Inspiring Humanitarian: Carlos Siderman

On occasion, we’re each fortunate enough to meet with the great minds that are changing the world around us, and recently I had the opportunity to do just that at an amazing event hosted by Southwestern Law School for the Jose Siderman-Fulbright Fellowship’s 5th anniversary celebration, featuring a keynote by the Fellowship founder, Carlos Siderman. This event not only changed my perspective of the world, it made me reevaluate how to think about those with whom I held resentments or fears.

In an effort to promote the training of young Argentine lawyers in civil liberties and human rights, Carlos Siderman and the Fulbright Commission in Argentina established the Human Rights Fellowship at Southwestern Law School to bring Argentine law graduates to Los Angeles to complete an LL.M. degree in Civil Liberties and Human Rights or Advocacy at the law school, including an externship with a civil rights organization.

The Fellowship is named for José Siderman, a successful Argentine businessman who, because he was Jewish, became a victim of the country’s military dictatorship’s “dirty war” that began in the mid-1970’s, and who suffered from egregious abuses including kidnapping, torture and exile as well as the regional governor seizing all his property and assets.

In a landmark human rights case heard and decided in federal court in Los Angeles in September 1996, the government of Argentina agreed to settle damage claims by Mr. Siderman and his family after a 14-year legal battle led by the American Civil Liberties Union, making it the first foreign government ever to be put on trial in the United States for abuses committed on its own soil.

I quickly discovered the powerful humanitarian impact one man can have to help ensure the future protection of human rights in Argentina or anywhere in the world today.

Learn more about the Jose Siderman-Fulbright Fellowship here.

By Chris Huppertz