CBA Record September-October 2021

PRO BONOWEEK 2021 – MAKING OUR WORLD A BETTER PLACE

APro BonoMagical Musical Mystery Tour

By Bob Glaves, Chicago Bar Foundation

I f you have been to the CBA and CBF Pro Bono and Public Service Awards Luncheon in recent years, you know that we start with a song to help set a theme for that year’s event. To my knowledge, none were written with our legal profession in mind, but they all have real resonance for those of us in law. The song choice each year is a mystery until it is unveiled the day of the event. After eight years of this tradition, we have a lot of musical inspiration to work with. As part of this year’s Pro Bono Week, we want to take a tour of our theme songs so far. My hope is that it will remind you of the unique power we pos- sess as lawyers and legal professionals to make a real difference in our community through pro bono service and our larger leadership in helping ensure that our justice system is fair and accessible to all. Now on to the music!

we have a unique ability to bridge that gap and a responsibility to lead by example to do so.

The Revolution Starts Now 2015 started with this call to action from Steve Earle. “The Revolution starts now, in your own backyard in your own hometown… Where you work and where you play, where you lay your money down, In what you do and what you say.”

The justice system is our own backyard, and this of course is our hometown. These words should inspire us to take ownership of our leadership responsibility to ensure we have a justice system that is fair and accessible for everyone in our community.

People Have the Power

We Take Care of Our Own

The 2016 Pro Bono Luncheon kicked off with this anthem for the ages by the legendary Patti Smith. As Smith said it so well, “I believe everything we dream can come to pass through our union we can turn the world around we can turn the earth’s revolution”

This tradition started at the annual Luncheon in 2014 when we opened with this Bruce Springsteen number where he calls out many ways we are falling short of our nation’s ideals and challenges us to live up to them. While Springsteen did not specifically reference our nation’s ideal of equal justice for

all, it would have fit right into his theme. We’re a long way from making that ideal a reality, and as lawyers and legal professionals,

20 September/October 2021