Alison Siegler, Lillian E. Kraemer Clinical Professor in Public Interest Law and director of the Federal Criminal Justice Clinic, received the American Constitution Society Chicago Lawyer Chapter’s 2026 Abner J. Mikva Award at its Legal Legends Luncheon on August 11.

The award recognizes Chicago-area lawyers and judges who have made extraordinary contributions to progressive legal causes. The award is named for the late Abner J. Mikva, ’51, a Law School alumnus and former faculty member who served as a U.S. congressman, federal appellate judge, and White House counsel. 

Professor Geoffrey R. Stone, ’71, nominated Siegler for the honor, citing her 26-year career representing low-income and marginalized clients in federal court, her work exposing and addressing racial disparities in the criminal justice system, and her commitment to inspiring future lawyers to pursue public service.

Stone also highlighted Siegler’s contributions to criminal justice reform since she received ACS Chicago’s Ruth Goldman Award in 2014. He noted a particularly fitting Law School connection: Siegler’s office at the Law School once belonged to Mikva when he was senior director of the Mandel Legal Aid Clinic.

Karl Leonard, ’09, staff attorney with the Exoneration Project, lecturer in law, and a former student of Siegler's, was among those at the ACS Legal Legends Luncheon celebrating her recognition.

“[Siegler’s] instruction, guidance, and mentorship have helped shape my career in many ways,” he said. “Teaching alongside her in the Clinics is an honor and an opportunity to continue to learn from Professor Siegler.”

Leonard said he found his former teacher’s acceptance speech “moving, vulnerable, and inspirational.”

Siegler is the founding director of the Federal Criminal Justice Clinic, the nation’s first legal clinic devoted to representing low-income clients charged with federal felonies. The clinic also pursues impact litigation and systemic reform to address inequities in the federal criminal system. 

Siegler was the first woman on the Law School faculty to run her own clinic and is a national expert on federal pretrial detention. In addition to testifying before Congress about the bail statute, she and her students have gathered data, released a groundbreaking report, and trained thousands of judges, federal public defenders, and pretrial officers. This fall, Siegler and a clinic alum are publishing an article in the Wisconsin Law Review—Pretrial Detention Without Counsel—that for the first time identifies and empirically documents the problem of federal courts jailing criminal defendants without first giving them a lawyer. Their article details the clinic’s successful “transformative advocacy” interventions to remedy this deprivation-of-counsel crisis and align federal court practices with the rule of law.

Siegler was honored alongside fellow Mikva Award recipients retired U.S. District Judge Rubén Castillo; Cara Hendrickson, executive deputy attorney general in the Illinois Attorney General’s Office; and Illinois Supreme Court Chief Justice P. Scott Neville Jr. The awards were presented at the Union League Club of Chicago.