Legal Assistance Society records, 1970/2000

Access and use

Location of collection:
University of Virginia, Special Collections Dept.
Albert and Shirley Small Special Collections Library
University of Virginia
P.O. Box 400110
170 McCormick Rd
Charlottesville, Virginia 22904-4110
Contact for questions and access:
POC: Special Collections Public Services & Reference Staff
Phone: (434) 243-1776
Fax: (434) 924-4968
Terms of access:

Case files are available with permission from the archivist and LAS.

Summary

Extent:
7.5 Cubic Feet 19 archival boxes
Language:
English

Background

Scope and content:

The files of the Legal Assistance Society consist of general organizational files, including finances, correspondence, case files and information on various legal aid projects. Case files are accessible only with permission of the archivist and the Legal Aid Society.

The Legal Assistance Society (LAS) Records (1974-1998) were transferred to Special Collections by Executive Director Erika Alonso in December of 2007.

The records were organized in general administrative papers and project files. Special Collections kept the original organization of the files.

Biographical / historical:

The Legal Assistance Society at the University of Virginia School of Law was conceived in 1967 in respond to a question that Justice William J. Brennan had asked the year before during oral arguments heard at the Law School in March of 1966:

"Might it not be possible to expose a much larger percentage of the student body, at some time during the three years of law school to the realities of the attorney-client relationship?" (VLW, v. xix, no. 14, Feb. 9, 1967, p.2).

The Virginia Law Weekly announced the soon to be established new organization: "Beginning June 1, an office will be opened....by the Charlottesville-Albemarle Bar Association to provide free civil legal aid to any person who shows to be indigent and in genuine need of a lawyer's help. Students of the law school will be needed to staff the office and to assist the lawyers in research, drawing up documents or anything else the lawyer assigned to the case would like him to do." (VLW, v. xix, no. 24, May 4, 1967). The program began in the Fall of 1967.

The director of the newly formed Legal Aid Society was Myron P. Simmons, the assistant director was Peter W. Windrem and the faculty advisor was Professor Peter C. Mason. (VLW, v. xx, no. 2, p. 2, Thursday September 28, 1967.) The organization was directly affiliated (and still is) with the Charlottesville-Albemarle Legal Aid Society, Inc. The membership was limited to forty students.

Processing information:

These files were organized in two:

1. General Administrative Files: memoranda and correspondence between the different members of the organization, handbooks, manuals, by-laws, etc.

2. Project files: Labor Project, Native American Law Project and Western State Hospital Project are of most importance. There is also documentation on the Migrant Farmworker Program and the Low Income Housing Project.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard