Although I had many teachers who played a significant role in my development as a lawyer, a judge, and now a law professor, Professor Chuck Clausen most profoundly impacted me. His love of teaching and his unwavering commitment to his students came across in everything he did.  Chuck believed in the goodness of all people and wanted to be sure that all of us demonstrated our own personal goodness in our legal careers. He was committed to the responsibility of lawyers to help others, particularly the poor, in every way that we could.

I was fortunate enough to have Chuck for a few classes and to have him as a faculty advisor on some moot court work that I did. What I loved about Chuck is that having a conversation with him was like speaking to a renaissance man. He was so knowledgeable and engaged in so many different areas of life and of the community that I always learned something new when I was around him. His enthusiasm for life was infectious.

Because of my deep admiration for him, we continued to have contact after graduation. He truly became one of my most trusted advisors.

In addition to talking about the law, we frequently would converse about life and the world.  We spent hours brainstorming on how we could help lawyers talk and think about the spiritual nature of their lives. While I was on the Wisconsin Supreme Court, Chuck and I put together a “spiritual trip” for thirteen lawyers, judges, and the dean of our law school to spend some time with the poor in the Dominican Republic. During that adventure, we explored some of the deeper questions about our own personal roles as lawyers and the meaning of our lives. That trip changed my life. It played a role in leading me to the decision to leave the Supreme Court and to return to teaching and working with the poor and wounded in the community. None of that might have happened without Chuck’s deep influence on my life decisions.

My current teaching involves weaving clinical and substantive knowledge as well as real experiences into a pattern of legal and human education. In my restorative justice work, the students learn how to actually conduct victim/offender dialogues in crimes of severe violence, and listening circles with gangs, police, victims, neighbors, and faith communities in Milwaukee’s central city. However, we also talk about the capacity of the human spirit to forgive those who have done the unspeakable. We explore how people who are economically, culturally, racially, and in many other ways living in different worlds, can come together in facilitated dialogue and can transform their views of each other and begin to understand the depth of all of our humanness.

In my small claims mediation clinic, I have students successfully mediating three-quarters of the small claims pro se cases we handle on Monday mornings. But more importantly to me, the students participate in the profound experience of helping some people find their own way out of rage-filled situations and dilemmas. They learn how to shepherd people from moments of darkness into a moments of light with their help. Chuck is responsible for modeling that kind of care and teaching for me.

Chuck taught me that the biggest gift we can give each other is the gift of one’s presence and willingness to just listen.  Every day I work to have our future lawyers understand the importance of not only learning the technical aspects of the law, but how to contribute to the heart and soul of the legal profession. I am so very grateful to Professor Clausen for how much he influenced my personal journey as a lawyer, as a judge, and now as a teacher.