On Sunday, April 27, 2014, the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives (ALBA) will present the fourth ALBA/Puffin Award for Human Rights Activism to EJI director Bryan Stevenson.
The ALBA/Puffin Award is part of a program connecting the inspiring legacy of the International Brigades — the 40,000 volunteers who helped fight fascism during the Spanish Civil War — to international activist causes of today. Spanish Judge Baltasar Garzón received the first ALBA/Puffin Award in May 2011. Other recipients include Kate Doyle and Fredy Peccerelli, who work to expose human rights violations in Guatemala, and United We Dream, a national network of youth-led immigrant activist organizations that fight for the rights of millions of undocumented immigrants in the United States.
The award recognizes EJI’s work challenging poverty and racial discrimination, particularly in the U.S. criminal justice system, which ALBA and the Puffin Foundation describe as among “the greatest civil rights challenges of our times.”
“I can’t think of anyone more worthy of this honor, not only because the volunteers of the Lincoln Brigade fought on the front lines in the struggle against racism and for social justice and civil rights, but also because the Equal Justice Initiative, like ALBA, believes that injustice is rooted in a lack of historical education and that teaching the United States about the dark chapters in its own history is an absolute necessity as we work toward a better Union,” said Sebastiaan Faber, chair of ALBA.