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Economic Liberty
“The Institute for Justice has launched the country’s first Clinic on Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago. Its purpose is to serve the needs of aspiring and new entrepreneurs in Chicago’s inner-city. With the assistance of students of the University’s Law School, IJ will help individuals establish their own small businesses. The Clinic provides legal counsel, helps with tax filings, securing licenses and permits, and financing. IJ’s President Chip Mellor says, ‘the Clinic will dramatically increase appreciation for inner-city entrepreneurship and assist us in challenging regulatory barriers that thwart such entrepreneurship.’ ”
—Issues & Views
Some people say that the only way the inner city
will grow economically is through handouts, government contracts,
or large outside investments. At the Institute for Justice Clinic
on Entrepreneurship, we say there is another way:
Entrepreneurship.
Through entrepreneurship, more and more residents of the inner
city are lifting themselves from poverty and dependence by staking
their claim in the American Dream: they are going into business
for themselves. They have discovered that they have skills,
products, and services to offer, and markets that only they know
how to satisfy. And their talent and hard work is paying off
in independence and pride.
But entrepreneurship can also be daunting. It can be difficult
to find emotional support, training, financing, good employees,
loyal customers, and protection from crime and liability. The
law is supposed to help, but often it serves as more of an obstacle
than a solution. A businessperson needs to know a mind-boggling
web of laws, rules, and regulations to survive. He or she also
needs to know how to circumvent bureaucratic inefficiency and
to avoid bureaucratic tyranny.
The journey is easier with the help of experienced and enthusiastic
legal counsel. Though legal guidance has always been available
to those who either have the means to afford it or who seek legal
redress in the courtroom, counsel for low- to moderate-income
entrepreneurs has been a rare commodity.
The Institute for Justice Clinic on Entrepreneurship exists to
help fill that void by becoming the nation's first law firm that
actively seeks to stimulate the private sector in an American
inner city by providing transactional assistance to entrepreneurs.
To reach that goal, we try to be more than lawyers. We want
our clients to understand the bigger picture of their businesses;
to have access to non-legal resources traditionally available
only to those at higher income levels or in more prosperous communities;
and to revel in the exercise of their right to earn an honest
living. Together with our clients, brick by brick, we can make
our communities better places to live, better places to work,
and better places to be free.
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