Stephen Berzon Receives the 2024 Ninth Circuit’s John P. Frank Award

Stephen Berzon received the 2024 John P. Frank Award at the 2024 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference in Sacramento.

Stephen Berzon, founding partner of the law firm Altshuler Berzon, received the 2024 John P. Frank Award, the “lawyer’s lawyer award,” as Chief Judge Emerita Mary M. Schroeder described it, at the 2024 Ninth Circuit Judicial Conference on July 22 in Sacramento.

The John P. Frank Award, established in 2003 and awarded by the Ninth Circuit Advisory Board, recognizes a lawyer who has “demonstrated outstanding character and integrity; dedication to the rule of law; proficiency as a trial and appellate lawyer; success in promoting collegiality among members of the bench and bar; and a lifetime of service to the federal courts of the Ninth Circuit.”

The award was “created by our attorney advisory board more than 20 years ago to honor members of the legal profession in the West, who are not only great lawyers but who would have provided notable service to the courts in our circuit,” said Judge Schroeder. “The award is appropriately named for a legendary member of the Arizona Bar, John Paul Frank, who began professional life as an Ivy League professor who migrated to Arizona because of asthma, and who for nearly 50 years represented clients who could not afford representation; clients like Ernesto Miranda and Anita Hill.

“John believed the courts were the guardians of the Constitution, and the Constitution’s protection of our civil rights and civil liberties,” said Judge Schroeder. “When our courts were attacked, he defended them. When judges needed advice, he provided it, and when Congress was threatening to take us backwards, he tried to set them straight, and he did. He was a great teacher who helped to build a great law firm.”

Melinda Haag, Ninth Circuit Advisory Board chair, made the presentation. “It became incredibly clear during our selection process that Steve Berzon has demonstrated throughout his professional lifetime all of the qualities we look for in connection with the John Frank award,” she said. “And he has clearly touched the lives and impacted the careers of many, many people in this room. We received countless nominations on Steve’s behalf and all of them contained long, heartfelt descriptions of his character and integrity, his talents as a lawyer, mentor and teacher and his dedicated service to the courts.”

“This award is also given for a dedication to the rule of law (and) proficiency as a trial and appellate lawyer,” said Ann O’Leary, a member of the advisory board. “I want to publicly thank Steve on behalf of the Ninth Circuit Advisory Board for his best-in-class advocacy with victories for DACA recipients, for mine workers for whom he preserved lifetime medical benefits and, of course, the way he has shaped and molded labor law in the Ninth Circuit and throughout our country. We are a stronger country and a stronger circuit because of Steve. I am one of the dozens of attorneys who grew up as a lawyer in the Ninth Circuit and had the opportunity to be inspired, trained and mentored in my legal career and in my life by Steve Berzon.”

“I can’t tell you how moved I am by those remarks,” said Berzon, upon accepting the award. “Thanks to all the lawyers on the Ninth Circuit Advisory Board who selected me. A very special thanks to my wife, Judge Marsha Berzon. For 58 years her courage, support and love have been my source of inspiration. John Frank was indeed a legend, a superb lawyer and to receive an award in his name is an extraordinary honor. I have also had the good fortune, for more than 58 years, to litigate in circuit and district courts, and the Supreme Court, throughout the country, and to appear before many exceptional judges, so I can say to all of you with some authority that there is no better place to practice law than here in the Ninth Circuit. To receive this award from this body is something I will cherish forever; I am so deeply moved. Thank you so much.”

Berzon’s practice has consisted primarily of major litigation in the areas of labor and employment, environment and public health, campaign, election and constitutional law. He has practiced both at the trial and appellate levels and has argued groundbreaking cases benefiting workers, their unions and the environment before the U.S. Supreme Court, the California and Hawaii Supreme Courts, and federal circuit and district courts throughout the country. He has testified before U.S. Senate and House committees and California Senate and Assembly committees, and has helped develop key legislation involving civil rights, education, unemployment insurance, environmental protection, food safety, at-risk children, union organizing and injunctions in labor disputes.

He has been a member of the Ninth Circuit’s Advisory Committee on Rules and Internal Operating Procedures, the national board of directors of the American Constitutional Society, and the board of directors of the national AFL-CIO Lawyers Coordinating Committee. He is currently on the Executive Committee of the Northern District of California Chapter of the Federal Bar Association and is a Fellow of the American Bar Foundation.

Before starting Altshuler Berzon, Berzon was a Reginald Heber Smith Fellow at the Contra Costa Legal Services Foundation in Richmond, California, and at the National Housing and Economic Development Law Project of the University of California, Berkeley School of Law. He practiced with the Legal Aid Society of Alameda County and served as the legal director of the Children’s Defense Fund in Washington, D.C.

Berzon received his Bachelor of Arts from Cornell University and his Juris Doctor from Harvard Law School.

The late John P. Frank was a renowned Phoenix attorney who, over the course of a 62-year career, argued more than 500 appeals before the Arizona Court of Appeals, the Arizona Supreme Court, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit, other federal circuit courts and the U.S. Supreme Court. The award was established in 2003 by the Judicial Council of the Ninth Circuit at the recommendation of the Ninth Circuit Advisory Board, a group of experienced attorneys who advise on circuit governance issues.

                                                                             #    #     #