Since opening meetings of the National Economic Commission within her first weeks of practicing law, Eleanor H. Smith has been advancing the interests of her clients in and out of court.

Eleanor leads the firm’s award-winning pro bono practice, for which the firm received a 2020 Outstanding Achievement Award from the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs for its attorneys seeking and obtaining compassionate release from prison for elderly, very sick, or at risk for COVID-19 clients.

In her litigation and government relations practice, Eleanor has handled a wide variety of matters, including those regarding voting rights, campaign finance and other political activity, information access, privacy, the First Amendment, professional liability, white collar criminal defense, debarment, gaming, and American Indian law. 

She has prosecuted and defended cases in trial and appellate courts, represented clients before regulatory agencies, prepared witnesses for congressional hearings, handled parallel proceedings, authored briefs amicus curiae in the U.S. Supreme Court, and negotiated settlements and governmental compacts. 

Eleanor is Secretary of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, serves on the board of directors of DC Appleseed, and is the former co-chair of the District of Columbia Bar’s Administrative Law Section.

Before joining Zuckerman Spaeder, Eleanor was a litigator with Public Citizen Litigation Group and a law clerk to the Hon. Harold H. Greene of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Before entering law school, Eleanor conducted advocacy work for non-governmental organizations favoring the Law of the Sea Treaty.