Lynette Labinger attended college during the height of the Vietnam War. She began to see civil rights law as a way to use the law to accomplish social reform. After graduating from college, she attended New York University Law School. She is now partners with John Roney in Roney and Labinger, a law office on the East Side in Providence. John Roney joined Federal Legal Services shortly after law school. A part of President Lyndon Johnson's "War on Poverty", it provided lawyers a chance to represent the indigent clients.
Labinger and Roney were lawyers for the defense in Ricci v. Wisner, or the "Private Parts" case in May 1978. The Private Parts show was a RISD student gallery exhibition that featured a range of art related to the theme of Private Parts. After news of the show reached the public, Providence Police raided the gallery and confiscated much of the artwork. Police told the group it was in violation of a new obscenity law, passed only days before. Organizers of the exhibit sued the city of violation of their first amendment rights. The judge ruled that the exhibit should be protected as art and ordered that the city pay for the damage caused to the confiscated work.
© 2005
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