Albert Kauffman

Biography

Kauffman has been a civil rights litigator specializing in the education, voting and employment rights of Latinos. For nearly 20 years, Kauffman was the senior litigating attorney for the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund (MALDEF) in San Antonio.

As a MALDEF attorney, Kauffman was the lead attorney for plaintiffs in the Texas school finance cases, for Latino plaintiffs in the Texas Higher Education System finance and desegregation case and in litigation challenging the state’s use of the TAAS test for graduation from Texas high schools. He has also litigated affirmative action cases, local and state voting rights, employment discrimination cases, immigration and hospital admission policy cases.

After MALDEF, he served as a Senior Legal and Policy Advocate Associate for the Civil Rights Project at Harvard Law School. Subsequently, he served as the Senior Legal Policy Advocate at the Chief Justice Earl Warren Institute on Race, Ethnicity and Diversity at the University of California at Berkeley. While there, he wrote about civil rights issues such as voting rights, No Child Left Behind, affirmative action, and public schools’ student assignment systems.

Kauffman was part of a small team of experts involved with passing both the state’s top 10 percent rule for admission to public universities and recent changes to admission and scholarship criteria for public graduate and professional schools.

• Drum Major for Justice Award from the American Association for Affirmative Action (2013).
• Maria A. Berriozabal Visionary Leadership Award from Our Lady of the Lake University (2013).
• Texas Lawyer selection as one of “The 25 Greatest Texas Lawyers of the Past Quarter-Century,” 2010.
• Lifetime Achievement Award, St. Mary’s Law School Hispanic Law Students Association, 2009.
• Laredo Texas LULAC, Champions of Education Award, 2004.
• Editorial Advisory Committee, Harvard Latino Law Review, 2003 (national award).
• Mary’s School of Law, Sir Thomas More Award, 2003 (national award).
• Boston College, chosen to give Boisi Lecture, “The No Child Left Behind Act, Dropouts and Affirmative Action: What’s the Common Issue?” 2003 (national award).
• American GI Forum Lifetime Achievement Award, 2002.
• Columbia Law School Human Rights Law Review Annual Award for Human Rights, 2002 (national award).
• Edgewood School District Achievement Award, 2002.
• Texas LULAC Service Award, 2002.
• Amistad award Texas State IMAGE, 2000.
• PTA national Lifetime Service Award, Edgewood I.S.D. PTA 2000.
• Board of Advisors, The Scholar: St. Mary’s Law Review on Minority Issues, 1999 (national award).
• Association of Higher Education – Hispanic Caucus selected to give Tomas Rivera lecture at 1997 National AHE Convention (national award).
• Texas State NAACP – Heroes Award, 1996.
• Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities – P. Gus Cardenas National Service to Higher Education Award – 1995 (national award).
• Texas Lawyer, selected one of ten most influential lawyers in Texas for decade 1985-1995.
• Hero for Children Award, Texas State Board of Education, 1994.
• Henry B. Gonzalez Award, Legal Achievement – St. Mary’s Law School Hispanic Alumni, 1994.
• Edgewood Plaintiffs Award – Service to Low-Wealth Districts, 1994.
• San Antonio Chapter, ACLU – John Henry Faulk Liberty Award, 1992.
• Texas Association of Chicanos in Higher Education – Meritorious Service Award, 1992.
• Association of Higher Education – Hispanic Caucus Lifetime Achievement Award, 1992
• Texas Mexican American Bar Association – Lifetime Achievement Award, 1992.
• Incarnate Word College – “Insigne Verbum” Award, 1992.
• San Antonio Mind Science Foundation, Imagineer Award, 1992.
• McAllen Tripas Club, “Tripero Distinguido,” 1990.
• Texas GI Forum Education Award, 1990.
• Texas Mexican American Bar Association Education Award, 1990.
• Harlandale I.S.D. Education Award, 1989.
• San Antonio Bilingual Education Trendsetter, 1988.
• Texas LULAC “Educacion – La Solucion,” 1988.
• Edgewood I.S.D., “Amigos de Edgewood”, 1987.
• Socorro I.S.D. Educational Achievement Award, 1987.
• Texas Association of Chicanos in Higher Education, 1986.
• Association for the Advancement of Mexican Americans, 1984.

Articles in a Periodical

• Supreme Court sets stage for partisan gerrymandering standards, San Antonio Express News, June 30, 2018
• Constitution does not guarantee right to bear an AR-15, San Antonio Express News, April 8, 2018; also in News Taco, April 9, 2018
• Latino Organizations Thrived in San Antonio in 1960s, chapter in “300 Years of San Antonio & Bexar County,” (Trinity University Press 2018)
• Moving from packing and cracking to fairness, San Antonio Express News, October 29, 2017; also in News Taco, https://newstaco.com/2017/11/01/gerrymandering-moving-cracking-packing-fairness/
• Texas must have the courage-and honor-to settle redistricting, San Antonio Express News, May 20, 2017 ; also in News Taco https://newstaco.com/2017/05/22/80036/
• Texas Supreme Court Retreats from Finance Battles, 19 The Scholar: St. Mary’s L. Rev. on Racial & Soc’l Just. 145 (2017)
• Effective Litigation Strategies to Improve State Education and Social Service Systems, 45 J. L. & Educ. 453 (2016)
• Albert Kauffman, The Barriers and Route to Texas School Finance Equity, 1Tex. Educ. Rev. 27 (2013)(Online).
• Tribute, Judge William Wayne Justice: A Life of Human Dignity and Refractory Mules, St. Mary’s Law Journal, 215-230 (2010).
• Introduction to Issue: Education and Minorities in the Modern Era: Working Civil Rights Into Practice, Policy and Procedure, The Scholar: St. Mary’s Law Review on Minority Issues , 101-108 (2010).
• The Texas School Finance Litigation Saga: Great Progress, Then Near Death By A Thousand Cuts, 40 St. Mary’s Law Journal 511-579 (2008).
• Accessibility to Comprehensive Higher Education in Texas, 31 The Social Science Journal 263 (1994) (with Richard Jones)
• Applying Edgewood v. Kirby to Analysis of Fundamental Rights Under the Texas Constitution, 22 St. Mary’s Law Journal 69 (1991) (with Carmen Rumbaut)

Shorter Works in Collections

• Texas School Finance Litigation: Great Progress and Some Regression, in Institute for Educational Equity and Opportunity, A Quality Education for Every Child: Stories from the Lawyers on the Front Lines, pp.109-155 (David Long, et al. ed., 2009).
• A Continuation of an Analysis of School Finance Cases Comparing Adequacy and Equity Theories, Albert H. Kauffman. Rockefeller Foundation. 01/2004. p. 26.
• A Comparison of Equity and Adequacy School Finance Cases and a Consideration of the Current New York and California School Finance Litigation on the Equity and Adequacy Dimensions, Albert H. Kauffman. Rockefeller Foundation. 01/2003. p. 26.
• The Hopwood Case: What It Says and What It Doesn’t, chapter in Affirmative Action’s Testament of Hope: Strategies for a New Era in Higher Education by Mildred Garcia, State University of New York Press (1997).
• Minority Concerns: A Response to TASP, Chapter in From Politics to Policy: A Case Study in Educational Reform, Matthews, Swanson, Kerker, Praeger Press, (New York, NY 1991).No Child Left Behind Act Resource Guide, The Civil Rights Project at Harvard (2004) (with Dan Losen)
• Lead writer and lead researcher on large number of briefs to U.S. Supreme Court, Texas Supreme Court, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit and numerous U.S. District Courts on issues of school finance, testing, higher education finance, affirmative action, and voting rights.

Op-Eds

• Commentary: Constitution does not guarantee right to bear an AR-15, McAllen Monitor, April 22, 2018.
• Commentary: Gerrymandering Affect Voter Turnout, McAllen Monitor, November 5, 2017.
• Stand Up, Texas, and Fix Redistricting, San Antonio Express-News, May 21, 2017.
• Courts rightfully stop unconstitutional executive order on immigration, San Antonio Express-News, April 1,2017.
• Texans deserves the full protection of the Voting Rights Act, San Antonio Express-News, Oct. 8, 2016.
• Court missed opportunity to promote diversity, San Antonio Express-News, June 27, 2016.
• Border higher ed gains began with a lawsuit, San Antonio Express-News, May 21, 2016.
• On school funding, the needed next steps will be hard, Houston Chronicle, May 13, 2016.

Presentations

• History of School Finance Issues in Texas, Say Si youth project, San Antonio, June, 2017.
• Reflections of Texas Scholars on Growing up in Texas, American Education Research Association national convention, San Antonio, April 2017.
• Civil and Criminal Procedures, The U.S Legal System and the Mexican Oral Trials Course, St. Mary’s University, August 2016.
• Panel: The Fisher Decision, 7th Annual Texas Higher Education Symposium, Austin, Texas August, 2016.
• United States Legal Systems, Presentation to law students at Universidad Enrique Diaz de Leon, Guadalajara, Jalisco Mexico, March, 2016. (In Spanish)
• School Finance Update to San Antonio Inns of Court, February 2015.
• Phoenix Law School, Phoenix Arizona, presentation to faculty on Wal-Mart case and class actions, Nov. 2011.
• Phoenix Law School, Phoenix Arizona, presentation to students on effects of litigation on societal change, Nov. 2011.
• Texas Tech Law School, presentation to faculty on Wal-Mart case and class actions, Oct. 2011.
• “A Comparison of Fifth Circuit and Texas Class Action Cases—Worse and Worser: No Class Left in Texas” New Scholars Workshop, August 2, 2010, Southeast Association of Law Schools, Palm Beach Florida.
• Hispanic National Bar Association annual convention, Minneapolis, Minnesota, September 8, 2010, Latino Education issues.