By Allison Torres Burtka
Michigan Law
The Center for Reproductive Rights, which works to strengthen legal guarantees to reproductive health care and decision-making, has selected 3L Avery Coombe for one of just two two-year, post-graduate fellowships.
The fellowship will be a return to the Center for Reproductive Rights for Coombe, who worked as a paralegal in its litigation department before law school. “Coming back to the center is my dream job,” she said.
Coombe’s experience at the center set her on the path to law school. She was working there in 2022, when the Supreme Court decided Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, overturning Roe v. Wade.
“The decision came down on a Friday. It was very, very sad, even though it was expected. And over the weekend, my colleagues just immediately turned around and kept working. I came back to work on Monday, and a group of attorneys were already ready to file a case in Louisiana challenging the state’s trigger bans,” Coombe said, referring to laws designed to go into effect to ban abortion if Roe were overturned. “I was really impressed by people’s grit and determination and the creative legal strategies they used to try and bring these cases.”
Coombe said she appreciated the opportunity to contribute to these efforts and to have an impact on people’s lives, even though the battle was often uphill. “It was a very long summer of fighting against trigger bans and old abortion bans that were springing back into effect. Part of it was knowing that we weren’t going to win all of those cases, but that it was still important to try and fight and keep abortion legal for a few weeks longer,” she said.
As she heads into her fellowship, Coombe said that she is interested to see how reproductive rights litigation has pivoted in the years since Dobbs. “There’s been a lot of exciting work going on in state courts using new state constitutional amendments to protect reproductive rights.”
In the long term, Coombe sees herself in litigation for reproductive rights or gender justice more broadly. “This fellowship seems like the perfect starting point to get a good amount of experience in litigation and to better understand the players in the field and how different impact lawyers in different issue areas all work together,” she said.
At Michigan Law, Coombe was a student-attorney in the Civil Rights Litigation Initiative for two semesters. There, she worked closely with clients for the first time “and got to understand how important it was for them to be taken seriously, to have someone advocating for their rights, and to have their moment in court,” she said.
Working with other clinical students gave Coombe a sense of community with people interested in other issue areas under the civil rights umbrella, she added.
“It’s been really encouraging to connect with the public interest community through the clinic.”
In addition, she cited logistical help and moral support from Emily Bretz, ’11, the Law School’s public interest director within the Office of Career Planning.
Bretz “helped me hone my voice and why I want to do this work,” Coombe said.
Coombe joins the Center for Reproductive Rights at a time when, she says, “reproductive rights are under attack.” She added that she sees these rights as tied together with women’s equality and LGBTQ rights.
“There’s this broader movement attacking civil rights in a lot of different ways, and it all comes down to treating some groups of people like they’re less human, less deserving of respect, or less capable of making autonomous decisions for themselves,” Coombe said. “And I think it’s really important to fight back and make sure that everyone has this basic level of respect and ability to make important decisions for themselves.”
Michigan Law
The Center for Reproductive Rights, which works to strengthen legal guarantees to reproductive health care and decision-making, has selected 3L Avery Coombe for one of just two two-year, post-graduate fellowships.
The fellowship will be a return to the Center for Reproductive Rights for Coombe, who worked as a paralegal in its litigation department before law school. “Coming back to the center is my dream job,” she said.
Coombe’s experience at the center set her on the path to law school. She was working there in 2022, when the Supreme Court decided Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, overturning Roe v. Wade.
“The decision came down on a Friday. It was very, very sad, even though it was expected. And over the weekend, my colleagues just immediately turned around and kept working. I came back to work on Monday, and a group of attorneys were already ready to file a case in Louisiana challenging the state’s trigger bans,” Coombe said, referring to laws designed to go into effect to ban abortion if Roe were overturned. “I was really impressed by people’s grit and determination and the creative legal strategies they used to try and bring these cases.”
Coombe said she appreciated the opportunity to contribute to these efforts and to have an impact on people’s lives, even though the battle was often uphill. “It was a very long summer of fighting against trigger bans and old abortion bans that were springing back into effect. Part of it was knowing that we weren’t going to win all of those cases, but that it was still important to try and fight and keep abortion legal for a few weeks longer,” she said.
As she heads into her fellowship, Coombe said that she is interested to see how reproductive rights litigation has pivoted in the years since Dobbs. “There’s been a lot of exciting work going on in state courts using new state constitutional amendments to protect reproductive rights.”
In the long term, Coombe sees herself in litigation for reproductive rights or gender justice more broadly. “This fellowship seems like the perfect starting point to get a good amount of experience in litigation and to better understand the players in the field and how different impact lawyers in different issue areas all work together,” she said.
At Michigan Law, Coombe was a student-attorney in the Civil Rights Litigation Initiative for two semesters. There, she worked closely with clients for the first time “and got to understand how important it was for them to be taken seriously, to have someone advocating for their rights, and to have their moment in court,” she said.
Working with other clinical students gave Coombe a sense of community with people interested in other issue areas under the civil rights umbrella, she added.
“It’s been really encouraging to connect with the public interest community through the clinic.”
In addition, she cited logistical help and moral support from Emily Bretz, ’11, the Law School’s public interest director within the Office of Career Planning.
Bretz “helped me hone my voice and why I want to do this work,” Coombe said.
Coombe joins the Center for Reproductive Rights at a time when, she says, “reproductive rights are under attack.” She added that she sees these rights as tied together with women’s equality and LGBTQ rights.
“There’s this broader movement attacking civil rights in a lot of different ways, and it all comes down to treating some groups of people like they’re less human, less deserving of respect, or less capable of making autonomous decisions for themselves,” Coombe said. “And I think it’s really important to fight back and make sure that everyone has this basic level of respect and ability to make important decisions for themselves.”
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