The Equal Justice Initiative is a private, nonprofit law organization that has provided legal services to the poor, incarcerated, and condemned for nearly 30 years. From our office in Montgomery, Alabama, we have challenged mass incarceration, excessive punishment, and the abuse of children, people with disabilities, and the indigent in America’s criminal justice system. We have made eliminating racial bias and discrimination against the poor a central feature of our work and have won major legal reforms and secured relief, release, or reduced sentences for over 140 condemned people on death row. Our advocacy and litigation to ban mandatory life-imprisonment-without-parole sentences for children resulted in landmark rulings by the United States Supreme Court that have impacted thousands of cases.
Over the last several years, we have engaged in new work to challenge the history of racial injustice in America with research, reports, community education efforts, advocacy, and public markers.This year we opened two new national institutions that have drawn international praise. The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice represent years of work by EJI to create new narrative spaces in the United States that document our nation’s history of racial inequality. The sites have already attracted tens of thousands of visitors. The opening of our sites in April 2018 was accompanied by three days of events, talks, lectures, and performances that brought together an amazing array of voices and continue to have a great impact on the national discourse about race, poverty, and criminal justice reform.
EJI’s staff and work have grown dramatically in the last year. Our work is the product of thousands of people like you who support us, donate to us, encourage us, and stand with us as we try to create a just nation more committed to fairness and equality. We are grateful for your support.