Harry T. Edwards
| Harry Edwards | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Chief Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit | |
|
In office September 19, 1994 – July 16, 2001 |
|
| Preceded by | Abner Mikva |
| Succeeded by | Douglas Ginsburg |
| Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit | |
|
In office February 20, 1980 – November 3, 2005 |
|
| Appointed by | Jimmy Carter |
| Preceded by | David Bazelon |
| Succeeded by | Seat abolished |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Harry Thomas Edwards November 3, 1940 New York City, New York, U.S. |
| Education |
Cornell University (BA) University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (JD) |
Harry Thomas Edwards (born November 3, 1940), an American jurist and legal scholar, is currently a senior circuit judge and chief judge emeritus on the United States Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit in Washington, D.C., and a professor of law at the New York University School of Law.
Edwards was born in New York, New York, the oldest of three children and the son of Arline Ross Edwards and George H. Edwards. His parents were divorced in 1950 and Edwards and his two sisters, Verne Debourg and Pamela Matthews, were raised by their mother. In 1952–53, his mother attended Smith College where she earned a Master's degree in social work. While his mother was away, Edwards lived with his grandparents, whom he adored, in Harlem, New York. When his mother returned, the family moved to Long Island, New York, where Edwards attended Uniondale High School and was president of the first graduating class. In 1961, Edwards' mother married Thomas Lyle; Edwards shared a very close relationship with his stepfather.
Edwards received a B.S. degree from Cornell University in 1962 and a J.D. from University of Michigan Law School in 1965. He graduated from law school with distinction and was a member of the Michigan Law Review and the Order of the Coif.
During his time in Michigan, Edwards spent time with his father, George H. Edwards, a long-time member of the Michigan House of Representatives; his stepmother, Esther Gordy Edwards, a Senior Vice President at Motown Record Company; and Berry Gordy, Jr., the renowned founder of Motown Record Company.
Despite his very strong academic record in law school, Edwards had difficulty in finding a job in the legal profession because he was African American. All of the major law firms to which he applied openly rejected him because of his race. It was only after Professor Russell Smith, his mentor at Michigan, interceded on his behalf that he was hired at Seyfarth, Shaw, Fairweather & Geraldson. He worked with the firm in Chicago, Illinois from 1965 to 1970 specializing in labor relations law and collective bargaining.
In 1970, he accepted an invitation to join the faculty of the University of Michigan Law School and became the first African American to teach at the law school. His teaching and scholarship focused on labor law, collective bargaining, labor law in the public sector, employment discrimination, negotiations, and higher education and the law. In 1974, he and his then-wife Becky, and their children, Brent and Michelle, traveled to Brussels, Belgium, where Edwards was a Visiting Professor of Law at the Free University of Brussels. In 1975, Edwards accepted an invitation to visit at Harvard Law School. He was a Visiting Professor of Law at Harvard Law School during the 1975–76 school year and was awarded tenure in 1976. While at Harvard, Edwards was also a faculty member at the Institute for Educational Management at Harvard University from 1976 through 1982. During this period, he co-authored a book on Higher Education and the Law, which was a major shift in his academic work. In the spring of 1977, Edwards and his family returned to Ann Arbor, Michigan, where he rejoined the faculty of the University of Michigan Law School. In 1980, Edwards was the co-author of four different casebooks (the only legal scholar in the country at the time to achieve the feat).
...
Wikipedia