Spotlight on Playwright & Writer Members

The largest unified bar in the country, the DC Bar has 100,000 members residing across the US and in more than 80 countries. Since its inception in 1972, the DC Bar’s three pillars have been to improve the legal system, facilitate access to justice, and empower attorneys. While the DC Bar’s primary mission involves the above work, the organization also supports its members’ outside interests through writing programs and spotlighting their creative endeavors.

In the latter part of 2021, the DC Bar highlighted the work of two DC Bar members who are not only practicing attorney-authors, but creatives as well. In mid-November, the DC Bar recognized Mary Kathryn Nagle and Akeem Earle, the former a playwright of Fairly Traceable and the latter a newly chosen Writer in Residence for the DC Bar.

Earle was chosen to participate in the Writers in Residence program, which is in its second year. As a part of the program, the fourth-year law school student will work with DC staff writers and editors to create content for the Bar’s various media channels, including Washington Lawyer Magazine.

The program provides participants with the chance to hone their interviewing skills, benefit from interactions with attorneys from various practice areas, and earn credit. In addition to serving on the Mock Trial team, Earle served as a student attorney for the General Practice Clinic for family law cases and has worked with the DC Bar Pro Bono Center to generate content covering domestic relations for litigants who represent themselves.

On November 12, the American Bar Association presented Nagle’s Fairly Traceable as a virtual stage reading of a romantic dramedy. The play’s name was derived from Anthony Scalia's opinion of the Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, a 1992 Supreme Court case.

The case involved the challenge an environmental organization made against federal regulations that were part of the Endangered Species Act. As part of its ruling the high court established a three-pronged test for standing in court, with one of the stipulations being the plaintiff’s injury must be “fairly traceable.”

The play conveys messages related to identity and environmental harm. Taking place in Baton Rouge and New Orleans, Louisiana, and Joplin, Missouri, the plot also travels between events that happened just after the millennia (Hurricane Katrina and other large-scale storms) and the year 2042.

In the backdrop of the plot is the love story between two of the principal characters, Randy and Erin. The characters' relationship is threatened after Erin files a lawsuit against oil companies that have destroyed Native American lands.

The play makes accessible to viewers the importance of environmental law and its impact on human existence. One of the reasons this is so is because, since it is positioned with one foot on high ground and the other in dangerous territory, environmental law keeps the government honest, according to professor of law at Tulane University Law School Oliver Houck. It requires that those who practice law in this field become accustomed to rebelling and being willing to take risks, including sacrificing income if necessary.