Remembering Steve Pollak, a lawyer whose work inspired generations: NPR

The Justice Department is hosting a memorial for Stephen Pollak, who played a key role in writing the Voting Rights Act and other major civil rights moments.

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Leaders from the Justice Department and the civil rights community gathered today in Washington to honor a lawyer whose work inspired generations. Steve Pollak died earlier this year at the age of 95, NPR justice correspondent Carrie Johnson reports.

CARRIE JOHNSON, BYLINE: The Justice Department’s majestic Great Hall filled with luminaries who came to pay their respects. One of them is Kristen Clarke. She is an assistant attorney general for civil rights.

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KRISTEN CLARKE: I am the latest in a long line of leaders in the Civil Rights Division dating back to the man we honor and remember today, Steve Pollak.

JOHNSON: Pollak launched his career during the era of Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, a time when violent protests erupted as black students integrated Southern schools.

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CLARKE: Steve wasn’t just there at the creation. He was one of the creators.

JOHNSON: Pollak has lived through some of the most tense and important moments of the last 60 years.

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CLARKE: On his very first day at the Civil Rights Division, Steve was deployed to Selma, Alabama, after state troopers attacked peaceful protesters crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge on a now infamous day under the name Bloody Sunday.

JOHNSON: Attorney General Merrick Garland highlighted the experience that Pollak considered the pinnacle of his career.

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MERRICK GARLAND: Back in Washington, he helped draft the Voting Rights Act of 1965 using scissors, tape and a yellow legal pad.

JOHNSON: Pollak was stacking old versions of the bill that he liked under his chair. And ultimately, he would ask lawmakers if they really intended to throw these good bits in the trash. More often than not, the scraps under his chair ended up in the VRA, the most important civil rights law of the 20th century. The attorney general emphasized that Pollak always wanted to serve in government because he believed it was a force for good.

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GARLAND: Steve’s extraordinary service in this department and in the cause of civil rights helped ensure that the government in which he served was, in fact, a force for good.

JOHNSON: During his long life, Pollak argued a dozen cases before the Supreme Court. He inspired elite law firms to take on civil rights cases, and he helped advance and defend a post-Civil War statute that is still used today. This time, it’s a key part of a complaint filed by police officers against the rioters who stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.

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