Winner of the 1995 Presidential Medal of Freedom, Philadelphia-born lawyer William T. Coleman was the first black American to serve as a clerk for the Supreme Court, and the first to join a major American law firm. In a career spanning nearly 70 years, Coleman worked with Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund on Brown vs. Board of Education, served as a senior counsel to the Warren Commission's investigation of the Kennedy assassination, and as secretary of the U.S. Department of Transportation during the Ford administration. In his autobiography, Coleman recalls his extraordinary career and affirms the importance of the legal profession in a democratic society.

Interviewed by Paul Hendrickson, author of the National Book Critics Circle Award winner, Sons of Mississippi

Carole Phillips Memorial Lecture