Proskauer Rose LLP has received the President’s Award from the National Association of Counsel for Children, recognising the firm’s commitment to justice in a landmark child welfare case.
The award was presented on August 13th by Board President Dawne Mitchell, honouring Proskauer’s role as counsel in the Matter of Lawyers for Children v. New York State Office of Children and Family Services.
The New York Court of Appeals struck down state regulations that would have created a new system allowing parents to place children with strangers without statutory safeguards.
Those safeguards included court oversight and the appointment of legal counsel, protections the court ruled could not be removed through regulation alone.
William C. Silverman of Proskauer Rose accepted the award and offered remarks framing the case as a defence of the family court system itself, not merely a legal victory.
Silverman described the outcome plainly: “I’m here because I won a straightforward case, seven-nothing in the Court of Appeals, based on a very basic principle of law that regulations cannot conflict with a statute.”
He added that the state had attempted to impose what he called “a shadow foster care system through regulation,” which he said was “completely unlawful.”
Silverman acknowledged the Legal Aid Society, Lawyers for Children, and Legal Aid of Buffalo, noting that repeated early setbacks had created the opportunity to ultimately argue before the state’s highest court.
The litigation lasted three years, in part because, as Silverman noted, many people initially believed that removing court oversight from the child welfare system was a sound reform idea.
The state’s stated aim had been to “transform and modernise the child welfare system,” but regulators sought to achieve that outside the court system entirely, stripping away essential services for families and children along the way.
Silverman was clear that the greater risk is not outright abolition of the family court, but rather a gradual erosion of public confidence in the institution that could undermine future reform efforts.
“If people believe that the court is the crux of the problem, they’re less likely to support reforms and additional resources and services that we desperately need to make the system actually work,” he said.
His remarks placed the legal win in a broader context, arguing that the professionals working daily within the family court system serve a role in the justice system that is worth defending as a matter of principle.