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January 4, 2002/20 Tevet 5762, Vol. 54, No. 16
Childhood memories led to career in civil liberty
BARRY COHEN
Editor
Richard Foltin meets with President Bill Clinton in September 2000 in the Oval Office.
Photo courtesy of the American Jewish Committee
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A desire to weave together secular and religious Jewish identities led a Harvard law school graduate from private practice in Manhattan to secular and religious studies in Jerusalem, and ultimately to a position with the American Jewish Committee at the nation's capital.
"I wanted to find work to do that would allow me to work in the area of civil liberties and civil rights ... but also to bring it into a Jewish context and serve the Jewish community," says Richard Foltin, legislative director and counsel of the AJC.
Foltin, the son of Holocaust survivors, grew up in the Manhattan neighborhood of Washington Heights. "We were regular shul-goers," he remarks. His family attended worship services at a number of the Orthodox and Conservative synagogues in the area, he adds.
Because Foltin's parents lived through the Holocaust, "there was a sense of the fragility of my parents' situation, the sense that you had to battle to maintain a sense of identity and the values to protect us from things like this (the Holocaust) happening again," he explains. "But they tried to ensure that we had a sense of a Jewish identity that was based on more positive messages as well."
One of these positive messages was the importance of maintaining a strong commitment to the state of Israel, he explains.
After graduating cum laude from Harvard Law School in 1976 and working for a private law firm in Manhattan until 1981, Foltin decided to spend a year in Israel. There, he took classes at Hebrew University and at "ba'al teshuvah (returning to the covenant) yeshivas" in Jerusalem.
"I came out of that year with the sense that I wanted to be more engaged on a day-to-day, week-to-week basis with Jewish observance," he explains.
When he returned to New York, Foltin says he started regularly going to synagogue and volunteered with such groups as the Anti-Defamation League.
Foltin accepted a position with the AJC in 1984. What guided this decision was the AJC's commitment to religious liberty, separation of church and state, and efforts to work with other religious groups, he explains.
He initially served as the director of Governmental Affairs in the AJC's New York office. However, he says he became more interested with the legal aspect of the legislative work in Washington, D.C.
In 1993, he accepted the new position of Legislative Director and Counsel and moved to the capital. Foltin is responsible for the development, promotion and execution of the AJC's legislative agenda.
Foltin will be visiting the Valley, Thursday, Jan. 17, as the featured speaker of the Arizona AJC's chapter "Member-Bring-A-Member" lecture series. He will speak about the nation's new domestic agenda in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
One of his goals during his stay is to ensure the local chapter understands the agenda of the AJC's national office. He also aims to receive feedback about the concerns and questions of the local members, he explains.
"It's all about a two-way conversation," he remarks. "Our work in Washington depends upon the support of members in chapters."
Foltin and his wife Oreet have a 10-year-old son, Benjamin, and an 8-year-old daughter, Eliana.
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