Southern Poverty Law Center litigates for change

SPLC works through the legal field to advocate for justice

Photo taken from the Southern Poverty Law Center's official website

Among several organizations committed to combating hate crimes, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), founded in 1971, is a racial justice organization dedicated to using litigation to battle hate crimes.

“We were involved in [cases of] the Ku Klux Klan [and other] groups that were racist organizations,” said Michael Lieberman, Senior Policy Counsel for Hate and Extremism for the SLPC. “We filed on behalf of black plaintiffs in the aftermath of lynchings or other hate crimes or violent incidents. Subsequently, we also developed anti-bias work, now called ‘Learning for Justice’.”

The SPLC has achieved several milestones in its decades since its founding that go beyond racial inequality. 

In 1977, SPLC won the U.S. Supreme Court’s favor, helping women gain access to law enforcement positions. In 2010, when an elderly black man was shot to death by a white police officer, SPLC filed a civil lawsuit against the town of Homer, La., reaching a settlement agreement in Aug. 2010. When the Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore violated his oath of office by ordering the denial of same-sex marriages, SPLC filed a complaint that led to Moore’s removal in 2016.

Working under the SPLC, Lieberman has primarily focused his efforts on pushing for the passage of different legislation related to hate crimes.

“I worked on the most important federal hate crime law, the federal hate crime enforcement law, which is called the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act,” Lieberman said. “I also worked on a law called the Hate Crime Statistics Act, which is a requirement that the Department of Justice collect and report incidents of hate crimes from the nation's 19,000 federal, state, local, and tribal police departments.”

The Hate Crime Statistics Act is a critical foundation for what Lieberman believes is the start of change and advocacy.

“It's one thing for the Southern Poverty Law Center to say there were X number of hate crimes directed against Black, Jewish or trans-gender people or women in 2024, but it's another thing for the FBI data to come through and for us to be able to cite the FBI data, which is a source that should be reliable no matter what administration is in power,” Lieberman said. “That data is definitely incomplete [right now,] but it is the best single source of data in the country. Knowing the data allows you to allocate resources to prevent [hate crimes].”

Despite increasing opportunities to obtain justice, some legislation and policies continue to have their flaws.

“There are some hate crime laws and some hate crime policies that do not cover all the categories of possible hate crimes,” Lieberman said. “[If] you want to make an inclusive response to hate crimes, you can't do that if the law does not cover inclusively.”

Lieberman has had the opportunity to follow up with certain hate crimes, the victims and their families. He has observed that there are often negative effects that follow the victims long after the incident.

“If you've been victimized because you're disabled or because you're a member of the AAPI community or black, the next day you're still going to be black, and you could be victimized again,” Lieberman said. “The fear and impact of these crimes really stay with the victim.”

These impacts can spill over into the community.

“When you have a cross that's burned on a black family's lawn that just moved into the neighborhood, it's not just a message that goes to that particular family,” Lieberman said. “It's a message that resonates for anyone who's black who would dare to move into that community.”

Many families that lost a loved one to violent hate crimes have used their grief to fuel their advocacy.

“Richard Collins III, a black man who had just been commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the Army, was murdered at the University of Maryland just before he graduated from Bowie State [University],” Lieberman said. “His family became advocates for an improved hate crime law in Maryland and has inspired social justice responses at Bowie State and at the University of Maryland.”

The deaths of Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. in 1998 were two murders that marked a turning point in the fight against hate crimes and are what inspired the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act. Lieberman was able to get to know the two victims’ families and their continued efforts to pave the way for justice.

“Both family members have done something other than what could have been expected of them to do, which is just be devastated and curl up into their cocoons and remember and grieve silently,” Lieberman said. “The Shepards have been amazing, speaking out in support of a more effective response to hate violence, and the Byrd family has also been fantastic at elevating the issues and making it clear that they're willing to tell their story again and again.”