Call To Action Text

(Below is the Call To Action written by Roderick Palmore, general counsel of Sara Lee, and circulated to general counsel at Fortune 500 companies, along with his cover letter. The letter was edited for length and clarity, while the Call To Action is reprinted in its entirety.)

Dear General Counsel Colleagues:

Attached is a copy of a document entitled a “Call To Action.” The document is intended to be a commitment to push forward to the next level on diversity in the profession, both with our outside lawyers and within out own departments.

More particularly, the commitment is to act on the diversity principles which most of us have espoused by making decisions on hiring and retaining outside firms which factor in the diversity performance of those firms.

The document reflects some very helpful comments and insights from a number of our colleagues. Any criticisms, however, should be directed to me as the primary author.

The purpose of this letter is to seek your support for this effort. I believe that it is time for us to send a strong and critically important message to the firms we use and contemplate using, as well as to the profession and to the larger community, about our commitment to diversity.

To that end, I would like to see as many signatures as possible from the chief legal officers of the major public and private companies in the U.S.

The ultimate goal is to facilitate progress on diversity in the profession. The focus of this effort is on the community of large law firms, a community with which we have great influence.

Roderick A. Palmore

A Call to Action – Diversity In The Legal Profession

In 1999, the Chief Legal Officers of about 500 major corporations signed a document entitled Diversity In The Workplace – A Statement of Principle. The Statement evidenced the commitment of the signatory corporations to diversity in the legal profession. In particular, it was intended to be a mandate for law firms to make immediate and sustained improvement in this area. Unfortunately, however, all objective assessments show that the collective efforts and gains of law firms in diversity have reached a disappointing plateau.

As Chief Legal Officers, we hereby reaffirm our commitment to diversity in the legal profession. Our action is based on the need to enhance opportunity in the legal profession and our recognition that the legal and business interests of our clients require legal representation that reflects the diversity of our employees, customers and the communities where we do business. In furtherance of this renewed commitment, this is intended to be a Call to Action for the profession generally and in particular for our law departments and for the law firms with which our companies do business.

In an effort to realize a truly diverse profession and to promote diversity in law firms, we commit to taking action consistent with the referenced Statement. To that end, in addition to our abiding commitment to diversity in our own departments, we pledge that we will make decisions regarding which law firms represent our companies based in significant part on the diversity performance of the firms. We intend to look for opportunities for firms we regularly use which positively distinguish themselves in this area. We further intend to end or limit our relationships with firms whose performance consistently evidences a lack of meaningful interest in being diverse.