By Brian Cox
Legal News
Pepper Hamilton attorney Matthew Lund at the start of the year took up his new duties as president of the Historical Society for the U.S. District Court of the Eastern District of Michigan. His involvement with the group began with a simple newsletter.
Lund joined the Historical Society as a trustee in 2010 after his colleague Barbara Rom showed him a copy of “The Court Legacy,” a perodically published newsletter that recounts stories of influential people and cases in the history of the court. The majority of Lund’s practice since joining Pepper Hamilton in 1993 has been in the federal court and so the history intrigued him.
“Southeast Michigan has a rich history of case law,” says Lund. “Every case has a life of its own and has a story.”
The Historical Society is dedicated to preserving and sharing those stories. Formed in 1992, the society’s mission is to promote an awareness of the court’s past and its historical significance. The newsletter is part of that effort as is assisting federal district judges preserve their records and personal papers; promoting public education about significant cases; sponsoring speakers at the society’s annual meeting; and curating a museum on the first floor of the Theodore Levin U.S. Courthouse.
The museum, said to be the first of its kind in the country, chronicles the history of the court with profiles of its most famous cases and biographical information on judicial officers. It even includes a few artifacts, such as a steno-graph and a record disk dictation machine.
During his 2-year tenure as president, Lund plans to explore developing an educational video for use in schools and the community.
In addition to leading the Historical Society, Lund recently assumed the seat of vice president for the Federal Bar Association, with the expectation that he will be president in two years.
“Deep involvement with the association is an important part of developing myself professionally and personally,” says Lund. “It’s a helpful way to get to know the lawyers with whom and against whom you practice and to get to know the judges.”
His level of engagement helps him keep his finger on what’s going on in the court and his practice.
A graduate of the University of Detroit Mercy School of Law, Lund heads up Pepper Hamilton’s litigation practice statewide. He serves on the firm’s Finance, Pro Bono and Contributions committees.
He received national recognition in 2008 when he successfully pursued a federal voting rights case that challenged the systematic purging of voter lists and related disenfranchment of thousands of Michigan voters. His work on the case was recognized by the American Lawyer magazine in a June 2009 feature titled “Franchise Players,” and he was awarded Pepper Hamilton’s William R. Klaus Pro Bono Award “in recognition of [his] distinguished role in protecting the fundamental right to vote and [his] inspiration to Pepper Lawyers to be defenders of the constitutional rights of all.”
If Lund can ever find the time, an accounting of the voting rights case might make a fine inclusion in the “The Court Legacy,” but for now he encourages others who may be interested in writing a story for the newsletter to contact the Historical Society at https:// members.fbamich.org/historicalsociety/home.aspx.
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