Mass Law Reform Institute Announces Models of Justice, Featuring John Carroll

Mass Law Reform Institute Announces Models of Justice in the 2021-22 Annual Report, featuring John Carroll of Meehan, Boyle, Black & Bogdanow. The full report can be viewed here, and John Carroll is featured on page 15. The feature is also transcribed with permission below.

Donor Story of Impact

John Carroll is redefining the role of nonprofit donors

According to John Carroll, “Life is lived going forward, but understood looking back.” In his eighth decade of life and more than 40 years into a successful legal career, Carroll has a lot to reflect on.

He has come to realize that the best thing that ever happened to him was his mother emigrating to the United States before he was born. While she grew up poor and oppressed as part of a large family in Ireland under British rule, John’s experience in America was one of education, opportunity, freedom, safety, and prosperity.

The second best thing to ever happen to him was the year he spent working at South Dakota Legal Services on the Pine Ridge and Rosebud Sioux Reservations. Fresh out of law school and struggling to find work, it was a job accepted out of desperation to care for his family, but working amidst great poverty on the reservation opened his eyes to the power of and need for the law.

“Mark Twain once said that the two most important days in your life are the day you were born and the day you realized why you are here,” says Carroll. “I realized why I was here at South Dakota Legal Services. It was biblical. Native Americans are treated as the least of God’s children. They have enormous rights that had never been asserted.”

That experience early in his career awakened for Carroll a belief that working as a lawyer was synonymous with serving those in need, and reinforced his philosophical worldview that there is no natural hierarchy in life, even if society is riven with it.

While the next 40 years of his career were spent working as a trial lawyer, Carroll always maintained various roles in the legal service sector on the side. Still, Carroll never thought of himself as worthy of involvement with MLRI.

“I was in the trenches,” Carroll remarks. “MLRI was the strategic headquarters.”

In John’s mind, MLRI was like the “Pentagon” of legal service programs, where great systemic advocacy was—and continues to be—conceived and exquisitely carried out. Working at the center of a web of like-minded programs and allies makes MLRI an influential voice in matters pertaining to almost any issue impacting low-income families and communities. Further, it often serves as the teaching and training arm of legal service programs and a model across the country. Many government agencies and officials give great credence to the positions of MLRI on various legislative and regulatory matters.

“MLRI has a 50 year history that no rotating government administrator can compete with,” says John.

After decades of admiring MLRI’s work, now John is all in for the organization, supporting MLRI in a variety of ways. In addition to contributing as a donor, Carroll is serving his first term on the board of directors and has taken on an unofficial role as cheerleader, celebrating not only the success of the past two years, but of the past decade.

“Georgia and those she has chosen to bring with her have brought MLRI to a new era.
There is energy and enthusiasm. There is a renewed sense of purpose and clear plans to achieve that purpose. MLRI’s future is bright.”

Modeling Justice

Next Generation Poverty Law Advocates

MLRI is fortunate to have a staff and board full of experienced and nationally-renowned advocates like John, who work tirelessly for families and communities in need. Our consistently excellent staff has, for over 50 years, amassed an impressive record of success and life-changing impact for countless people in the Commonwealth—and across the country. But as we celebrate the many achievements of our past, we also look towards the future.

Over the last several years, thanks to our generous funders and donors, MLRI brought on several new attorneys, policy advocates, and operations staff who infuse the organization with energy, ideas, and enthusiasm. We hired new program staff in our benefits, immigration, housing, health care, and racial equity practice groups, as well as the MA Legal Aid Websites Project and the Civil Legal Aid for Victims of Crime (CLAVC) Project (the latter two projects generously funded by MLAC). Our staff not only spans generations, but also works with a lens of intersectionality and with passion and vision for racial justice and community-driven advocacy. In the coming years, we plan to hire even more staff to meet the growing needs of the people and communities we serve.

We are excited and proud to be cultivating and mentoring the next generation of great advocates who will continue MLRI’s legacy of impact and excellence into the future.