Peggy Ann Nagae ’73

Overview

Principal & Owner, Peggy Nagae Consulting
Portland, OR

• BA, Asian Studies, Vassar College
• MA, Spiritual Psychology, University of Santa Monica
• JD, Poverty Law, Lewis and Clark Law School

Peggy A. Nagae (she/her), a third-generation Japanese American (Sansei), grew up on a farm in Boring, Oregon. Her career has spanned many arenas: litigator in criminal defense, civil rights, business defense, and general practice; Assistant Dean for Academic Affairs, University of Oregon Law School; Affirmative Action Director, Lewis and Clark Law School; COO of a national diversity consulting firm; and owner of her own consulting firm. Peggy is Co-Chair of the Tsuru for Solidarity Campaign on Black Reparations and Solidarity; Co-founder of the Oregon Hub of Tsuru; member of the Social Justice Committee for the Japanese American Citizens League (JACL); on the University of Oregon President’s Diversity Advisory Community Council, and a board member of the Vassar Alum Association. She is recognized for her advocacy and service as the lead counsel for Minoru Yasui in reopening his WWII Supreme Court case and achieving a vacation of his conviction, as one of President Clinton’s appointees to the Civil Liberties Public Education Fund Board, and as the third president and first woman president of the National Asian Pacific American Bar Association. She spearheaded Yasui’s successful nomination for a Presidential Medal of Freedom, which President Obama posthumously awarded him in 2015, and co-chaired Mitsuye Endo Tsutsumi’s successful nomination for a Presidential Citizens Medal, which President Biden awarded him posthumously in 2025. In 2017, she was awarded the American Bar Association’s Spirit of Excellence Award.

Advice to Students:

We live in unprecedented times where the rule of law, the constitution, and our democracy are being challenged. Democracy requires a commitment to equality and that we value each person equally, whatever our race, religion, gender, or class. It’s about pluralism, and Vassar knows about pluralism. You call it Engaged Pluralism. Please learn the skills of Engaged Pluralism. As well, you can ask yourself three questions posed by Rabbi Hillel, the first-century Jerusalem sage. When asked what to do with one’s life, Hillel responded with three questions to ask yourself: 1) If I am not for myself, who will be for me? 2) When I am for myself alone, what am I? And, 3) If not now, when? (Source: Steve Downer of theDifference)