I’ve been thinking quite a bit about the movie Selma and all of the controversy that has swirled around it.  One way you could frame that controversy might be to lay out this series of questions that could be asked: Why wasn’t the movie more historically-accurate when it came to President Johnson’s position regarding the […]

Altomease “Al” Kennedy is a trailblazer who wears many caps.  Al is a partner at Sanford Heisler Kimpel and practices qui tam law, representing employees who blow the whistle on companies that are cheating and stealing from the government.  Al has worked full-time as an attorney for forty years, while raising two children with her […]

Often employers seek to portray the employee who files a discrimination claim as self- interested, pursuing the claim out of spite or greed.  We, who do this work, know that righting discrimination is a socially-valuable undertaking because a more diverse workplace benefits employees, clients, consumers, and the business itself.  But remedying employment discrimination also has […]

I work at a law firm that did something extraordinary last month: it added a woman’s name to the door. When the firm announced this name change, I immediately recognized its significance for the female name partner.  This distinction would raise her profile and signal to those outside the firm what those of us inside […]

I read Sabrina Erdely’s article, “A Rape on Campus,” the day Rolling Stone published it online.  The account details allegations by “Jackie,” a UVA undergraduate, that a group of UVA fraternity brothers sexually assaulted her at a fraternity party.  Like most readers, I admired the author, I felt deep-seated anger at the university, and I […]

I attended the Supreme Court’s oral arguments on Young v. UPS earlier this month and was very excited to talk with Plaintiff Peggy Young’s lawyer, Sharon Gustafson, about the case.  Sharon will be among the speakers at an upcoming panel I am hosting, sponsored by the Women’s Bar Association and Sanford Heisler Kimpel. Kate: For the […]

Like many children of the 1980s, I grew up on The Cosby Show. Amid the jokes and physical comedy, the show painted a legendarily wholesome portrait not only of an admirable and loving African-American family, but also of Cosby himself as a male obstetrician who loyally supported and was adored by his female patients and […]

Last month, my colleague David Tracey discussed some of the benefits of President Obama’s recent executive action on immigration.  He explored how the executive action might help address the challenges confronted by undocumented farmworkers.  As David explained, undocumented female farmworkers are vulnerable to discrimination, harassment, and violence at the hands of male supervisors who count […]

President Obama’s announcement of executive action on immigration last week set off a chain of political chatter– “does the president have the authority?”; “how will Republicans respond?”; “what does this mean for 2016?” The politics of policy were front-and-center; the benefits of action, pushed to the periphery. So I wanted to devote this post to […]

When I was a senior in high school, I wrote a submission for the Ohio Bar Association’s There Ought to Be a Law Contest (nerd, guilty as charged).  I advocated civil unions for same-sex couples.  I presented the essay at a conference organized by my school, only to have a student visiting from another school […]