Jocelyn Benson is a Harvard grad, expert on election law, former Democratic candidate for Secretary of State, marathoner, Wayne State law professor and author.
Now she is a military wife, and while her husband, Army Spc. Ryan Friedrichs, serves in Afghanistan, Benson has co-founded a new organization, Military Spouses of Michigan (milspousemichigan.org).
Laura Berman of the Detroit News writes that Friedrichs, who met Benson at Harvard in 2003, was an unlikely future soldier when they met. He was a graduate student at the Kennedy School for Government, a political progressive, a runner and a native of Ann Arbor — a city that's never been a haven for military recruiters. She was in law school. After the couple's 2006 wedding, he headed Michigan Voice, a nonprofit that encourages civic engagement and voter participation.
"We believe that you have to be the change you want to see,"said Benson, in her book-filled Detroit condo overlooking the Detroit River. A large poster depicting the Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi looms in the study.
