Chai Feldblum
Encyclopedia
Chai Rachel FeldblumProfessor of Pride: Georgetown Law's Nan Hunter wields academic activism, November 27, 2008. MetroWeekly [Washington, DC]. . Accessed October 11, 2009. is an American law professor at Georgetown University
, author and activist for disability rights and LGBT rights. In March 2010, she was appointed to a position on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
(EEOC) by President Barack Obama, and in December 2010 she was confirmed to a full term on the EEOC by the United States Senate
.
section of New York City.
Her father was born in a small town in Lithuania
. His town's entire Jewish community was killed in the Holocaust
with the exception of him and a young girl. He survived by hiding in the forests of Poland and emigrated to the United States after the war. He was ordained as a Rabbi and received his Ph.D. in Talmudic studies.
Her mother was raised in a strict Hasidic Jewish family in Philadelphia. She received her Ph.D. and was a professor at Brooklyn College
. She focused her career on Jewish-Catholic relations and wrote at least two books on the subject, The American Catholic Press and the Jewish State, 1917-1959 and New Realities: Israel in the Holy Land. She died in a car accident in 1974 at the age of 41.
After Esther died, her husband remarried and emigrated to Israel where he died in 2002 of pancreatic cancer.
Chai Feldblum attended the Yeshiva University High School for Girls in Queens, New York before majoring in Ancient Studies
and Religion at Barnard College
. Feldblum received her J.D.
from Harvard Law School
in 1985. Coming
from a long line of Orthodox Jewish rabbis she had hoped to become one herself. When she learned that her family's branch of Judaism did not permit women rabbis, she decided
to become an attorney.
While working from 1988-1990Bio: Chai Feldblum, March 4, 2005. Yale Law School. Accessed October 14, 2009. as Legislative Counsel to the AIDS Project of the American Civil Liberties Union
, Feldblum was the lead attorney on the team drafting the Americans with Disabilities Act, which became law in 1990.
She joined the faculty of Georgetown University Law Center
in Washington, DC in 1991, teaching classes on "legislative lawyering," a phrase she coined to describe the work of the attorneys who craft or lobby for legislation. She founded and is the director of the university's Federal Legislation Clinic.
Since joining Georgetown, Feldblum has continued her own legislative lawyering career. In 1993, she was the legal director for the Campaign for Military Service, a group which lobbied to overturn policies forbidding gay and bisexual people from serving openly in the U.S. armed forces. The CMS was the first organization to air a nationwide television commercial on a gay rights issue.
In 2003, Feldblum became co-director of Georgetown's Workplace Flexibility 2010 project, which works to improve conditions for employers and employees. The program focuses on flexible work arrangements (FWAs), including phased retirement, non-traditional scheduling and number of hours worked, telecommuting
, and multiple points of exit and re-entry into the workforce.
In 2006, she founded the Moral Values Project, with the mission statement:
More recently, she was the lead drafter of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act
, which would prohibit employment discrimination based on someone's real or perceived sexual orientation. She also worked on passage of the ADA Amendments Act of 2008
, and has testified before Congress on numerous occasions.
nominated Feldblum for one of the seats on the five-member Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
. Conservative blogs and press outlets objected strenuously, but in response, in an October 10
speech to the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign
, Obama stated:
Protests have centered on Feldblum's identity as an out lesbian
and her advocacy on orientation issues. A typical headline was If you hate America, you have a lawyer, authored by the Traditional Values Coalition
and republished in Right Side News, in an article which referred to her as "a sort of general counsel to the Forces of Darkness."If you hate America, you have a lawyer, September 18, 2009. Right Side News. Accessed October 11, 2009.
Of particular concern to them is Feldblum's signature on the 2006 statement of BeyondMarriage.Org, which supported legal recognition of a variety of non-traditional relationships besides marriage, including "Committed, loving households in which there is more than one conjugal partner," which the objectors consider an endorsement of polygamy
. In testimony before the United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
, Feldblum testified that she did not believe in governmental endorsement of polygamy or polyamorous relationships, consistent with her own writings in which she had always restricted such endorsement to non-sexual domestic partners. She testified that she has therefore asked for her name to be removed from the Beyond Same-Sex Marriage document.
Objections have also been raised regarding her Supreme Court tenure as a clerk for Justice Blackmun. He authored the Roe v. Wade
decision which recognized a nationwide right to legal abortion. Blackmun's opinion was written over ten years prior to Feldblum's clerkship for him, but organizations which oppose legal abortion express dismay over the connection regardless.Barack Obama Names Pro-Abortion ACLU Lawyer Chai Feldblum to EEOC Panel, October 5, 2009. Life News. Accessed October 11, 2009.
Obama made a recess appointment of Feldblum and three other nominees to the EEOC on March 27, 2010. On December 22, 2010, the U.S. Senate confirmed Feldblum to the seat on the EEOC for a term expiring July 1, 2013.
Georgetown University
Georgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...
, author and activist for disability rights and LGBT rights. In March 2010, she was appointed to a position on the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an independent federal law enforcement agency that enforces laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, perceived intelligence,...
(EEOC) by President Barack Obama, and in December 2010 she was confirmed to a full term on the EEOC by the United States Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
.
Family and education
Chai Feldblum was born in New York City to Rabbi Meyer Simcha Feldblum and his wife Esther Yolles Feldblum. She grew up in an Orthodox Jewish home in the Washington HeightsWashington Heights, Manhattan
Washington Heights is a New York City neighborhood in the northern reaches of the borough of Manhattan. It is named for Fort Washington, a fortification constructed at the highest point on Manhattan island by Continental Army troops during the American Revolutionary War, to defend the area from the...
section of New York City.
Her father was born in a small town in Lithuania
Lithuania
Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
. His town's entire Jewish community was killed in the Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
with the exception of him and a young girl. He survived by hiding in the forests of Poland and emigrated to the United States after the war. He was ordained as a Rabbi and received his Ph.D. in Talmudic studies.
Her mother was raised in a strict Hasidic Jewish family in Philadelphia. She received her Ph.D. and was a professor at Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College
Brooklyn College is a senior college of the City University of New York, located in Brooklyn, New York, United States.Established in 1930 by the New York City Board of Higher Education, the College had its beginnings as the Downtown Brooklyn branches of Hunter College and the City College of New...
. She focused her career on Jewish-Catholic relations and wrote at least two books on the subject, The American Catholic Press and the Jewish State, 1917-1959 and New Realities: Israel in the Holy Land. She died in a car accident in 1974 at the age of 41.
After Esther died, her husband remarried and emigrated to Israel where he died in 2002 of pancreatic cancer.
Chai Feldblum attended the Yeshiva University High School for Girls in Queens, New York before majoring in Ancient Studies
and Religion at Barnard College
Barnard College
Barnard College is a private women's liberal arts college and a member of the Seven Sisters. Founded in 1889, Barnard has been affiliated with Columbia University since 1900. The campus stretches along Broadway between 116th and 120th Streets in the Morningside Heights neighborhood in the borough...
. Feldblum received her J.D.
Juris Doctor
Juris Doctor is a professional doctorate and first professional graduate degree in law.The degree was first awarded by Harvard University in the United States in the late 19th century and was created as a modern version of the old European doctor of law degree Juris Doctor (see etymology and...
from Harvard Law School
Harvard Law School
Harvard Law School is one of the professional graduate schools of Harvard University. Located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, it is the oldest continually-operating law school in the United States and is home to the largest academic law library in the world. The school is routinely ranked by the U.S...
in 1985. Coming
from a long line of Orthodox Jewish rabbis she had hoped to become one herself. When she learned that her family's branch of Judaism did not permit women rabbis, she decided
to become an attorney.
Career
After graduating from law school, Feldblum clerked for federal Judge Frank M. Coffin on the First Circuit Court of Appeals. After her clerkship there, she became a clerk for Justice Harry A. Blackmun on the U.S. Supreme Court.Supreme Court of the United States
The Supreme Court of the United States is the highest court in the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all state and federal courts, and original jurisdiction over a small range of cases...
While working from 1988-1990Bio: Chai Feldblum, March 4, 2005. Yale Law School. Accessed October 14, 2009. as Legislative Counsel to the AIDS Project of the American Civil Liberties Union
American Civil Liberties Union
The American Civil Liberties Union is a U.S. non-profit organization whose stated mission is "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States." It works through litigation, legislation, and...
, Feldblum was the lead attorney on the team drafting the Americans with Disabilities Act, which became law in 1990.
She joined the faculty of Georgetown University Law Center
Georgetown University Law Center
Georgetown University Law Center is the law school of Georgetown University, located in Washington, D.C.. Established in 1870, the Law Center offers J.D., LL.M., and S.J.D. degrees in law...
in Washington, DC in 1991, teaching classes on "legislative lawyering," a phrase she coined to describe the work of the attorneys who craft or lobby for legislation. She founded and is the director of the university's Federal Legislation Clinic.
Since joining Georgetown, Feldblum has continued her own legislative lawyering career. In 1993, she was the legal director for the Campaign for Military Service, a group which lobbied to overturn policies forbidding gay and bisexual people from serving openly in the U.S. armed forces. The CMS was the first organization to air a nationwide television commercial on a gay rights issue.
In 2003, Feldblum became co-director of Georgetown's Workplace Flexibility 2010 project, which works to improve conditions for employers and employees. The program focuses on flexible work arrangements (FWAs), including phased retirement, non-traditional scheduling and number of hours worked, telecommuting
Telecommuting
Telecommuting or telework is a work arrangement in which employees enjoy flexibility in working location and hours. In other words, the daily commute to a central place of work is replaced by telecommunication links...
, and multiple points of exit and re-entry into the workforce.
In 2006, she founded the Moral Values Project, with the mission statement:
We believe that moral values matter in the governing of our polity. And we believe that Americans can articulate, and live up to, a more progressive set of moral values regarding sexuality, sexual orientation and gender equity. Sexuality can be a positive, important force in our lives. Heterosexuality, homosexuality and bisexuality are all morally neutral. But the love that is expressed by those who are straight, gay or bisexual is morally good – and all equally morally good. All forms of gender are morally neutral. But lack of gender equity is morally bad.
More recently, she was the lead drafter of the Employment Non-Discrimination Act
Employment Non-Discrimination Act
The Employment Non-Discrimination Act is a proposed bill in the United States Congress that would prohibit discrimination against employees on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity by civilian, nonreligious employers with at least 15 employees.ENDA has been introduced in every...
, which would prohibit employment discrimination based on someone's real or perceived sexual orientation. She also worked on passage of the ADA Amendments Act of 2008
ADA Amendments Act of 2008
The ADA Amendments Act of 2008 is an Act of Congress, effective January 1, 2009, that amended the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 and other disability nondiscrimination laws at the Federal level of the United States. Passed on September 17, 2008, and signed into law by President George W...
, and has testified before Congress on numerous occasions.
EEOC nomination
In 2009, President Barack ObamaBarack Obama
Barack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
nominated Feldblum for one of the seats on the five-member Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an independent federal law enforcement agency that enforces laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, perceived intelligence,...
. Conservative blogs and press outlets objected strenuously, but in response, in an October 10
National Coming Out Day
National Coming Out Day is an internationally observed civil awareness day celebrating individuals who publicly identify as bisexual, gay, lesbian, transgender—coming out regarding one's sexual orientation and/or gender identity being akin to a cultural rite of passage for LGBT people...
speech to the gay rights group Human Rights Campaign
Human Rights Campaign
The Human Rights Campaign is the United States' largest LGBT advocacy group and lobbying organization; according to the HRC, it has more than one million members and supporters...
, Obama stated:
Nobody in America should be fired because they’re gay, despite doing a great job and meeting their responsibilities. It’s not fair, it’s not right, we’re going to put a stop to it. And it’s for this reason if any of my nominees are attacked not for what they believe but for who they are, I will not waver in my support because I will not waver in my commitment to ending discrimination in all its forms. Obama Speaks to HRC, ThinkProgess.Org, October 10, 2009. Accessed October 11, 2009.
Protests have centered on Feldblum's identity as an out lesbian
Lesbian
Lesbian is a term most widely used in the English language to describe sexual and romantic desire between females. The word may be used as a noun, to refer to women who identify themselves or who are characterized by others as having the primary attribute of female homosexuality, or as an...
and her advocacy on orientation issues. A typical headline was If you hate America, you have a lawyer, authored by the Traditional Values Coalition
Traditional Values Coalition
The Traditional Values Coalition is a conservative Christian organization that represents, by its estimate, over 43,000 Christian churches throughout the United States of America...
and republished in Right Side News, in an article which referred to her as "a sort of general counsel to the Forces of Darkness."If you hate America, you have a lawyer, September 18, 2009. Right Side News. Accessed October 11, 2009.
Of particular concern to them is Feldblum's signature on the 2006 statement of BeyondMarriage.Org, which supported legal recognition of a variety of non-traditional relationships besides marriage, including "Committed, loving households in which there is more than one conjugal partner," which the objectors consider an endorsement of polygamy
Polygamy
Polygamy is a marriage which includes more than two partners...
. In testimony before the United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
The United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions generally considers matters relating to health, education, labor, and pensions...
, Feldblum testified that she did not believe in governmental endorsement of polygamy or polyamorous relationships, consistent with her own writings in which she had always restricted such endorsement to non-sexual domestic partners. She testified that she has therefore asked for her name to be removed from the Beyond Same-Sex Marriage document.
Objections have also been raised regarding her Supreme Court tenure as a clerk for Justice Blackmun. He authored the Roe v. Wade
Roe v. Wade
Roe v. Wade, , was a controversial landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court on the issue of abortion. The Court decided that a right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution extends to a woman's decision to have an abortion,...
decision which recognized a nationwide right to legal abortion. Blackmun's opinion was written over ten years prior to Feldblum's clerkship for him, but organizations which oppose legal abortion express dismay over the connection regardless.Barack Obama Names Pro-Abortion ACLU Lawyer Chai Feldblum to EEOC Panel, October 5, 2009. Life News. Accessed October 11, 2009.
Obama made a recess appointment of Feldblum and three other nominees to the EEOC on March 27, 2010. On December 22, 2010, the U.S. Senate confirmed Feldblum to the seat on the EEOC for a term expiring July 1, 2013.
Select bibliography
- Sexual Orientation, Morality, and the Law: Devlin Revisited (1996).
- The Federal Gay Civil Rights Bill: From Bella to ENDA in Creating Change: Sexuality, Public Policy, & Civil Rights ( J. D’Emilio, W. Turner & U. Vaid eds. 2000).
- Rectifying the Tilt: Equality Lessons from Religion, Disability, Sexual Orientation and Transgender, University of Maine Law Review (Tenth Annual Coffin Lecture) (2003).
- The Art of Legislative Lawyering and the Six Circles of Legislative Advocacy, 34 MCGEORGE LAW REVIEW 785 (2003).
- Gay is Good: The Moral Case for Marriage Equality and More, 17 Yale J.L. & Feminism 139-184 (2005).
- The Definition of Disability in the Americans With Disabilities Act: Its Successes and Shortcomings, 9 Emp. Rts. & Emp. Pol’y J. 473-498 (2005) (co-authored piece).
- Moral Conflict and Liberty: Gay Rights and Religion, 72 Brook. L. Rev. 61-123 (2006).
- The Right to Define One’s Own Concept of Existence: What LawrenceLawrence v. TexasLawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 , is a landmark United States Supreme Court case. In the 6-3 ruling, the Court struck down the sodomy law in Texas and, by proxy, invalidated sodomy laws in the thirteen other states where they remained in existence, thereby making same-sex sexual activity legal in...
Can Mean for Intersex and Transgender People, 7 Geo. J. Gender & L. 115-139 (2006).
See also
External links
- Testimony of Chai Feldblum on the Religious Liberty Protection Act of 1999, May 12, 1999, United States House Committee on the JudiciaryUnited States House Committee on the JudiciaryThe U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, also called the House Judiciary Committee, is a standing committee of the United States House of Representatives. It is charged with overseeing the administration of justice within the federal courts, administrative agencies and Federal law enforcement...
- Testimony of Chai Feldblum: Introductory Biographical Statement, November 19, 2009, United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and PensionsUnited States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and PensionsThe United States Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions generally considers matters relating to health, education, labor, and pensions...