African Americans Speak Out

You introduction young James for. Teachers Law University of Michigan Law School and I think Michigan will come up a time or two tonight from what I understand. He is a graduate of Brown University and Yale Law School. Was an editor of The Yale Law Journal. I didn't make a law review but I'm told that's a pretty good thing to do. A former clerk of the United States Supreme Court for Judge Sandra Day O'Connor and his work for the public defenders office in Washington D.C. say he is one of the outstanding young legal minds in this country. Many of you know of the outstanding contributions that his father made him a civil rights movement. Wade Henderson the executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights. No American. And I say this with no exaggeration no American has done more. And the course of the last several decades to foreign policy and to shape the debate in this country from a progressive standpoint on issues of race. He has led the fight on judicial nominations. He has led the fight on legislation.

And he is at one point was also the Washington bureau director of the NWA sepi. Robin Leonhardt an old classmate of mine an old member of the Law Review at Harvard Law School has done pretty well. She is currently a fellow at the Georgetown University Law Center. She has previously been a counsel in the D.C. office of Wilmer Cutler and is the only member of this panel I believe who is currently involved on the litigation same that is actually going to be defending these two cases on Tuesday. So a lot of us will be talking in theory she will be helping preparation for the real thing on Tuesday. Julianne Malveaux is one of the outstanding intellectual. And the United States of America. She got her training in economics at a small school in Cambridge called MIT. She has been a contributor to Essence to USA Today and to all

scholarly publications around this country one insightful point of view she has regularly appeared on many of the television programs that a lot of you watch. And she has been an outstanding advocate for progressive politics in this country. Charles Ogletree Jr.. My hero from Harvard Law School one of the outstanding litigators in the country currently the Harvard Law School Jessica Maiko professor of law recently appointed associate dean for clinical programs. Previously the head of the public defenders office in Washington Charles Ogletree was so good that when he came to the public defenders office when he finally lost a case the U.S. attorney's office threw a party. He is as good as it gets. Rosa Clemente has arrived to join us. And as I was saying a Miskell man say earlier she is a black Puerto Rican grassroots

organizer journalists not for print to work. She is the founder of no self Speakers Bureau has regularly traveled around this country and has been one of the leading experts and analysts on the developing relationship and sometimes tension between the black and the Hispanic communities. Dr. Beverly Tatum There have only been nine presidents of Spelman College. Night. Here tonight. They've all been beautiful. They have all had an illustrious record. And Dr. Tatum has become in a very short period of time. One of the outstanding academicians of his country she has been a leader in the higher education community and has also been a prolific writer of the last 20 years. Theodore the wells junior. Partner and cochairman of the litigation department at Paul Weiss Rifkin ward and Garrison Amakosa counsel to the Harvard Yale and Stanford

Black Law Students Association has filed briefs I believe in connection with the Michigan lawsuits. But much more importantly any list of the best lawyers in this country always includes the name Ted Wells. He has been involved in a significant number of high profile cases in Washington D.C. and the last 20 years is where a great appellate lawyer and a great trial lawyer at the same time. And we're honored to have him here tonight I'd like to cover everyone on the panel. It's. The. Winds. Become a. Blast. From the ladies. And. Rector Council of the Legal Defense and Education five. Let me repeat that she is the most prominent and the lead lawyer at the end of a Legal Defense and Education Fund. She has ban for several years. One of the most outstanding advocates and one of the most outstanding litigators in

America and she's been there when all the big affirmative action cases and the last 20 years she's been there on all the cases that matter to the development of affirmative action as a legal doctrine and her reputation far proceed certified. The panel represent to you. T. T two brief notes before we get started if any of you have cell phones if you can please find some way to turn them off to put them on vibrate for the next two hours. It's not that long it just seems like a day as if we can have it with this many people. If we can have people be as respectful as they can be in terms of listening to this audience if you have to leave if you have to get up do so in a quiet manner

for the last half hour we will take questions and you will see several microphones at the back of the room or actually on the size of the room. Once we get to the time when I announce questions people should go to the back and begin to line up. And with that say out on with the program the first thing that I want to do tonight particularly for the benefit of the many non-lawyers who hopefully are listening out of sitting in the audience is to try to get a sense of exactly what we're talking about. Robin Leonhardt Tuesday the U.S. Supreme Court and the nine judges who sit on it are going to put their robes on and walk out and listen to an oral argument in two cases. We've heard a lot about those cases. What from a lawyer's standpoint is that issue on Tuesday. Let me answer that question before I do. I want to thank you for your

somewhat embellished introduction of me I want to correct one thing that I think is important. I'm no longer with Wilmer Cutler in Pickering the firm that has really masterminded the defense of the University of Michigan in this case. And although I would love to do it I won't be arguing the case on Tuesday that really John Payton. He's a friend of many of us on the panel. He's been a tremendous mentor to me. He's one of the leading African-American attorneys in this country and he is responsible for the tremendous case that you know the.