Lawyer

Lawyer Maurice Watson was born on January 13, 1958 in Kansas City, Missouri to Christene and George Watson. He attended Barstow School and was the first African American to graduate from there in 1976. Watson then attended Harvard University where he graduated cum laude and received his B.A. degree in social studies in 1980 before earning his J.D. degree from Harvard Law School in 1984.

After graduating from Harvard University in 1980, Watson worked in the legal department at Hallmark Cards, Inc. until 1981 when he entered Harvard Law School. Upon receiving his J.D. degree from Harvard Law School in 1984, Watson was hired as an aide for Senator John Danforth (R-MO) where he worked with civil rights, healthcare, and education issues. He remained here until 1987 when he returned to Kansas City, Missouri to serve as an associate at Blackwell Sanders, working on civil rights and education issues. Here, he would later become partner and relationship manager for the Kansas City Public School system. In 2012, Watson was named chairman of the board of Husch Blackwell, making him the first African American to head a major law firm in Missouri and the third to do so in the country. He remained as chairman until 2018 when he co-founded Credo Philanthropy Advisors and became of counsel to Husch Blackwell.

Watson has served on numerous boards throughout his career, including as president of the board of trustees for Barstow School from 1989 to 1996, chairman of the board of directors for Children’s Mercy Hospital from 1993 to 2007 and vice chair of ther board of trustees from 2002 to 2007, and secretary of the board of trustees for the National Association of Independent Schools from 1995 to 2003. He has also been a member of the African American Managing Partners Network, the Jackson County Bar Association, the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity, the Civic Council of Greater Kansas City, and the Kansas City Metropolitan Bar Association.

Watson also received numerous awards, including the 2007 Missouri Hospital Association Excellence in Governance Award, the NAACP Kansas City, Missouri Chapter’s Velma E. Woodson Outstanding Leadership Award in 2012, the Urban League of Greater Kansas City Difference Maker of the Year Award in 2012, Kansas City Business Journal’s Power 100 recognition from 2014 to 2017, the Missouri Lawyers Weekly’s 2018 Law Firm Leader Award, and the African American Managing Partners Network’s 2018 Managing Partner of the Year Award.

Watson resides in Kansas City, Missouri.

Maurice Watson was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on November 4, 2019.

Lawyer Kofi Appenteng was born on June 14, 1957 in Accra, Ghana to Felicia and Samuel Appenteng. He attended Gateway School and Aldenham School in England and later immigrated to the United States in 1977, where he attended Wesleyan University in Middletown, Connecticut. There, he was a member of the men’s soccer team and participated in track and field. Appenteng received his B.A. degree from Wesleyan University in 1981 and his J.D. degree from Columbia University School of Law in New York City in 1984.

After graduation, Appenteng was hired by the law firm of Webster & Sheffield as an associate. In 1991, he joined Thacher Proffitt & Wood LLP, where he specialized in merger and acquisitions, private placements, corporate governance, mortgage finance transactions, and not-for-profit law. Appenteng was promoted to partner in 1994, where he advised foreign and domestic individuals and companies on matters related to corporate governance, securities law compliance, acquisitions, corporate finance, regulatory compliance and crisis management. He then became CEO and director of Constant Capital Ghana Limited from 2008 to 2014. In 2014, Appenteng served as senior counsel at Dentons and became chair of the board of directors for the Ford Foundation. In 2016, he became president of the Africa-America Institute.

He served on Wesleyan University’s Board of Trustees from 1990 to 2006, and chaired the presidential search committee that recommended Michael S. Roth as the sixteenth president of Wesleyan University in 2007. He also served as non-executive director at Intravenous Infusions Limited and joined the board of directors of the Ford Foundation in 2007. He was later appointed to the board of directors at the International Center for Transitional Justice in 2015. He also served on the International Advisory Board of IE University, Spain and on the board of Instituto de Empresa Fund, Inc., Panbros Salt Industries Limited, the University of Cape Town Fund and the World Scout Fund.

Appenteng received the Baldwin Medal in 2007, the highest honor bestowed by the Wesleyan Alumni Association for service to the university and to society, and was inducted into the Wesleyan Athletics Hall of Fame in 2009. In 2013, Appenteng was named a “Great American Immigrant” by the Carnegie Corporation.

Kofi Appenteng was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on March 25, 2019.

Lawyer Michael A. Lawson was born on August 8, 1953 in Little Rock, Arkansas to Ruth Ellen Jones and Milton Anderson Lawson. He received his B.A. degree in political science and economics in 1975 from Loyola Marymount University, in Los Angeles, California, and his J.D. degree from Harvard
Law School, in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Lawson began his law career as a staff attorney for the U.S. Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation, in Washington, D.C. In 1980, he joined Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom, LLP, in Los Angeles, California, where he specialized in merger and acquisition transactions, bankruptcy, and litigation. Later, Lawson became a partner at the firm, where he worked for thirty-one years until 2011. In 2013, President Barack Obama nominated Lawson to serve as U.S. Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the Council of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a specialized agency of the United Nations. Based in Montreal, Canada, Lawson served in this role from 2014 to 2017, coordinating and regulating international air travel. In 2018, Lawson was named president and CEO of the Los Angeles Urban League.

From 2004 to 2014, Luster served as vice chair of the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles County’s board of directors; and, from 2005 to 2011, he served as a member of the Board of Airport Commissioners (BOAC) for Los Angeles World Airports. In 2011, California Governor Jerry Brown appointed Luster to the California State Teachers Retirement System (CALSTRS) Board of Trustees, the second largest retirement system in the United States, where he served until 2014. In addition, he served as a trustee of Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia and Loyola Marymount University of Los Angeles. He was also a board director and former chairman of the Constitutional Rights Foundation, and a board director of the Advancement Project and the Music Center Foundation.

Lawson was the recipient of the Strickland Excellence Award from the Loyola Marymount University African American Alumni Association in 2010. He was also recognized by Chambers USA as one of the nation's “Leading Lawyers for Business.”

Lawson and his wife, Mattie McFadden-Lawson, have two adult children, Michael Jr. and Jonathan.

Michael A. Lawson was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on February 8, 2019.

Lawyer Martina Bradford was born on September 14, 1952 in Washington, D.C. to Alma Ashton Lewis and Martin Luther Lewis, Jr. Bradford received her B.A. degree in economics from American University in 1973, and her J.D. degree from Duke University School of Law in 1975.

In 1975, Bradford joined the Interstate Commerce Commission as attorney-director in the finance division, and was later promoted to chief of staff to the vice chairman. At the same time, she served as counsel to the Senate Committee on Government Operations and the House Appropriations Committee. In 1983, Bradford was hired by AT&T as an attorney in the corporate legal department, before moving to the public affairs department. In 1988, she was promoted to vice president of external affairs of the New York/New England region. Two years later, she was appointed vice president for federal government affairs at AT&T, where she lobbied on behalf of the company as lawmakers drafted the 1996 Telecommunications Act. In 1996, Bradford moved to AT&T’s spinoff company, Lucent Technologies, where she served as corporate vice president of global public affairs and helped establish the company with governmental and regulatory bodies. She left Lucent Technologies in 2000 to serve as partner at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld. In 2006, Bradford served as senior advisor for human resources in the office of Senator Harry Reid and directed the Senate Democratic Diversity Initiative. She was appointed deputy sergeant at arms in 2010 and served for three years before joining the Bockorny Group as principal. In 2015, she founded Palladian Hill Strategies, a lobbying firm in Washington, D.C.

Bradford has served on the board of visitors at Duke University Law School and the board of trustees of American University. She also served as vice chairman of the board of trustees of the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club and as a member of the board of the Mid-Atlantic Region of the United States Golf Association. In 1991, Bradford was named one of Black Enterprise’s 21 Women of Power and Influence in Corporate America.

Bradford and her husband have one daughter and reside in Washington, D.C.

Martina Bradford was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on September 26, 2019.

Lawyer Stephanie Phillipps was born on March 13, 1952 in Boston Massachusetts, to Dr. Robert and Marion Phillipps. She attended William Lloyd Garrison School and Girls’ Latin School in Boston, graduating in 1969. Phillipps then attended Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where she earned her B.S. degree in economics in 1973. In 1976, she received her J.D. degree from Harvard Law School.

Phillipps was hired by the Washington D.C. law firm, Arnold & Porter, as its first African American woman associate in 1976. In 1984, she was promoted to partner and specialized in telecommunications, media, consumer protection and advertising law. Her clients included internet, cable television, and media companies, as well as state and local governments and nonprofit organizations. Phillipps also advised on various FCC rulemakings to implement and interpret the provisions of the 1984 and 1992 Cable Acts and the 1996 Telecommunications Act. In 1997, Phillipps and her husband, George Murray, established a fund with the Sidwell Friends School in Washington D.C., called The Stephanie M. Phillipps and George E. Murray Fund. Its mission was to expand and increase diversity in the school through a student scholarship for African Americans, as well as funds to support African American faculty. In 2010, Phillipps founded an online support group called Beccastone for mothers and caregivers to find and share information and support on raising African American children.

In addition to being a lawyer, Phillipps has served on many boards including the Clara Elizabeth Jackson Carter Foundation, the Ellington Fund, the National Conference for Community and Justice, Sidwell Friends School, For the Love of Children (FLOC), and the National Symphony Orchestra. She was chair of the board trustrees of the Washington Region for Justice and Inclusion. She is also a member of Harvard Law School Black Alumni Network and a fellow of the American Bar Foundation. Phillipps was named part of The Legal 500 U.S. in the Telecoms and Broadcast: Regulatory category in 2013, 2017, and 2018.

Stephanie Phillipps and her husband reside in Washington D.C. and have two adult children, Sydney Murray and Michael Phillipps Murray.

Stephanie Phillipps was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on August 23, 2019.

Lawyer Gay McDougall was born on August 13, 1947 in Atlanta, Georgia to Inez Johnson and Louis Johnson. After graduating from Booker T. Washington High School in 1965, McDougall became the first African American student to attend Agnes Scott College. She transferred to Bennington College in 1967, and received her B.A. degree in social science from there in 1969. McDougall went on to receive her J.D. degree from Yale University in 1972 and her L.L.M degree in international law from the London School of Economics in 1978.

McDougall worked at the firm of Debevoise, Plimpton, Lyons & Gates from 1972 to 1974, before joining the National Conference of Black Lawyers as general counsel in 1975. She served as a staff attorney in the minimum standards unit of the New York City Board of Correction in 1976, worked at the African National Congress Office to the United Nations in New York in 1978, and served as associate counsel in New York’s Office of the Deputy Mayor for Criminal Justice in 1979. From 1980 to 1994, McDougall served as executive director of the Lawyers Committee for Civil Rights Under Law’s Southern Africa Project, securing the release of thousands of political prisoners in South Africa and Namibia and founding the Commission on Independence for Namibia. In 1994, McDougall was appointed to serve on South Africa’s Independent Electoral Commission, where she worked closely with Nelson Mandela. She joined Global Rights in 1995 as executive director; and, in 1997, she was elected to serve a four-year term as an independent expert on the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. In 2005, McDougall was appointed the first U.N. Special Rapporteur on minority issues. She served as a distinguished scholar in residence at American University Washington College of Law in 2006 and as the Father Robert F. Drinan Visiting Professor in Human Rights at Georgetown University Law Center in 2011. In 2015, she was elected to another four-year term on the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, and served as vice-chair.

McDougall served on the board of the Southern Africa Legal Services and Education Project, the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Foundation, and Africare. She also served as vice chair of the board of Cooperative for Assistance and Relief Everywhere (CARE) USA from 2001 to 2003, and as chair of the governance committee of CARE International from 1994 to 2003. In 2005, she joined the board of the Global Fund for Women. McDougall also served on the advisory council of Realizing Rights and on the executive council of the American Society of International Law.

In 1999, McDougall received the MacArthur Foundation “Genius Grant” for her work on behalf of international human rights. She also received the Candace Award from the National Coalition of 100 Black Women in 1990, the Thurgood Marshall Award from District of Columbia Bar in 2010, and the Goler T. Butcher Medal from American Society for International Law in 2011.

Gay McDougall was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on October 23, 2019.

Lawyer, historian, and professor, Annette Gordon-Reed was born on November 19, 1958 in Livingston, Texas to Alfred and Bettye Jean Gordon. She was the first to integrate her elementary school in Conroe, Texas, and later graduated with high distinction from Dartmouth University with her B.A. degree in history in 1981. Gordon-Reed then attended Harvard Law School where she received her J.D. degree in 1984 and was the first African American editor for the Harvard Law Review.

In 1984, Gordon-Reed was hired as an associate at the law firm Cahill Gordon & Reindel in New York. She subsequently became general counsel for the New York City Board of Corrections in 1987 where she wrote minimum standards for New York City’s jails. Gordon-Reed served here until 1992, when she became a professor at the New York Law School. She published her first book, Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings: An American Controversy in 1997. Four years later, she published Vernon Jordan’s memoir, Vernon Can Read!, which received the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and the 2002 BCALA Award for Excellence in Nonfiction. In 2003, she contributed to Howard Dodson’s Jubilee: The Emergence of African-American Culture. Gordon-Reed was hired by Rutgers University in 2007 as a professor of history, and the following year she published The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family. This book won over ten awards, including the 2008 National Book Award, the 2009 Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for Nonfiction, and the 2009 Pulitzer Prize in History, of which she was the first African American recipient. Gordon-Reed left New York Law School and Rutgers University in 2010 upon joining Harvard University as a professor of history and American legal history. The same year she was named the Carol K. Pforzheimer Professor at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, a role she held until 2016. In 2011, Gordon-Reed released her book, Andrew Johnson; and, in 2017, she published Most Blessed of the Patriarchs: Thomas Jefferson and the Empire of the Imagination which was a New York Times Bestseller, and won numerous awards including being named a New York Times Book Review Editors’ Choice Selection.

Gordon-Reed has been a member of the Council of Foreign Relations, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Humanities Center, the American Philosophical Society, and was the 2018-2019 president of the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic.

In addition to her book’s awards, Gordon-Reed received the 2009 National Humanities Medal, the Woman of Power & Influence Award from the National Organization for Women in New York City, as well as an honorary degree from Ramapo College and the College of William & Mary. She has also been awarded New York Public Library’s Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers Fellowship, the Guggenheim Fellowship in Humanities, and the 2010 MacArthur Fellowship Genius Grant.

Gordon-Reed resides in Manhattan with her husband, New York Supreme Court Justice Robert Reed. They have two children, Susan and Gordon.

Annette Gordon-Reed was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on October 21, 2019.

Lawyer Joyce Moorehead was born on May 29, 1946 in Buffalo, New York to Rita Faragher and Ernest Hanks. She was raised in Crescent City, Florida. In 1967, she graduated from Bethune-Cookman University in Daytona Beach, Florida with her B.S. degree in sociology with a concentration in criminology. Moorehead then graduated from the University of Arkansas with her J.D. degree in 1976.

Moorehead served as assistant city prosecutor in Fayetteville, Arkansas for a year, before returning to Miami, Florida to serve as assistant director of a public interest law firm. In 1978, she was elected to the Miami-Dade County School Board, which she served on until 1982. Moorehead was subsequently hired by the Legal Services of Greater Miami as a senior attorney. In 1984, she moved to Baltimore, Maryland upon accepting a position as general counsel for Chicken George, Inc. She was then made associate general counsel for the NAACP, where she assisted in the development of civil rights litigation and handled cases in the federal system concerning employment and labor issues, as well as voting rights and education. Moorehead was also the primary liaison to multiple attorneys affiliated with various NAACP regions and several attorneys outside the organization. Starting in 1991, she worked as a senior associate at Hollis & Associates in Baltimore, specializing in employment and family cases. Moorehead left the firm in 1993 and started her own private practice focusing on employment, family, and labor issues. In 2004, she and her husband, Thomas Moorehead, established the Joyce and Thomas Moorehead Foundation to assist working families and provide college scholarships for graduating high school seniors. She also became co-owner of Sterling Motorcars with her husband in Sterling, Virginia. Thomas Moorehead was the first African American awarded a full franchise of Rolls Royce, McLaren, and Lamborghini brands.

Moorehead has served on the boards of the Maryland Legal Services Corporation, the Family League of Baltimore, the Sexual Assault Recovery Center, Bethune-Cookman University, the Urban League of Greater Miami, WPBT-TV of South Florida, the Girl Scouts of Tropical Florida, and the Library of Congress. She has also been a member of the Maryland and Florida Bars, the Monumental City Bar Association, the Baltimore City Bar Association, the Maryland Court of Appeals Standing Committee on Rules of Practice and Procedure, the Citizens Planning and Housing Authority of Baltimore, of which she was also chairman, and the Alliance of Black Women Attorneys, where she was a former president as well.

Moorehead resides in Virginia with her husband.

Joyce Moorehead was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on September 23, 2019.

Lawyer Marilyn Holifield was born in Tallahassee, Florida on June 17, 1948 to Millicent and Bishop Holifield, Sr. She attended the University of Florida A&M’s Lab School, before transferring to Leon High School in 1963 where she was among the first three African Americans to ever graduate from the school in 1965. Holifield then attended Swarthmore University, where she received her B.A. degree in economics with a concentration in black studies, and was a founding member of the Swarthmore Afro-American Student Society (SASS). In 1972, she graduated from Harvard Law School with her J.D. degree.

From 1972 to 1977, Holifield worked as an assistant counsel for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund in New York City, responsible for litigating class action employment lawsuits in Florida, Alabama, and Missouri, and a major prison reform suit in Georgia. She subsequently served as general counsel for the New York State Division for Youth under Peter Edelman until 1978. Holifield was then hired as a law clerk for the late Appellate Judge Paul Roney in St. Petersburg, Florida, a role she held until 1979. In 1981, she joined the Holland & Knight law firm in Tampa, Florida as its first African American associate. Holifield was transferred to the Miami office in 1984, and made partner in 1986, becoming the first black female partner of a major Florida law firm. Here, her areas of focus included class action litigation and arbitration; labor, employment and benefits; civil rights, discrimination and retaliation; and labor and employment class actions. In 2018, in her capacity as a director for the Miami-Dade North Arts and Humanities Foundation, Holifield helped to establish The Miami Museum of Contemporary Art of the African Diaspora (Miami MOCAAD).

Holifield has served on a multitude of boards, including Swarthmore College’s board of managers, the University of Miami’s board of trustees, the Swarthmore Black Alumni Network (co-founding member), Harvard Alumni Association, and the Harvard Board of Overseers.

She has won numerous awards for her legal work, including Holland & Knight’s highest honor, the Chesterfield Smith Award, in 2000. Holifield was also the recipient of the Anti-Defamation League's Jurisprudence Award in 2011, the 2012 National Bar Association's Gertrude E. Rush Award, HistoryMiami’s Legal Legend Award in 2014, and the 2019 David W. Dyer Professionalism Award presented by the Dade County Bar Association.

Marilyn Holifield was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on August 18, 2019.

Lawyer and nonprofit executive Maurita Coley was born on June 18, 1956 in Detroit, Michigan. Coley graduated from Cass Technical High School in 1973 and went on to receive her B.A. in communications arts and sciences from Michigan State University in 1977. In 1981, Coley received her J.D. degree from Georgetown University Law Center.

In 1981, Coley joined Clark Klein & Beaumont as an associate attorney in Detroit, Michigan. Two years later, she moved to Cole Raywid and Braverman, where she served as an attorney and partner. In 1993, Coley joined BET Networks as senior vice president of legal affairs; and, in 1995, she became senior vice president of network operations and programming. In 1999, Coley returned to Cole Raywid and Braverman, which became Davis Wright Tremaine LLP in 2007. She later served as principal of Coley Law and Media, PLLC, in 2009, where she worked for three years. In 2010, Coley joined Capital Area Asset Builders as its executive director. Two years later, Coley served as executive vice president, chief operating officer, and acting chief executive officer of Multicultural Media, Telecom and Internet Council. In 2018, she was promoted to president and chief executive officer.

Coley served as co-committee chair for Georgetown Law Center’s Black Alumni Endowment at the first Georgetown Black Law Alumni Reunion. She also served as co-agent for Davis Wright Tremaine law firm in the Georgetown Law Firm Challenge. In 2014, Coley was on the Strategic Planning Council of Alumni Leaders of Georgetown University Law Center. She is an executive committee member of Daniel Alexander Payne Community Development Corporation (DAPCDC), and is also a member of the District of Columbia Bar, the State of Michigan Bar, and the U.S. Supreme Court Bar.

Coley has received multiple awards for her work including the 2005 Distinguished Alumnae Award from Georgetown University Law Center’s Women’s Law Forum, being named a CableFax Top Lawyer in 2017, and receiving the 2018 President’s Award for Community Service from Black Data Professionals Association.

Coley and her husband, Paul Flippin, reside in Washington, D.C.

Maurita Coley was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on August 20, 2019.