The First Two Years: 2022-2024 (And Counting!)

International Attestations has come some distance since March 2022.  Every week since that time, Melissa A. Kotulski has uploaded a blogpost on topics pertaining to constitutional and international law as well as international affairs and other  matters pertinent to the President's interest.  

International projects in 2022-2024 have centered on advocacy at the United Nations as well as outreach for international courts.  And many of Melissa's blogposts centered on issues at the international level related to military and national security matters, sports, trade, advisory opinions, climate change, border matters, and biographies of judges.

Legal services projects have included  local, state, federal, and international matters pertaining to employment law in Massachusetts & New Jersey, and New York, to military and national security throughout the nation and the world, and constitutional questions.  A frequent topic of discussion in her weekly blogposts, the constitutional studies have considered laughter at the court, holiday discussions, and even elections.

For her creative projects, Melissa has contributed to a variety of works for young adults and for mature audiences to include poetry, short stories, novels, and biographies.   She has even worked with an amazing psychic who writes florid text by engaging with a Presidential library to release FOIA records.

Melissa is always researching to ensure to enrich her ability to negotiate all of these spheres.  She keeps current through immersion in the Presidential and other libraries as well as conducting analyses of the federal and international jurisprudence provided by the U.S. Supreme Court, the International Court of Justice, and he Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS),  in particular. 

 Further, she has found ways to affiliate herself as well as the business with a number of organizations in some capacity--not least of which was through a UN grounds pass experience in 2023.  Also, she joined the Vermont Bar Association in 2022,  the Boston Bar Association in 2023, and reunited with the Connecticut Italian American Bar Association in 2024.  She engages frequently in activities with the New York City Bar Association (2023).  She found ways to support community organizations like UNICO and the Irish American Home Society.  She frequently engages with the Library of Congress, various Presidential libraries (@1998; including having had membership at the Benjamin Harrison site in Indianapolis, Indiana; @2020), the Connecticut State Library (@2003), the resources of the International Court of Justices (@2014) and the U.S. Supreme Court (@2008),  and activities provided by the U.S. Supreme Court Society (@2010).  She recently joined the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in January 2024.

Melissa has contracted for more than a handful of individuals to contribute to her blog, with topics ranging from international law in U.S. Courts, pandemic measures on the international stage, youth engagement at the United Nations, mortgage matters, religion and prayer in schools as considered by the U.S. Supreme Court, and the diamond industry.  Melissa's blogs have consistently been published on a weekly basis since those first days of the company's founding!

And then there's food, which, after her family and Buddy, is Melissa's first and everlasting love!  And since the days of that food fight at Silas Deane Middle School (Wethersfield, CT, USA)  in the early 1990s, she has considered how that could happen at the world level in a variety of ways most recently by writing in her blog about Bread, Tomatoes, Pineapples, and...Cheese.

What better to enjoy these tasty morsels then to work out--or at least appreciate those who do it well.  Since her basketball days in high school, Melissa has been a true advocate and supporter of sports--even serving as a basketball coach for a high school.  In addition to her blogposts on baseball (she's a lifelong Yankees fan), basketball, tennis, and more at the CAS, she visited a sporting venue or two.  Most notably, Boston's new(ish) TD Gardens in April 2023.  

And nothing would be complete without Buddy--her AKC certified Good Citizen & Star Puppy through Petco as well as winner of the sit-stay contest in his kindergarten class at the ODTCW.   And nowadays, Ben Garson of Outrider Dogs has done amazing things with Buddy's development with others after he suffered several traumas the summer we stayed in the Beltway of Washington, DC in 2021.

International Attestations® has provided moral, intellectual, and fiscal support to a number of local and international organizations.  

In September 2023, Melissa contributed to two organizations--one cultural and one cause-related.  The Irish American Home Society, Inc. (IAHS) provided the community with a book dedicated to the history of the club as compiled by a committee under the leadership of Maureen Skowroneck.  

After her advocacy at the United Nations for the rights of children in general and for the disabled child in particular, Melissa donated to St. Jude's to encourage their continued good work for children in need of medical care--and it's free! 

Melissa also worked with a local town committee to enrich human rights movements in the area--even supporting one of the leaders with a big celebration of immigrants on her birthday, after which she went down to the U.S.-Mexican border to witness the issues there.  

Most recently, she contributed to the local UNICO chapter for its macaroni dinner.

International Attestations® would not be growing without the support of a number amazing individuals and organizations.

First and foremost, the various activities, events, and trainings provided by the United Nations have been integral to Melissa's growth over the decades.  Since her childhood when she wanted to bring modern appliances to the destitute areas of Africa, she has always looked toward that organization. So it was a dream come true to actually be there with a grounds pass in 2023 and she intends on seeking more engagement directly for the future.

That grounds pass came from the nomination of David Gallup of the World Court of Human Rights (WCHR) Coalition and the World Service Authority to be administered by the Citizens for Global Solutions Team under the leadership of the new Executive Director, Rebecca Shoot and her assistant, Drea Bergman. 

Gallup, before the grounds pass was administered, provided Kotulski wht a stipend to attend the Texas conference in March 2023.  As a token of her gratitude, she gave him a compass as he was their lead explorer who has convened their WCHR Coalition effortlessly.  Around that time, Melissa also organized a convention of two sets of WCHR statute drafters---the Kozma-Nowak-Scheinin drafters came to the coalition to engage with the Lucknow Drafter,  Mark Oettinger of Vermont.  

Mark was at the center of connecting her to David, and the two are an amazing team to enrich the movement for peace at the local, state, federal, and international levels.

As an acknowledgment of this good will and development of the Coalition, Kotulski was encouraged by one of its outreach coordinators to go to NYC and explore the grounds of the UN on the day of the annual meeting of the Chairs of the Human Rights Treaties.  She briefly considered going as Press, but her organization is multifaceted and she will reserve such nominations for the writers for her publication.  As fortunate would have it, Rebecca and Drea attended the March 29, 2023 convention of statute drafters so they were witness to the good work that Melissa provided the organization..  So they offered one of their organization's (CGS) grounds pass--and the UN approved it!

Rebecca also encouraged Melissa to attend the ABILA conference in October held at the Fordham Law School. To show her gratitude for such guidance in the negotiation of international affairs, Melissa sent Rebecca an dove-shaped ornament.

Also, a supporter was Anthony Mirabelle, her would-be fiancé.  While they did not work out romantically, his support was invaluable to the formative years of International Attestations.  As such, she gave him a plaque to thank him for his contribution.

Richard Albert's great efforts in the Constitutional Law community shows exactly why he leads the field, as he was the mind behind convening all the scholars in Texas in March 2023 as well as the organizer of the International Review of Constitutional Reform 2022 (published in 2023).