Officers

Interim Chairperson
Judith L. Lichtman January 12, 2011
National Partnership for Women
& Families
Vice Chairperson
Karen K. Narasaki
Asian American Justice Center
Treasurer The Leadership Conference’s Legislative Priorities for the 112th Congress
Gerald W. McEntee
American Federation of State,
County & Municipal Employees
Dear Senator:
Executive Committee
Barbara Arnwine
Lawyer’s Committee For
Civil Rights Under Law On behalf of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, we write to share with
Arlene Holt Baker
AFL-CIO you our goals for the 112th Congress. These legislative priorities are achievable steps that
Ron Gettelfinger
International Union, United will immediately help our nation move ever closer to its ideals, and they are key components
Automobile Workers of America
Marcia Greenberger of our long-range civil and human rights agenda for the 21st century. We urge you to join
National Women’s Law Center
Linda D. Hallman
with us in working toward their enactment.
American Association of
University Women
Andrew J. Imparato While the list that follows does not reflect the complete agenda of all of our member
American Association of People
with Disabilities
Benjamin Jealous
organizations, it does highlight the issues that are at the top of the coalition’s agenda. We
NAACP believe that these goals can and should be met during this Congress.
Michael B. Keegan
People For The American Way
Floyd Mori
Japanese American Citizens
League
Economic Security
Marc H. Morial
National Urban League
Overarching The Leadership Conference’s priority issues is the need for economic security
Janet Murguia for all Americans. We urge Congress to enact measures to create additional jobs and promote
National Council of La Raza
Debra Ness broad-based economic recovery, including:
National Partnership for Women
And Families
Sara Najjar-WIlson
American-Arab Anti- Direct job creation with targeted assistance to disadvantaged people and communities,
Discrimination Committee
Terry O’Neill and the provision of tools, such as broadband access, to take advantage of that recovery;
National Organization for Women
Jacqueline Johnson Pata Direct assistance that helps those in need and stimulates more jobs, including extended
National Congress of
American Indians unemployment insurance benefits, strengthening and improving Social Security and SSI,
John Payton
NAACP Legal Defense and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, Temporary Assistance to Needy
Educational Fund, Inc.
Barry Rand Families (TANF) benefits, child care assistance, child support funding, and refundable
AARP
Dennis Van Roekel tax credits;
National Education Association
Anthony Romero State fiscal relief to preserve jobs and vital public services; and
American Civil Liberties Union
Thomas A. Saenz Ensuring that the nation’s workforce system is made more responsive to the needs of
Mexican American Legal Defense
& Educational Fund low-income individuals. This can be accomplished through reauthorization of the
David Saperstein
Religious Action Center for Workforce Investment Act, and the targeting of resources toward moving low-income
Reform Judaism
Shanna L. Smith individuals into high demand jobs that pay family supporting wages.
National Fair Housing Alliance
Joe Solmonese
Human Rights Campaign
Andrew L. Stern Reauthorization and Full Funding of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (the
Service Employees
International Union No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, or NCLB)
Randi Weingarten
American Federation of Teachers Congress should reauthorize and fully fund NCLB to ensure (a) equal opportunity for all
Mary G. Wilson
League of Women Voters students to learn and to be college- and career-ready upon graduation; (b) preservation of
Compliance/Enforcement accountability and improvement of data collection and reporting (including by subgroup); (c)
Committee Chairperson
Karen K. Narasaki the development of higher standards and better assessments; (d) the reduction of concentrated
Asian American Justice Center
President & CEO
Wade J. Henderson poverty and racial isolation in schools; (e) the creation of safe and healthy schools that reduce
the incidence of bullying, harassment, and the use of disciplinary measures that are associated
with lower academic outcomes;
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(f) that additional resources are targeted for high schools and programs that prioritize vulnerable
populations in high-poverty communities; and (g) that parents, educators, and community members are
involved at all stages of school improvement, reconstitution, and turn-around.

Judicial and Executive Appointments

The Senate must ensure the prompt confirmation of highly qualified judicial and Executive Branch
nominees. We believe it is particularly important to confirm judges who would bring diversity to the
federal bench and appointees to executive branch positions which will have responsibility for civil and
human rights policies.

Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act

While comprehensive reform of our nation’s immigration system remains a vital and long-overdue goal,
the DREAM Act also presents an opportunity for much-needed reform that will remove some of the
barriers that undocumented young adults – brought into the United States through no fault of their own –
face in obtaining a college education and becoming fully contributing members of our society. The
DREAM Act would provide a tough but fair path to legal status for young adults who have achieved
academic success and have demonstrated a clear willingness to play by the rules. In the 111 th Congress,
the legislation enjoyed majority support in both the House and the Senate.

Equal Opportunity and Equity in the next Surface Transportation Bill

The next Federal Surface Transportation Authorization bill represents an opportunity to transform
neighborhoods throughout our nation into fairer, more equitable communities, and to provide low-income
families and communities of color with greater access to quality education, employment, housing, and
transportation. The next bill should have strong anti-discrimination provisions and should strengthen,
enforce, and tie federal funding to compliance with established minority contracting goals for under-
represented businesses in order to ensure diversity.

Equal Pay Legislation

The Paycheck Fairness Act passed the House of Representatives in the 111th Congress and received a
majority of votes in the Senate, but it was blocked by a procedural maneuver and failed by only two
votes. Equal pay for women is vital to working families’ economic security, and the Leadership
Conference will continue to make passage of equal pay legislation a top priority in the 112th Congress.

Protecting Older Workers Against Discrimination Act

Designed as a response to the Supreme Court’s 2009 decision in Gross v. FBL Financial Services, the
Protecting Older Workers Against Discrimination Act amends the Age Discrimination in Employment
Act and other federal anti-discrimination and retaliation laws to allow for mixed-motive cases.

Ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women
(CEDAW)
CEDAW is a landmark international agreement that affirms principles of fundamental human rights and
equality for women around the world. The treaty calls for an end to discrimination against women and
has been ratified by 186 countries. The Obama Administration supports the ratification of CEDAW as
one of its top priorities. The Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Human Rights and the Law held a
hearing on U.S. ratification of CEDAW in November 2010. It has been reported twice from the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee with a bipartisan vote but has never been considered by the full Senate.
The Leadership Conference is currently leading a campaign supported by 170 national organizations to
urge the Senate to ratify CEDAW, and our efforts will continue in the 112th Congress.
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Reform of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights

Congress should transform the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights into a truly nonpartisan and independent
agency, whose mandate is expanded to monitor and investigate the full panoply of civil rights and human
rights issues in the U.S. as well as to ensure our domestic compliance with human rights treaty
obligations.

End Racial Profiling Act (ERPA)

ERPA would prohibit any local, state, or federal law enforcement agency or officer from engaging in
racial profiling. It would condition the receipt of federal money on law enforcement agencies’ efforts to
eliminate the practice, and would institute a meaningful enforcement mechanism to ensure that anti-
profiling policies are being followed. Law enforcement agencies would be required to collect
demographic data on routine investigatory activities, develop procedures to respond to racial profiling
complaints, and craft policies to discipline officers who engage in the practice. ERPA would also provide
a private right of action to victims of racial profiling, thereby giving them the legal tools to hold law
enforcement agencies accountable. We will work to identify a Senate champion for ERPA and continue
to build support for this legislation and to reintroduce ERPA in the House.

National Criminal Justice Commission Act

This legislation would create a blue ribbon, bipartisan commission tasked with examining the nation’s
criminal justice system and devising consensus-based reform recommendations in a number of important
areas designed to prevent, deter and reduce crime and violence. The National Criminal Justice
Commission would be the first since President Lyndon Johnson’s 1967 Commission on Law Enforcement
and the Administration of Justice to take a comprehensive look at the criminal justice system.
Legislation to create such a commission has enjoyed steadily increasing bipartisan support, both in
Congress and from a broad range of stakeholder groups representing law enforcement, state and local
governments, practitioners, academicians, criminal justice reform advocates, and faith-based
organizations. It passed the House by voice vote in the 111th Congress.

Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Act (JJDPA)

Under the JJDPA, states would be required to assess and address the disproportionate contact of youth of
color at key points of contact in the juvenile justice system, from arrest to detention to confinement. Most
importantly, JJDPA will help ensure fairness by making government officials more accountable for
reducing disproportionate minority contact through policies, practices, and programs within the juvenile
justice system. We will continue to build support for legislation like the JJDPA, which was voted out of
the Senate Judiciary Committee in the 111th Congress with bipartisan support, and oppose more punitive
legislative approaches that would simply push more and more young people into prisons and jails.

Restoring Voting Rights for Individuals with Criminal Convictions

Congressional action is needed to restore voting rights in federal elections to the millions of Americans
who have been released from incarceration, but who continue to be denied the ability to fully participate
in civic life. The Democracy Restoration Act (DRA) is federal legislation that seeks to restore voting
rights in federal elections to the nearly four million disenfranchised Americans who have been released
from prison and are living in the community. The DRA has garnered support from a growing and diverse
group of organizations. In 2009, law enforcement and criminal justice leaders, faith organizations,
and civil rights organizations all submitted letters to members of Congress in support of the DRA.
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Modernizing Voter Registration

Congress should help protect our nation’s most important civil right through legislation designed to
achieve universal permanent voter registration of all eligible Americans through such means as automated
registration at government agencies, permanent registration, online registration, and fail-safe mechanisms
for voters to correct errors in voter registration databases.

Voting Rights and Autonomy for District of Columbia Residents

While we have strongly supported the District of Columbia House Voting Rights Act in recent years, the
proposal will soon be overtaken in part by the upcoming Congressional reapportionment. The lack of
representation in Congress for D.C. residents, however, remains a grave injustice and undermines our
nation’s credibility as we attempt to foster representative democracy abroad. We will continue working
with our allies in Congress to craft new legislation to remedy the disenfranchisement of the nearly
600,000 residents of D.C., and we urge you to support these efforts. In the meantime, as D.C. residents
continue to live under the “taxation without representation” that drove our nation to declare its
independence, we urge you to support the District of Columbia Legislative Autonomy and Budget
Autonomy Acts, which would give D.C. residents more control over purely local decisions.

Protection of the Affordable Care Act

In the wake of last year’s historic enactment of the Affordable Care Act (ACA), Congress should ensure
that the provisions of the new law are sufficiently funded and properly implemented, particularly with
respect to provisions that affect low-income and minority communities. We also urge Congress to oppose
any legislative proposals designed to repeal the ACA, in whole or in part.

Increased Funding and Removal of Unfair Restrictions in Legal Services Appropriations

Restrictions in the Legal Services Corporation appropriations have prohibited vulnerable legal aid clients
from joining class actions, claiming court-ordered attorneys’ fee awards, or having their lawyers engage
in other types of advocacy. These restrictions, starting with the restriction on state, local and private
funds, should be removed from the next Commerce, Justice, and Science appropriations bill.

Modernization of the Fair Housing Act

The Housing Opportunities Made Equal (HOME) Act would extend the civil rights protections of the Fair
Housing Act to people on the basis of their sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, or source of
income. It also would provide additional protections for people with disabilities and ensure that recipients
of federal housing and community development funding are not perpetuating segregation. These
necessary protections, many of which are already provided by a number of states and local municipalities,
would eliminate prevalent types of discrimination and help re-establish fairness in our nation’s damaged
housing market.

Civil Rights Act

The Civil Rights Act addresses Supreme Court decisions that have undermined existing civil rights laws.
Among its most notable and far-reaching provisions, the bill corrects the Supreme Court's 2001 Alexander
v. Sandoval ruling by establishing a private right of action in disparate impact claims against entities
receiving federal funding. It also strengthens gender and age discrimination protections, improves
remedies for victims of discrimination, prevents employers from forcing workers to bring claims to
arbitration instead of the courts, and addresses workplace exploitation of undocumented workers.

Each of these items are important and achievable. In addition to these legislative priorities, we urge you
to ensure the full funding of civil rights enforcement activities as the annual appropriations process gets
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under way. We look forward to working with you and your staff on these critically important issues
during the 112th Congress. Please contact Executive Vice President Nancy Zirkin at (202) 263-2880, or
Senior Counsel Rob Randhava at (202) 466-6058, if you would like to discuss these priorities or any
other issues of concern to the civil and human rights community.

Sincerely,

Wade Henderson Nancy Zirkin

President & CEO Executive Vice President