[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 23 (Tuesday, February 28, 2006)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1534-S1535]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    TRIBUTE TO JANET ALTMAN SPRAGENS

 Mrs. CLINTON. Mr. President, on February 19, 2006, our Nation 
lost a great lawyer, educator, advocate, and public servant. Janet 
Altman Spragens was a lifelong resident of Washington, DC, and a 
professor at American University's Washington College of Law for 33 
years.
  I met Janet when she was a young graduate student at Northwestern 
University and taught social studies at my alma mater, Maine South High 
School in Park Ridge, IL. She was a Wellesley graduate, and as I was 
making choices about where I would go to college, she urged me to 
consider Wellesley. I am grateful to Janet for helping me make that 
important decision in my life.
  Janet went on to law school and developed an expertise in tax law. 
She used that expertise to benefit our Nation's underserved taxpayers 
by advocating for them in Congress and, in 1990, founding the Federal 
Tax Clinic. The clinic continues to operate today and the American Bar 
Association's Tax Section called it one of the earliest and most 
successful low-income taxpayer clinics in the country.
  Janet Altman Spragens made a difference in the lives of many 
Americans who never will have the pleasure and privilege of knowing 
her. I join her family and friends in mourning her loss and ask that 
her obituary in the Washington Post be printed in the Record.
  The material follows:

               [From the Washington Post, Feb. 22, 2006]

    Janet Spragens, 62; Law Professor Set Up Tax Clinic to Aid Poor

                            (By Joe Holley)

       Janet R. Spragens, 62, a tax professor at American 
     University's Washington College of Law and the founder of the 
     nation's first tax clinic for low-income taxpayers, died Feb. 
     19 of cancer at her home in the District.

[[Page S1535]]

       Ms. Spragens joined the faculty of the Washington College 
     of Law in fall 1973 and founded the Federal Tax Clinic in 
     1990. Its purpose is to provide third-year law students the 
     opportunity to learn by doing instead of just reading legal 
     theory and to provide assistance to people who frequently are 
     not served well by the legal system.
       ``Janet came to realize that the tax system is a place 
     where low- and moderate-income taxpayers don't have the 
     resources to protect themselves,'' said Andy Pike, an 
     associate dean at the law school.
       The clinic's clients have included cabdrivers, single 
     working mothers, travel agents, construction workers, 
     retirees, high school teachers, household workers and others 
     who find themselves caught up in the complexity of the 
     nation's administrative and judicial systems. As Ms. Spragens 
     told a House committee in 2001, many are non-English speakers 
     who are frightened and confused. The clinic charges no fees 
     for its services.
       Since the clinic was founded, participation in it has been 
     ``standing-room only,'' said its supervising attorney, Nancy 
     Abramowitz, referring both to students and clients. The 
     program's success has spawned others at law schools across 
     the nation.
       Born in Washington into a family of lawyers, Ms. Spragens 
     considered becoming a teacher before deciding to pursue a 
     career as a lawyer who taught. She received a bachelor's 
     degree from Wellesley College in 1964 and a master's degree 
     in education from Northwestern University in 1965. She 
     received a law degree from George Washington University Law 
     School in 1968.
       As a student teacher during her year at Northwestern, she 
     taught future Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), then a 
     high school senior. In her memoir, ``Living History,'' 
     Clinton credits Ms. Spragens with urging her to broaden her 
     horizons by leaving the Midwest and attending college in the 
     East. Like Ms. Spragens, Clinton chose Wellesley.
       During her third year of law school, Ms. Spragens served as 
     a clerk to U.S. District Judge Oliver Gasch. She was an 
     attorney with the appellate section of the Justice 
     Department's tax division before joining the faculty of the 
     Washington College of Law in 1973. At the time, she was the 
     only female member of the full-time faculty.
       Federal funding for the tax clinic, thanks to Ms. Spragens' 
     efforts, came about almost accidentally. Testifying in 1997 
     before the National Commission on Restructuring the Internal 
     Revenue Service, she was asked what could be done to 
     alleviate tax problems confronting the working poor.
       ``She said, somewhat offhandedly, just provide funds to 
     create more clinics for the provision of services to this 
     needy population across the country,'' Abramowitz noted. 
     ``The rest is history.''
       Ms. Spragens also was concerned about unethical tax 
     preparers who prey on low-income taxpayers and about the 
     complexities of the earned income tax credit, which is 
     designed to help the working poor. ``They are just 
     overwhelmed by the complexity,'' she told The Washington Post 
     in 2001.
       Ms. Spragens served as executive director of the American 
     Tax Policy Institute from 1996 to 2001, was a member of the 
     council for the American Bar Association section on taxation 
     since 1999 and had chaired the section's low-income taxpayer 
     and teaching taxation committees. She was director of the 
     Israel program at the Washington College of Law and was 
     visiting professor of law at the University of Haifa Faculty 
     of Law in 2000.
       For her work on behalf of low-income taxpayers, she 
     received the 2006 ABA Section on Taxation Pro Bono Award.
       Her marriage to Jeffrey Spragens ended in divorce.
       Survivors include two daughters, Robin Spragens Trepanier 
     of Washington and Lee Spragens of Los Angeles; her mother, 
     Sophie B. Altman of Washington; two sisters, Susan Altman of 
     Washington and Nancy Altman of Bethesda; and a brother, 
     Robert Altman of Potomac.

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