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The Indiana Lawyer honored Kenneth J. Falk and James Bopp Jr. with its annual Leadership in Law Lifetime Achievement award, recognizing their years of community service as well as their extensive contributions to Indiana’s legal community.
Falk and Bopp spoke in a fireside chat moderated by The Indiana Lawyer Assistant Publisher and Editor Lesley Weidenbener at a Tuesday morning breakfast celebration at the Indiana Roof Ballroom. In addition to discussing their career highlights, the men discussed the importance of civility both in and out of the courtroom.
Although they often represent different sides of the ideological spectrum, both Falk and Bopp stressed their respect for each other’s work and upholding the rule of law.
While the ACLU’s efforts are often perceived as supporting liberal causes, Falk noted he’s represented a wide range of organizations, from the NAACP to the Ku Klux Klan.
“The point about the ACLU’s litigation, historically, has been to stand up for the Bill of Rights, because a fundamental belief — and, I think, a truism — is that if we don’t stand up for the rights of everyone, even people we don’t necessarily personally agree with, all of our rights are diminished,” Falk said.
And Bopp said he counts among his inspirations the former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, who as a civil rights attorney led the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund and successfully argued to overturn Plessy v. Ferguson, which held that segregation in public education was unconstitutional. Seeing the organization involved in such issues lit a fire in him to do the same for conservative causes, he said.
“The NAACP and what they did in planning, executing the overturning of Plessy v. Ferguson in Brown v. Board of Education … was a completely legitimate effort, in my opinion,” he said. “They were assisting the courts with amicus briefs and all that but also designing cases that obviously the court was prepared to hear and consider, and that needed to happen on the right.”
Both expressed concern about the erosion of trust in the justice system.
Falk said among the most alarming contributors to the breakdown is a rejection of the traditional roles dictated to the branches of government by the U.S. Constitution and a growing tendency to question the authority of the courts based on one’s ideological beliefs.
“Democracy is wonderful, and we accept in a democratic system that your viewpoint, whatever it is, may lose, and that’s fine,” Falk said. “But what we’re seeing today I think is a perversion, because people are not staying in their lanes, and that is extremely troubling from the standpoint of someone whose goal is to defend people’s rights.”
Bopp said he sees defiant rhetoric coming from both sides of the political spectrum and stressed that no matter our individual differences, a common ground is needed for a civil society to survive.
“One of the rules for lawyers is civility, which I think is extremely important,” he said. “And there’s concern about the undermining of that, which again, would serve ultimately to undermine our common ground, which would be disastrous.”
The Indiana Lawyer honored 34 men and women in its 2026 Leadership in Law class, including 16 Distinguished Barristers, 10 Up and Coming Lawyers and six Legal Support Stars.
Read profiles of Falk, Bopp and each of our 2026 honorees at indianalawyer.com/leadership-in-law-2026 and see our print special section inserted into the May 29 edition of IBJ, mailed to subscribers on Friday.
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