For Merklinger, helping people with autism is personal

Attorney James “Merk” Merklinger understands all the legal ramifications of helping children with autism, but it's mainly a personal challenge.

Merklinger’s son was diagnosed with autism.  That makes it very personal. Not surprisingly, he leads an organization that leads the charge against autism, which is devoted to supporting children and families affected by autism.

“The Autism Society phone rings nonstop because of the need,” says Merklinger. “In South Carolina, there are over 20,000 students in the public schools diagnosed with autism. Case managers are overworked; we need more parent mentors; we need to track better and automate records; and there’s never enough funding.”

It’s a change from his previous work with the Association of Corporate Counsel, but he says when the opportunity came along, he felt like it was the right thing to do.

“We’re constantly trying to leverage resources and make things work,” he says.

In some ways, it’s the story of Merklinger’s life.

Born with Tourette syndrome, Merklinger was the kid who twitched and made funny noises. Playing football gave him a peer group and friends who cared more about his ability to throw a block or catch a pass than his tics.

“At Wofford, I was fortunate to start as a freshman, and by my senior year I was captain of the offense,” says Merklinger, who also excelled in the classroom. He taught English in Japan for a year after graduation, and while there, he was a contestant on “Takeshi’s Castle,” the most popular show in Japan at the time. “It was the original ‘Wipe Out’ show that years later became popular in the U.S. I wore my Wofford College T-shirt on the show. It got trashed, but I wore it proudly.” He was also in China with his brother on holiday during the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests; they had to be smuggled out of the country.

Merklinger went on to law school at the University of South Carolina and, after graduation, worked in the legal department for a technology company for a year before joining the Association of Corporate Counsel in Washington, D.C.

“We had members in 15 countries when I started. By the time I transitioned to chief advisor for the organization’s credentialing institute, we had a presence in 95 countries. Getting to travel and work in Hong Kong, Australia, Dubai, across Europe, and throughout the U.S. was something I really enjoyed,” says Merklinger. “It allowed me to learn from the best attorneys in the world. … A benefit I got from Wofford’s liberal arts education was intellectual curiosity and the ability and desire to learn. It came in handy,” he said.

He’s also used those skills in his pro bono immigration work to help hundreds of people from around the world, and when he testified before Congress on the importance of allocating funding for Fragile X and Tourette syndromes.

“Merk” is now supremely poised to apply a lifetime of learning to the work at hand of helping families with autism to thrive.

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