Sylvia Clute, Esquire

Sylvia Clute[1]
Lawyer, Bank Founder, Author, Recent Graduate Student, Political Candidate,
Legal Architect-Inventor, Wife and Mother

Presented by Judith J. Bentley


A BIOGRAPHICAL CHRONOLOGY

Sylvia Lanabeth Clute was one of four children born to Francis Hector Clute, an inventor (1905-1968), and Elva Lois Long (1908-1985) in Rocky Ford, Colorado. Her life’s work and focus is a testament to the fact that she did indeed inherit her father’s mind, for she has become both an inventor and a pioneering architect in the field of law. She has been bent on replacing existing laws with better ones, using her ingenuity and knowledge of law to reform the legal system in Virginia.

Of necessity the “inventor” personality is iconoclastic and tends to be seen as such so she “can get into a bit of trouble with the elders, who usually are not all that pleased to see their tried-and-true tools, operations, and enterprises blithely set aside for her better mousetrap.”[2] Of course, the “architect” is not merely a designer of buildings. “There is the architect of ideas (the philosopher), the architect of number systems (the mathematician), the architect of computer languages (the programmer), and on and on. In short, abstract design is the forté of the architect and coherence is the primary issue.”[3] Sylvia has become an architect in law.

The ’60s.

It is not surprising that Sylvia had actually wanted to be an architect but her high school counselor told her she couldn’t because she was a woman. Her mother steered her toward teaching or nursing, both traditional women’s careers. Then in her sophomore year in college, her mother astonished Sylvia by urging her to travel alone to study in Paris when a unified Europe was a distant dream. From 1962 to 1963 she studied at the Institute of European Studies in Paris, France. That was a formative experience for Sylvia as she watched President Charles de Gaulle urging his country to be economically entwined with the rest of Europe and with Germany. His example of leadership and vision of unity influenced her life.

She graduated from the University of Colorado in 1965 with a B.A. in Political Science, served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Nepal,[4] teaching English as a foreign language (1965-1967), married fellow Peace Corps volunteer Eric Johnson in 1967,[5] and got her first Master’s Degree in Public Administration in 1968 from the University of California at Berkeley.

The ’70s.

In 1970 she entered law school with a 2-month-old child. When she was pregnant with her second child, she obtained her Juris Doctor degree from Boston University School of Law in 1973 and moved to Richmond. Although she had passed the bar, she was unable even to get an interview in a Richmond law firm since there were still quotas on the number of women and minorities admitted to law school and it was difficult for a female law school graduate to find employment in an established law firm in the South. She became the first female attorney and the first pregnant attorney to be hired by Reynolds Metals. In 1975, when her third child was 5 months old, she left Reynolds and opened her own private law practice as a trial attorney. This was during a time when child care was not available.

She began organizing what became The Women’s Bank, the South's only Women's Bank specializing in services for business and professional women. The Bank opened in 1976, with Sylvia as co-founder and Chairman of the Board (1976-1985). A decade later it sold for a profit and merged with other banks. In its Annual Report of 2003, the Virginia Historical Society noted that “through the courtesy of Sylvia Clute” the board of directors of The Women’s Bank donated to the Society their records from 1976 to 2002 to the Virginia Historical Society.

She was a member of the Goochland County Planning Commission from 1976 to 1979 and was a Hearing Officer for Virginia Department of Health Professions from 1976 to 1993.

The ’80s.

I first met Sylvia Clute in the early 1980’s when I had decided to leave the teaching profession and a vocational counselor/psychologist had recommended I consider a career in law. Sylvia was the only female attorney in Richmond at that time that was being written about in the local paper. I was interested in meeting her especially because she had been a Peace Corps Volunteer in Nepal and I had been an Appalachian Volunteer in the hills of Eastern Kentucky during my undergraduate years at the University of Kentucky. I got up my courage to call her, and she immediately invited me to attend the Women’s Bar meetings as her guest where I met other women attorneys who were former school teachers. When she learned that I was interested in attending law school, Sylvia invited me to read law under her supervision instead. Virginia is one of the few states in the United States that allow students to earn a law degree by apprenticeship and thereby become licensed to practice law. I gratefully accepted, being by then a single parent without sufficient funds to pay the law school tuition fees, and from 1981 to 1983 Sylvia supervised me as a Virginia law reader, requiring that I read the same law books that law students enrolled at T. C. Williams were reading. Under Sylvia’s supervision and tutelage, I studied civil and criminal law and procedure, constitutional law, partnerships and corporations, and real property law.[6]

Sylvia was practicing “family law” (a legal euphemism for law that deals with the dissolution and destruction of the family) but was also involved in legislative reform affecting marital property rights of women. In addition, she often served as an administrative law judge.[7] In her law office, I assisted Sylvia in drafting pleadings, summarizing depositions and conducting legal research. I worked part-time in another law firm to support myself because the Virginia Bar did not allow any law reader to earn income from a supervising attorney. I also accompanied Sylvia to court, to her administrative law hearings where she served as an administrative law judge, and to the early morning sessions of The Women’s Roundtable, a group of women legislators and lobbyists who met each Wednesday morning at 7 a.m. during the General Assembly sessions to comb through bills affecting women and children and lobby for those they supported. It was no surprise to me to learn that Sylvia had founded and organized this group of women in her own living room with the help of two other women. The Women’s Roundtable still meets regularly each year during the General Assembly sessions to review legislative issues affecting women and children.

As part of my law study curriculum, I sometimes accompanied Sylvia to the Virginia General Assembly where she bravely lobbyied the Senators and Delegates on behalf of women and children. During those years, women were not particularly welcome in the Assembly’s hallowed halls and were sometimes even mocked. Sylvia was the primary Promethean force behind women organizing across the Commonwealth to change unfair laws affecting women, such as the marital property distribution law. That law as finally enacted required judges from henceforth to consider the non-monetary as well as the monetary contributions of each spouse so that women homemakers rearing children while their husbands were out in the work world could not be left completely destitute and abandoned to poverty upon the dissolution of marriage as was the case prior to the enactment of this new law. She also worked to have property settlement agreements incorporated into a divorce decree. Prior to this revision, parties to a divorce, with attorneys present, would argue hours into the night about who got grandma’s cactus plants. I witnessed one such ordeal which lasted until midnight while Sylvia had three school-aged children waiting for her to come home.

About her experience practicing law in Virginia, Sylvia has written:

“When I began my private practice of law in Richmond in 1975, Virginia's laws still included many common law principles based on men's role being dominant and women's place being decidedly limited. I immediately set out to work with others in modernizing these laws. I have spoken many times before legislative committees, hundreds of organizations, etc. and traveled the state to solicit grass-roots support for such reform. I learned that it is possible to change the system from the bottom up, despite entrenched interests that oppose you. Through the efforts of many, Virginia's laws regarding the rights of women and children are now updated and in some instances more progressive than her sister states. I know, through the same process, our laws can become more holistic, in harmony with Natural Law.”

In 1982 YWCA of Richmond chose Sylvia as one of Virginia’s Outstanding Women.[8]

From 1982 to 1994, Sylvia served as Commissioner of the Virginia Public School Authority where she served as Chairman Pro Tem in 1990 and Vice Chairman 1990-1994.
From 1986 to 1987 Sylvia Clute served as the President of the Virginia Women Attorneys Association[9]. By this time, Sylvia had established her own law firm, Clute and Shilling, in Old City Hall composed of all women attorneys. In the Fall of 1986 under Sylvia’s leadership, and with the co-sponsorship of the League of Women Voters of Virginia, the VWAA launched its First Women’s Roundtable Legislative Conference[10] attended by representatives of over 100 organizations and featuring panel discussions and workshops on teen pregnancy, the legislative process, day care, child abuse, marriage and divorce issues, inheritance, budget issues and political strategy. The organization also created the Virginia Women Attorneys Association Foundation, a Section 501 (c) (3) charitable organization committed to educating the general public about the legal status of women and authorized to accept tax deductible donations was approved. On December 23, 1986, with the issuance of a charter by the State Corporation Commission, the Foundation became a reality.
In 1987 President Sylvia Clute called for the creation of local VWAA chapters and set up the mechanism for two pilot chapters. In addition, VWAA held its first CLE. co-sponsored with EX-POSE (Ex-Partners of Servicemen (women) for Equality), titled "Military Divorce Seminar" presented in Norfolk and in Arlington.. In the Spring of 1987 VWAA members participated in a Bicentennial Admission to the United States Supreme Court Ceremony held in Washington, D.C. and sponsored by the National Conference of Women’s Bar Associations. At the Virginia State Bar’s Annual Meeting in June 1987, the VWAA was honored by the Conference of Local Bar Associations and presented with an Award of Merit for service to the community for its sponsorship of the First Women’s Roundtable Legislative Conference. Another highlight of the State Bar’s Annual Meeting was the debut of the Virginia Commission on Women and Minorities in the Legal System which had been organized in 1986 by its member organizations: the VWAA, the Virginia State Bar, the Virginia Bar Association, the Old Dominion Bar Association, and the Virginia Conference of Local Bar Associations.

Although I was not working directly with Sylvia after 1988 when I pursued an opportunity in another law firm, I learned that she had begun representing sexually abused children. She successfully lobbied for reform of the child sexual abuse laws to extend the statute of limitations so that an adult who was sexually abused as a child could file a lawsuit for damages against his or her perpetrator.

In 1988, Sylvia tried one of Virginia’s first civil incest cases and advocated for the extension of the statute of limitations for survivors of child sexual abuse. She assisted Senator Joseph Gartlan, a Democrat from Fairfax, in drafting legislation to extend the statute of limitations for survivors of sexual abuse. Gartan’s bill passed and was signed into law in 1988. That same year, Sylvia wrote an editorial for The Lawyer’s Weekly that stressed the need to extend the statute of limitations for survivors of childhood sexual abuse. Until that time Virginia had allowed abused or injured children only until their 20th birthday to file a civil lawsuit against their abuser after which they were forever barred.

The ’90s.

In 1991 Sylvia was named among Richmond's Best and Brightest Attorneys by Style Magazine.

In 1991, Sylvia filed a civil lawsuit in Hampton Circuit Court in a child sexual abuse case, but the Circuit Judge dismissed it three months later. She appealed the lawsuit to the Virginia Supreme Court, which affirmed the Judge’s ruling in June of 1992. The Court maintained that the molester’s civil rights would be violated by the lawsuit because Gartlan’s legislation had not been in effect at the time of the abuse. After the rebuff on the civil side, Sylvia’s client and other women abused by the same man charged him criminally. The 64-year-old pleaded guilty in 1993 to six felony charges and was sentenced to 39 years in prison.

In 1993 in the Journal of Child Sexual Abuse, a journal for the research, treatment and program innovations for victims, survivors and offenders, Sylvia published an article on “Adult Survivor Litigation as an Integral Part of the Therapeutic Process.”[11]

When the new law that Sylvia had helped Senator Gartlan draft was ruled unconstitutional by the Virginia Supreme Court, Sylvia was undeterred and urged the Senator in 1993 to sponsor a measure to amend the Virginia Constitution which he did. The narrowly drawn amendment would apply only to individuals and would not allow lawsuits against churches, clubs or other organizations. It passed with 11 dissenting votes and passed again in 1994, qualifying it for a referendum. The proposed Constitutional amendment allowed the Virginia legislature to retroactively extend the statute of limitations when an individual intentionally injures a child. It was endorsed by various groups including the Medical Society of Virginia and the Virginia Trial Lawyers Association as well as by numerous newspapers.[12]

Sylvia Enters Politics

Sylvia ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination for the United States Senate in the 1994 primary. Then Senator Charles Robb won the nomination. She mobilized grassroots social-justice activists for her ambitious reform platform, which called for a moratorium on the death penalty in Virginia, as well as implementing treatment alternatives to imprisonment for nonviolent drug offenders.

“I got into this race mainly to address what I consider injustices that are taking place in the criminal-justice system because the politicians are using marketing tools…rhetoric, sound bites that have translated into being progressively more punitive and building more prisons. And as a result, the bias against the poor people and minorities who don’t have the money to wind their way through that system is being magnified.”

In 1995 she was selected as a Fellow of the prestigious Virginia Law Foundation, established by the Virginia State Bar and the Virginia Bar Association, which is to date composed of 330 members, only 25 of whom are women. This distinction is limited to no more than 1% of the membership of the Virginia State Bar, in recognition of service to the community.[13]

In 1996 Sylvia wrote a “friend of the court” brief (Amicus Curiae) on behalf of the Virginia Women Attorneys Association, et al. in the case against Virginia Military Institute for excluding women from admission to its military school. In United States v. Commonwealth, 116 S.Ct. 2264 (1996),[14] the U.S. Supreme Court reversed the judgment of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, holding that the supposed military style program set up at Mary Baldwin College “was not an adequate remedy for the equal protection violation. Justice Ginsburg, writing for the Court, found “no ‘persuasive evidence’ in the record that VMI’s male-only admission policy furthered a state policy of diversity” and that Virginia had shown “no ‘exceedingly persuasive justification’ for withholding from women qualified for the experience premier training of a kind VMI affords.” The Court remanded the case for further proceedings consistent with its opinion and the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit vacated the district court’s judgment and remanded the case “to require Virginia to formulate, adopt, and implement a plan that conforms with the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment as applied in this case by the Supreme Court.”

For several years, Sylvia had been a student of A Course in Miracles. She began participating in retreats using Vipassana meditation,[15] an ancient Indian self-observation technique that has been preserved for over 2,500 years to reduce conflict and enhance teamwork, increase efficiency, patience and self-dependency and progressively eliminate such negativities as anger, jealousy and depression. She has described how Vipassana has helped her combat stress:

“I am not attached to the actions of others, so I don’t create conflict by responding negatively.”

Vipassana is taught in residential courses from a 10-day regimen to 45-day and 60-day courses for advanced students. Completing a course demands discipline, will power and following such rules as not communicating with fellow students and the outside world for the duration of the course. The rule of silence is to clam and quiet the chattering mind and turn attention inward. No fee is charged for Vipassana courses, not even for board and lodging. Expenses are met solely through voluntary donations and services of previous students. Meals are vegetarian. Besides an annual retreat, Vipassana students are required to practice at home twice daily for an hour each. One student commented that Vipassana is an art of living through continuous self-improvement. It helps the student in adverse conditions, in being tolerant of others and taking positive action as opposed to blind reaction.

In 1997, Sylvia published her first novel, Destiny. “As the novel begins, Christi Daniel, an attorney in the civil litigation department of a large Washington, DC law firm well known for defending claims brought against their insurance clients, faces the prospect of defending two disturbing clients – one, a plastic surgeon charged with medical malpractice and fraud in a reconstructive post-mastectomy case and the other, a child molester – in addition to warding off the unwanted advances of one of the married senior partners in the firm as she leaves for home one night. Increasingly distraught over the dysfunctional legal and governmental systems, she begins a search to find a better way. Through her journey she learns that America was founded upon secret spiritual truths rooted in ancient Egyptian and Kabalistic traditions. From there she learns about new ways of seeing reality and about the seven spiritual principles for government.”

“Destiny is a novel based on America’s secret spiritual past—and future – and Christi’s struggles reflect everyone’s quest for peace and harmony in a complex and demanding world. In her novel, Sylvia sets out seven spiritual principles for governing a people.”
Fear shall never be used to manipulate the people
Justice shall be delivered without judgment
The equality of every citizen shall be honored
The power of the people shall be inviolate
Change only comes from within
Love is the only source of power
E Pluribus Unum - the many are one
The 2000s.

In 2001, despite no campaign funds and only volunteers on her staff, she sought but lost the Democratic nomination for Virginia’s attorney general. She ran on an ambitious drug court reform platform, which called for treatment alternatives for non-violent drug offenders. The one Republic candidate and all 3 Democratic candidates had announced that they were “get tough on crime” candidates. Sylvia’s was a different voice in the campaign and she explained why “get tough on crime” was bad public policy.

Democrats debate Va. Leadership
Attorney General candidates discuss issues for November's election
Justin Bernick, Cavalier Daily Associate Editor
Sylvia Clute, Sen. John Edwards and Del. Donald McEachin (left to right) agreed on most issues in last night's debate.
As part of the Democratic Primary Debate Series, three of the four candidates for the Democratic attorney general nomination met last night in the Chemistry Auditorium in a debate sponsored by University Democrats.
Consensus on many key issues characterized the debate. Candidates Del. Donald McEachin of Henrico County, Sen. John Edwards of Roanoke, and Sylvia Clute of Richmond participated in the debates. Del. Whitt Clement, who is also a candidate, did not attend. The four candidates are competing for a position on the ticket that will include Democratic gubernatorial candidate Mark Warner.
The candidates debated a broad spectrum of issues including gun control, abortion, the death penalty, the war on drugs and genetic privacy.
Clute commented on the growing problem of the Commonwealth's response to crime.
"I am concerned about our response [to crime] that is increasingly punitive."
Clute stressed the need to increase the scope of "drug courts" given low costs and effectiveness at deterrence. The debate moderators, led by Alexander Theodoridis, chief of staff of the Center for Governmental Studies, questioned candidates regarding the role of current Republican Attorney General Mark Earley in the car tax reduction and the ensuing budget freeze at institutions of higher education in Virginia.
"The attorney general is the person who can set standards of accountability," Clute said. She said the office of attorney general should be more responsible to the people.
2002. In November, Jonathan B. Wight, Professor of Economics at the Robins School of Business, University of Richmond, lectured at Unity of Richmond Book Club on “Adam Smith and Moral Transformation.” Sylvia was the moderator and host.
2003. In 2003, Sylvia entered Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government to begin work on her second Master’s Degree in Public Administration. There she studied the European Union whose birth she had watched de Gaulle predict more than four decades earlier. In October of 2003 the Harvard Crimson News reported on Doris Haddock, better known as “Granny D,” a 93-year-old woman who walked across the country from 1999 to 2000 to advocate campaign finance reform. Harvard was her first stop on her second journey in the name of a political cause—a 14-month tour through cities and towns across the United States to encourage greater voter participation. Sylvia was quoted in that article, ‘Granny D’ Rocks Vote at Harvard, as saying that Haddock an inspiration. “I look at her and I realize I have at least 30 years to make use” of.[16]
2004. In the Fall of 2004 in Letters to the Editor of The Citizen, the Kennedy School’s newsletter, the Senior Associate Dean wrote:
“Dear Editors:On behalf of the Degree Programs Administration, I would like to thank all who worked to make the recent KSSG elections successful, especially Stephanie Cohn and Sylvia Clute. Notwithstanding various critiques of the election process offered in these pages, the elections required a great deal of work and planning and, in my view, produced a good result. Stephanie, Sylvia and the other members of the Election Committee have performed a valuable public service to the Kennedy School.Sincerely,Senior Assc. Dean Joe McCarthy”[17]
2005. Sylvia completed her second Master’s Degree in Public Administration from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

From a press release, Family Members and Friends of People Incarcerated March on Washington, DC: August 13th, 9:00 AM - 2:00 PM, Lafayette Park:[18]


Family members and friends of people incarcerated from all over the country will travel to Washington, DC and join together on Saturday, August 13th, from 9:00 AM until 2:00 PM at Lafayette Park (north side of the White House) to be heard regarding the need to focus on responsible justice that is no longer merely ‘tough on crime’ but also ‘smart on crime’ at the same time.
(PRWEB) August 8, 2005 -- Family members and friends of people incarcerated from all over the country will travel to Washington, DC and join together on Saturday, August 13th, from 9:00 AM until 2:00 PM at Lafayette Park (north side of the White House) to be heard regarding the need to focus on responsible justice that is no longer merely ‘tough on crime’ but also ‘smart on crime’ at the same time.The United States imprisons its citizens at rates three to ten times higher than other democratic societies and holds 25% of the world's prison population. Racially discriminatory mandatory sentencing drug laws and 'get tough' policies have made prisons crowded, dangerous and places where international human rights laws are broken every day. US prisons are guilty of torture of men, women and children housed there and do not contribute to a safer society. The impact of continued bias in employment of former prisoners, lack of voting rights and affordable housing adds stress to poorer US communities and families.“The March on August 13th is intended to send a message to US leaders that violation of international law, the continued use of the poor and bodies of color as a business commodity and the current arrest, sentencing and prison procedures are no longer acceptable. Leaders of the March note that the US must stop relying on incarceration as a first resort, provide young people with an equitable education and provide our communities with the means to equal opportunity. Abuse flourishes in US prisons, and the punishment industry is dependent on bodies of color and the poor, similar to the dynamics of slavery.” – Roberta Franklin, Director, Family Members and Friends of People Incarcerated (FMI).“When you truly consider the most recent data that indicates close to 85% of those in prison are incarcerated for nonviolent offenses and over 60% are first-time, nonviolent offenders, it compels you to look for methods of responsible justice that are no longer just ‘tough on crime’ but also ‘smart on crime’ at the same time.” – Judy Freyermuth, Executive Director, Federal Prison Policy Project.“Our prison system has become like a cancer patient being treated by removing one part after another until the whole is no longer able to survive.” – Sylvia Clute, Author of Destiny“We can hate the crime without hating the individual and seeking merely vengeful justice. Instead, we should pursue constructive rehabilitative justice that will benefit everyone in the long term, especially those families impacted.” – Paticia A. Dilts, Treasurer, AdvoCare, Inc.“We must protect the moral fiber of this country. However, simply handing out harsher prison sentences is proving to be more damaging to families and our communities than we ever imagined. Therefore, it is essential that a ‘Smart on Crime’ policy be the center of discussion across the country.” – Keith Wm. DeBlasio, Director, AdvoCare, Inc.Website: http://www.journeyforjustice.org/Family Members and Friends of People Incarcerated (FMI)Roberta Franklin, Director2243 Ajax StreetMontgomery, Alabama 36108Phone: 334-220-4670; 334-834-9592 or 334-868-0312

2006.

When Sylvia learned that Sue Williamson, Director of the Master in Public Administration (MPA) program at the Kennedy School, was battling cancer, she wrote her on February 9, 2006.
“Sue;It's hard to imagine going from healthy and vigorous to the diagnosis you received. I know it was huge to incorporate it into your reality because, as you see, it is hard for those of us who grew so fond of you and welcomed your joyful nature into our lives to take it in. My prayers are with you. You indicated that you enjoyed my novel, Destiny. I have spent the time since my graduation in June until now revising it to bring it into the post 9-11 era. I believe it is far better than the first. I hope to have it published by April or May. In the meantime, if you have time to read and would be interested while you undergo treatment, I will send you a copy of the manuscript. If you don't feel up to that, I will wait and send you a copy when it is in print. Please keep a strong outlook, and we will do the same. That seems to be an important factor in the outcome. Be well!”[19]


A Brief Sketch of Sylvia’s Trial Career



Sylvia practiced law for 28 years during which time she was a pioneer in Virginia’s legal reform on behalf of women and children. She was appointed to legislative study committees for issues such as domestic violence. She fought for passage of the Equal Rights Amendment and for expanded divorce and sexual abuse laws.

For 11 years, Sylvia Clute served on the Board of Commissioners of the Virginia Public School Authority. She also served on the Goochland County Planning Commission.

In her career as a trial attorney, she found that clients often came to her with broken relationships, looking for solutions in a legal process in which justice means vengeance. While she did not handle many criminal trials, she became well aware of our criminal justice system’s feeding frenzy of vengeance, a system that incarcerates a greater proportion of this country’s citizens than any other nation on Earth. That this vengeance model permeates much of our world in foreign policy, politics, corporate culture and even our family life has been especially disconcerting to her.

Sylvia has written: “Ours is a fundamentally flawed system built on ‘an eye for an eye,’ with a carefully constructed system of beliefs that discredit the Golden Rule as ‘weak.’” Throughout her legal career, Sylvia was continually faced with the question, If not this system, then what? Just as in the 1980s she campaigned with another female attorney across the Commonwealth to change the laws relating to women and children, now in the 21st century, she has teamed up with Jana Usry, a mediator certified by the Virginia Supreme Court, for a speaking tour across the Commonwealth, mobilizing grass roots folks to change the laws relating to criminal justice. Sylvia is on a mission to reform the criminal justice system where justice often means vengeance. She joins others who are working for a restorative justice model which heals victims by having their losses acknowledged and allows offenders the opportunity to acknowledge the harm they have done and make reparations not only to the victim but to the community at large. Her passion today is healing and peace through public policies that further those objectives. Her motto is “We can do this!”

Citizens of the Commonwealth and advocates for positive criminal justice reform in Virginia drew up a petition and recommended Sylvia for the position of Chairperson on the Virginia Parole Board to then Governor-Elect Tim Kaine.[20]

Sylvia’s second novel, Destiny Unveiled, soon to be published, distinguishes between the worlds of love and fear and how they apply to law and public policy. She is currently writing a guide to help people discuss its subject, restorative justice, and she frequently speaks to churches and other community groups on restorative justice.

Sylvia is founder and CEO of Meta United, “where grass roots people meet to foster laws that benefit the people, strengthen democracy and advance human rights.”[21] On the Meta United website, she and others will be organizing around particular policy issues, using the Golden Rule model as the public policy foundation to be supported in each policy area.

Sylvia currently seeks opportunities to speak and teach regarding a Holistic Approach To Law And Government based on her in-depth (11 years) study of A Course In Miracles, delving into quantum physics, exploring the spiritual roots of our Nation. With her experience as a trial attorney for over 26 years and her formal education, she is able to approach this subject from several perspectives--speaking about the Seven Spiritual Principles for Governing a People that she set out in her legal novel, Destiny. She can explain how public policies can be adopted that are consistent with spiritual principles, about holistic law and government as it relates to the quantum field, or approach the subject from the aspect of history and the spiritual symbolism our Freemason Founding Fathers incorporated into the very form of our Nation. This can be as keynote, workshop leader, seminar, conference or other format up to two weeks in length. Organizations of diverse types, churches, educational institutions, conferences, etc. are all welcome forums.

Sylvia Clute speaks softly but carries a very big stick.
She lives with her family in Richmond, Virginia.

Research for this biographical sketch has been taken from numerous sources, including my own observations of Sylvia and conversations with her over the past 26 years as well as from news articles and the Internet. I can attest only to her words and my own observations and experiences and do not attest to the accuracy of any other sources.

[2] Please Understand Me: Character & Temperament Types, David Keirsey and Marilyn Bates, 1984, at p.72.
[3] Ibid, p. 71.
[4] http://peacecorpsonline.org/

[5] Sylvia’s husband is her opposite and is “humorously and preposterously different” from her. He is “the meaning-giver, the mystic, the oracle and perhaps the conservator of [her] soul, a sort of messiah, and a rescuer from the vultures from Hell.” From Please Understand Me, at p. 72.
[6] At the beginning of what would have been my third year of law study after having taken the bar review course in preparation for the bar exam in 1983, I met with Sylvia in her home and told her I had decided not to continue. My daughter had contracted Reyes Syndrome on the heels of an outbreak of chicken pox while a 3rd grade student at John B. Cary Model School and was subsequently diagnosed with a learning disability, requiring nightly tutoring and frequent meetings with her teachers to plan her IEPs (Individual Educational Plans). I completed my paralegal studies and began working full-time in law firms as a paralegal.

[7] Sylvia and I occasionally had discussions as to what area of law I wanted to pursue. I told her I wanted to be a child advocate because I was a survivor of child sexual abuse and I wanted to help other children and adults who had been sexually abused. Like all other good lawyers, Sylvia had been prepared in law school to “go for the jugular,” and advised me that if I didn’t like to see blood, I shouldn’t think of practicing law. She further counseled that since children didn’t have any rights, I wouldn’t have any cases or make any money. This was a major but necessary blow for which I am today extremely grateful though it was very painful to hear at the time.
[8] Http://www.ywcarichmond.org/honorees.html


[9] Sylvia asked me if I would serve as the executive director of the Association. When I told her I did not know how to be an executive director, she said “Well, I don’t know how to be president; we’ll learn together.” And we did.

[10] http://www.vwaa.org/history.htm

[11] Sylvia Clute, “Adult Survivor Litigation as an Integral Part of the Therapeutic Process,” Journal of Child Sexual Abuse: Volume 2: Issue 1, 1993.

[12]“Sex-Abuse Victim’s Fight for Reform,” The Virginian-Pilot, November 7, 1994.
[13] http://www.virginialawfoundation.org/fellows.htm

[14] http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/

[15] “Vipassana Changes the Spirit of Business,” Asia Times, July 30, 2003.
[16] http://www.thecrimson.com//
[17] http://www.ksgcitizen.org/media/storage

[18] http://www.prweb.com/releases/2005

[19] Sue Williamson died May 27 at her home in Watertown after battling cancer for several months. During her nearly twenty years at the School, she was legendary for her enthusiasm, optimism, and personal commitment to students. She was sixty years old.

[20] http://www.petitiononline.com/CluteVPB/petition.html

[21] http://www.metaunited.org/