Uniting the legal community in the service of the people
The National Lawyers Guild (NLG) was founded in 1937 as the country's first racially-integrated bar association of prog
ressive lawyers and jurists who believed that they had a major role to play in the reconstruction of legal values to emphasize human rights over property rights. The Guild is the oldest and most extensive network of public interest and human rights activists working within the legal system.
We work tirelessly towards our mission of uniting lawyers, law students, legal workers and jailhouse lawyers to function as an effective force in the service of the people, to the end that human rights shall be regarded as more sacred than property interests.
Our aim is to bring together all those who recognize the importance of safeguarding and extending the rights of workers, women, LGBTQ people, farmers, people with disabilities and people of color, upon whom the welfare of the entire nation depends; who seek actively to eliminate racism; who work to maintain and protect our civil rights and liberties in the face of persistent attacks upon them; and who look upon the law as an instrument for the protection of the people, rather than for their repression.
Click here to watch NLG-LA's Year-In-Review Video.
Our Programs
The Guild Los Angeles has four primary programmatic areas to fulfill our mission: