Volunteer Lawyers for Justice

At Volunteer Lawyers for Justice (VLJ), our mission is to ensure access to justice for people experiencing poverty. VLJ’s staff and trustees drafted an ambitious mission that doesn’t set out to merely provide free legal services, but to ensure access to justice. Our mission focuses on people experiencing poverty, stressing that poverty can be (and should be) transitory. We believe that legal services have the ability to effectuate profound change, including economic stability and prosperity. VLJ mobilizes volunteers to work alongside staff to address critical legal needs across New Jersey, advancing racial, social, and economic justice for the most at-risk members of our community. At the start, VLJ aimed to address the unmet civil legal needs of individuals with no- or low-incomes in Essex County. Initially operating as a program of the Legal Services Foundation of Essex County, VLJ focused on housing, consumer, family, and education law cases, assigning them to volunteer attorneys. Despite early challenges in institutionalizing pro bono culture in law firms and garnering support from funders unfamiliar with civil legal pro bono efforts, VLJ achieved significant milestones, including influencing court rules that expanded the pool of potential volunteers, partnering with law firms and corporate legal departments, and expanding services statewide. Today, VLJ remains dedicated to its mission of ensuring access to justice for those experiencing poverty, taking on cases and changing lives for thousands of New Jerseyans each year while harnessing the pro bono power of hundreds of volunteer attorneys and non-attorneys. The organization's success is attributed to the inspiration drawn from clients’ resilience and hope as they confront challenges from landlords, abusers, traffickers, creditors, and others in their pursuit of justice. At VLJ, collaboration is key and we make a much larger impact because of our community of supporters, who help us to “Take Cases and Change Lives” every day.