Lawyer

George Levi Russell, Jr. was born on March 19, 1929 in Baltimore, Maryland. His mother was a homemaker and his father worked as a postal worker. He attended Baltimore City public schools and earned his high school diploma from Frederick Douglass high school in 1946. While in high school, he was sports editor of the school newspaper and a member of the debate team.

He earned his A.B. degree in economics from Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, where he pledged Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity and was a member of the debate team. He earned his law degree from the University of Maryland in 1954. After earning his law degree, he was drafted into the army in 1954, where he practiced law and was in charge of Courts, Boards and Special Court-martials.

From 1956 to 1966, Russell was an associate at Brown, Allen, Watts, and Murphy and was later named as a partner in the firm. In 1967, Russell became the first African American to sit on the Circuit Court in Maryland as well as becoming the first Black to sit on an Appellate Court in the state. From 1968 to 1974, Russell worked as the first African American City Solicitor for Baltimore City. Continuing to break barriers, Russell served as the first African American President of the Maryland Bar Association from 1973 to 1974. Leaving the Maryland Bar Association, he was a partner at Russell & Thompson from 1974 to 1986, and then worked as a partner for Josey, Gibson, Allen and Mitchell. In 1982, he established Harbor Bank, one of the largest minority owned banks in the country. In 1986, Russell merged his all black firm with a predominately white firm, Piper and Marbury, one of the top 100 law firms in the country – the merger was a historic first in the nation.

In 2002, Russell was appointed chairperson of a commission that would be responsible for building the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History and Culture, the largest museum on the East Coast dedicated to African American history and culture. The museum is scheduled open in January of 2005.

Lawyer James L. Hudson was born on November 6, 1939 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana to Augustine Lagarde and James Hudson. He received his B.A. degree in 1961 from Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia and his J.D. degree in 1965 from Boston University School of Law.

In 1966, Hudson joined the firm Rhyne & Rhyne in Washington, D.C. He then worked as a research fellow at The Urban Institute from 1968 until 1970. In 1970, Hudson co-founded the law firm Hudson Leftwich where he served as a senior partner. The firm later became Hudson, Leftwich & Davenport in 1972, and he represented various municipalities including Detroit, New Orleans, Oakland and Kansas City. Hudson also served as finance counsel to the District of Columbia from 1974 to 1982. In 1985, he was named chairman at JAH Development Company and JLH Partners LLC.

Hudson has served on numerous boards throughout his career. He was a member of the Carter-Mondale Steering Committee of Washington, D.C. in 1976, was appointed to the board of the District of Columbia National Capital Revitalization Corporation by Mayor Anthony Williams in May of 2003; and, in 2009, President Barack Obama appointed Hudson as the United States executive director of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. In 2013, Hudson was selected to lead the Gwendolyn S. and Colbert I. King Endowed Chair Lecture Series at Howard University; and, in 2013, he served as the Holden Lecturer at Jackson State University. Hudson also was a member of the District of Columbia Tax Revision Commission, was chairman of the Morehouse College Board of Trustees, and served on the boards of the Metropolitan Washington Airport Authority, the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African Art, the Georgetown Day School, the District of Columbia General Hospital, the Municipal Finance Forum of Washington, the District of Columbia National Bank, and Carson Products, Inc.

In 2017, Hudson was recognized at the Morehouse University 133rd Commencement where he was conferred the title “Chairman Emeritus” with a special black academic chair, and received the College’s 150th anniversary sesquicentennial medallion.

James L. Hudson was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on January 22, 2020.

Lawyer Benjamin F. Wilson was born on June 29, 1951 in Bloomington, Indiana to Anna and Harrison B. Wilson, Jr. He graduated from the Jackson State College Laboratory School in Jackson, Mississippi in 1965, and the Wilbraham Academy in Wilbraham, Massachusetts in 1969. Wilson earned his B.A. degree in history in 1973 from Dartmouth College, and his J.D. degree with honors in 1976 from Harvard Law School.

Wilson began his career as an associate at the Atlanta, Georgia law firm King & Spalding in 1976. He then joined the civil division of the U.S. Department of Justice in 1979 where he handled commercial litigation matters. Wilson was later hired by Rose, Schmidt, Chapman, Duff, and Hasley in 1982 as an associate where he focused on civil litigation and was promoted to partner in 1983. Wilson subsequently joined Beveridge & Diamond, P.C. in November of 1986 where he served as lead counsel in numerous complex environmental litigation and regulatory matters for major consumer product corporations, retailers, oil and gas companies, municipalities, as well as developers. He was named managing partner of the firm in 2008 and chairman of Beveridge & Diamond, P.C. in 2017. Wilson also served as an adjunct professor of environmental law at the Howard University School of Law where he also co-founded the Howard Energy and Environmental Law Society.

Wilson has served on many boards throughout his career, including as chair of the Environmental Law Institute, on the board of directors of Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company, the board of trustees of Dartmouth College, as secretary on the board of the Leadership Council on Legal Diversity, and as chairman of the Environmental, Energy, and Public Utilities Law section of the National Bar Association from 1987 to 1998.

Wilson has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the Spirit of Excellence Award from the American Bar Association’s Commission on Racial and Ethnic Diversity in the Profession in 2014, the Washington Bar Association’s Charles Hamilton Houston Medallion of Merit in 2016, and the Presidential Award from the National Bar Association in 2019.

Benjamin F. Wilson was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on January 24, 2020.

Professor Charles R. Lawrence III was born on May 4, 1943 in New York City. He attended Spring Valley public schools in New York; and, in 1965, graduated with his B.A. degree from Haverford College in Haverford, Pennsylvania. In 1969, he received his J.D. degree from Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut.

From 1969 to 1970, Lawrence served as an attorney and research associate at the Harvard Center for Law and Education an as an assistant professor at the Harvard University Graduate School of Education. From 1970 to 1972, he was director and principal of the Highland Park Free School in Boston, Massachusetts. In 1972, Lawrence was hired as a senior attorney at Public Advocates in San Francisco, California where he also served as a professor of law at the University of San Francisco School of Law from 1974 to 1986. During this time he also served as a visiting professor at Harvard Law School from 1979 to 1980, the University of California at Berkeley School of Law from 1981 to 1982, and the UCLA School of Law in 1986. He worked as a tenured professor at Stanford Law School from 1986 to 1993 and at Georgetown University Law Center from 1993 to 2012. During this time, Lawrence also briefly served as a visiting professor at the University of Southern California Gould School of Law from 1991 to 1992, and at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa from 2004 to 2005. Lawrence later joined the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa’s William S. Richardson School of Law in 2008 where he served as professor of law and Centennial University Professor. During his career, Lawrence specialized in antidiscrimination law, equal protection, and critical race theory. He has co-authored three books: The Bakke Case: The Politics of Inequality (1979), Words That Wound: Critical Race Theory, Assaultive Speech, and The First Amendment (1993), and We Won't Go Back: Making the Case for Affirmative Action (1997).

Charles R. Lawrence III was interviewed by The HistoryMakers on December 9, 2019.

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.