Paul Steven Miller

Paul Steven Miller (May 4, 1961 He was a Commissioner of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) for almost 10 years, and in 2009 he was chosen to serve as a special assistant to President Barack Obama. Miller, who had the genetic condition achondroplasia (a type of dwarfism) was tall. He was known as a leader in the disability rights movement,

Biography

Miller was born in Flushing, New York He went to Harvard Law School and received his J.D. in 1986.

When Miller graduated from Harvard Law, the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 had not yet been adopted and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act did not do enough; despite his academic credentials of graduating near the top of his class, Miller encountered considerable resistance in his efforts to find a job. Initially he had over 40 firms seeking his application, but later said that he received 45 rejection letters without a single callback. He repeatedly found that law firms would show interest in him, based on his resume, and then lose interest when they discovered his height. He said that one firm told him they were afraid clients would consider his employment a "circus freak show". A hiring committee told him, "We're not going to hire you because we think our clients would think we are running a freak circus if they saw you." Miller eventually became a litigation associate at the Los Angeles law firm then known as Manatt, Phelps, Phillips & Kantor. (Miller's stint at Manatt Phelps has been identified as an inspiration for the character "Hamilton Schuyler", a dwarf lawyer portrayed by actor David Rappaport in the television series L.A. Law.)

In 1990 Miller became director of litigation for the Western Law Center for Disability Rights at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles. After the election of Bill Clinton as president in 1992, Miller worked for the transition team as a disability outreach and search manager. He subsequently held posts as deputy director of the U.S. Office of Consumer Affairs and White House liaison to the disability community. At the EEOC, he worked to develop an alternative dispute resolution program to resolve discrimination claims before litigation. UW made Miller the Henry M. Jackson Professor of Law in January 2008. At the installation ceremony for this position, Miller's law school colleague Anna Mastroianni commented, "Paul Miller may have been born a dwarf, but in reality he is a giant. We are all better for seeing a little further from the perch of his shoulders."

Honors Early in his career Miller had become a leader of the Little People of America.

Personal life Miller married Jennifer Coletti Mechem, a disability policy coordinator, in 1997. They had two children who were 10 and 5 when their father died.