. He speaks from memory, without notes."
"In my 40-plus years of law practice, Jim was the best client I ever had
- smart, sophisticated, insightful, and reasonable," says Flagg, who
served as general counsel to the LSC during Sandman's tenure.

TEACHING FUTURE ADVOCATES
With that kind of love, why end a good thing? "It was time," Sandman
says. "I'm 68 years old and there are things I want to do before I retire. And
I'd like to do them when I'm still in great health and have a lot of energy."

He's pursuing his passion for history - with a goal to visit every state
capitol building in the country - and for classic cars, the Washington
Performing Arts Society, and education. He recently joined the D.C. Public
Charter School Board.
Sandman is also taking on a new role. He is the "chief thought leader" for
the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School's Future of the Profession
Initiative. What that translates to is a combination of teaching, speaking,
and writing on a subject dear to him: access to justice.
"Job one is to make sure no one graduates from law school without understanding the reality of our justice system today," he says. Most of the people
who show up to court are there for the fundamentals of life: "the roof over
your head, the stability of your family, child support, child custody, your
personal safety, getting a protection order against an abuser," he says.
Law students read case law, but Sandman suspects that it does not truly
represent what really goes on in court, since it's based on the assumption
that both parties have legal representation. "No one tells them this,"
Sandman says.
He understands that most beginning lawyers will not be able to jump
into legal aid work. "But over the course of their careers, I hope they would
find some way, possibly taking some time away from commercial practice,
to work in the public interest," Sandman says. "Do what I did."
Debra Bruno is a local journalist who writes for the Washington Post,
Washingtonian magazine, and many other publications.

JUNE 2020

WASHINGTON LAWYER

Washington Lawyer - June 2020

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