Editor’s note: Lora L. Fong is an assistant New Jersey attorney general who serves as the first chief diversity officer for the Department of Law and Public Safety. She was awarded the New Jersey State Bar Association (NJSBA) Diversity Committee’s 2020 Mel Narol Award at the Oct. 9 Diversity Summit. The award is given to individuals or organizations whose work has advanced diversity and inclusion for women and minority lawyers. The following is Fong’s acceptance speech.
Thank you to the members of the Diversity Committee and the New Jersey State Bar Association for this award. I am truly honored and so very appreciative. This award means a great deal to me for so many reasons. As a former chairperson of the Diversity Committee and having served as a trustee of the state bar for six years, I have had the privilege of working with so many incredibly talented and dedicated individuals who make up this organization – we have spent many hours together over many years. To be recognized by this group is special and deeply meaningful. I want to thank the individuals who have reached out to me to say congratulations on this occasion – it is like having flashbacks of my 30-year legal career to hear from so many wonderful folks. I must confess, it is a bit overwhelming.
I want to acknowledge the person for whom this award is named, Mel Narol. For those of you who did not know him, Mel Narol was a nationally recognized expert in sports law, who was next in line to be the president of the New Jersey State Bar Association when he tragically died in 2002. He was only 51. I did not have the good fortune to know him well, but our paths did cross briefly and it was impactful. You see, he was a strong force and proponent for diversity in the bar association, and he did not just talk the talk, he walked the walk.
A short time before his passing, I met Mel Narol for the first time. While I had been a member of the NJSBA since my admission to the bar in 1991, I seldom attended state bar events. Candidly, I did not really feel like I would fit in or be welcomed. However, I had been active for years in the New Jersey Asian bar association – APALA-NJ, and in 2002, I was to become its president. That is when I met Mel Narol. He was the first person from the state bar leadership to come to an APALA-NJ event – he attended the dinner at which I was sworn in. I remember what that meant to us in APALA-NJ, then just a fledgling bar association – it was as if we had been invisible to the greater legal community and were being seen for the first time.
That single act made a difference. I realized that the NJSBA might actually be a place that would welcome attorneys who look like me. That was the catalyst for my increased involvement in the NJSBA, an organization that has since come to mean so much to me personally and professionally. What I did not mention is that Mel was a white male. As such, his allyship was critical. He was a force, a steady voice, and an active advocate for diversity and inclusion in the state bar. We all need allies, and we should all be allies, especially today.
These are such challenging times. We are all experiencing fatigue and trepidation. There is so much to be worried about—a pandemic, the economy, social injustice, factions and deep divides that exist in our society that threaten our way of life. We are facing the existential threat of climate change, rising white supremacy, and hate groups. During all of this, we have lost heroes—Congressman John Lewis, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Far too many of us have lost loved ones: as of today, 213,995 people in this country have lost their lives to COVID-19 and the number continues to rise.
Still, we cannot lose hope. We have to realize we are in this for the long game. None of these threats was spawned overnight. The history of this great country is what it is. Its indigenous people were subjected to the threat of elimination starting with the earliest European settlements in the 15th century. The transatlantic slave trade began in 1619 and continued for hundreds of years. Something that resonates very personally with me – the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 – banned immigration from China. It remained in effect for over 60 years and was only repealed in 1943 because we needed to align politically with China as an ally. On the heels of its repeal, thousands of Japanese Americans were rounded up, deprived of their property and placed into internment camps during World War II. Sadly, we can fast forward to today, a time where we have witnessed the immoral and unthinkable systematic separation of thousands of children from their families at our southern border, and a time where tragically, it would seem that our system of laws offers no justice for the taking of innocent lives, like Breonna Taylor’s.
But there is hope. After all, this is a country, with all its frailties, where people like me can rise up. I am the granddaughter of a woman who was a widowed, single mother. She raised her son during the Great Depression in the tenements of New York City’s Chinatown, eking out a living by waiting tables and becoming a cook. I am the daughter of her son, a man who served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and managed get a college education courtesy of the GI Bill. Each of his three children had access to quality education at good public schools and we all graduated from affordable state colleges and universities. We got to realize the American Dream. Nothing was handed to us, but we are privileged.
“Privilege” is one of those words that makes people feel uncomfortable. We need to get beyond that. If you have privilege, it does not mean you are undeserving or a bad person. It simply means you stand in a place where you have advantages that others do not have. It means that you can walk through your life taking for granted things that others cannot. We all need to be aware of our privilege – of the gifts we have that others do not.
As attorneys, we all occupy a place of privilege. We are taught to be critical thinkers, to be able to sort out fact from fiction, to evaluate evidence, to challenge theories and logic. In today’s world, we have access to more data than ever before. Yet our democracy, our culture, and our way of life is threatened, not by lack information about the critical issues of the day, but rather, by an inability to distinguish the truth from lies. As lawyers, we have studied the Constitution, and we have taken an oath to support it. We understand the rule of law and its importance to our society. With this privilege, comes great responsibility – to speak up, to take action, to be advocates, to be the change.
During this time, so many of us are more isolated – being socially distanced has taken its toll on all of our psyches. We need to look out for one another, to pick each other up, to allow each other to take a break from the chaos and stress of coping with the world. Seeking strength and inspiration from others is a way to regenerate. I have found so much support and solace from my friends in the New Jersey State Bar Association as well as in the Asian bar, and in the New Jersey Women Lawyers Association. I am so grateful for the personal relationships and solidarity as well as the reminders and resources about how I can stay on track as a professional. Today’s Diversity Summit is an incredible example of the invaluable programming that helps us all remember that we are part of something that is bigger than ourselves.
I am grateful for all of this, and once again, I want to thank the NJSBA and the Diversity Committee for this award. I would be remiss if I did not also express my gratitude and love for my family – my husband Jack, my daughter Ruth and son Steven, as well as my extended family and close friends who have empowered me, put up with me, and sustained me.
Thank you.