The overall purpose of the Gavel Awards is to recognize annually eligible entries from communications media that have been exemplary in helping to foster the American public's understanding of the law and the legal system.

2006 Silver Gavel Award Winners
2006 Silver Gavel Honorable Mentions

Entry information

• 2007 Entry Form and Guidelines (or download the entry form as a .pdf)
• Award Winners
• Archives

The Gavel Awards seek to recognize entries reaching the public across a wide range of communities and audiences. The "public" includes, but is not limited to, people in their various roles as consumers, as students of all ages (including young people and adults), and as citizens of a law-based democratic society. To address this purpose the Gavel Awards also seeks to recognize publications and programs that meet one or more of these objectives:

• educate the public about the American constitutional/legal system and the fundamental principles and values upon which it is based (this may include both domestic and international issues or comparative perspectives);
  
• educate the public about the operations of legal institutions (e.g., the courts, legislatures, regulatory agencies, prisons, and law enforcement agencies) and the role lawyers and other legal professionals play in the justice system; and
  
• encourage public support for improvements in the American justice system by informing the public about current practices, policies and issues.
  

The permanent Gavel Award Winner Archives is maintained for the ABA by the Jamail Center for Legal Research, Tarlton Law Library, University of Texas School of Law. The Tarlton Law Library also maintains a keyword searchable online archive of Gavel Award winners dating back to 1987.

For additional information about the Gavel Awards, please contact:
American Bar Association
Division for Public Education
321 N. Clark St., 20.2
Chicago, IL 60610
312/988-5738 (phone)
312/988-5494 (fax attn: Gavel Awards)
howardkaplan@staff.abanet.org