TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Liz Slagle Todaro on Feb 5, 2021

In honor of Black History Month, the TBA is highlighting the work of Black attorneys in Tennessee, both past and present, and celebrating the ways in which they have helped shape the bar and legal community. Watch for stories each week.

In 1960, students across Tennessee engaged in lunch counter sit-ins to protest racial segregation. These non-violent demonstrators brought national attention and helped make tangible change; within a few months, Nashville became the first major city in the South to desegregate public facilities. A group of Tennessee lawyers who shared the students’ courage and determination stepped up to represent those who were arrested, risking danger and condemnation to do their job for a cause they believed in. The Black attorneys who played a vital role in the historic Tennessee sit-ins were Emmett Ballard, A.A. Birch, Coyness L. Ennix Jr., Benjamin Hooks, Robert Lillard, H.T. Lockard, Z. Alexander Looby, Russell B. Sugarmon and Avon Williams Jr., among others. Read more about these Civil Rights Movement heroes in Suzanne Robertson’s article “When ‘Courage Superseded Fear’” from the May 2010 Tennessee Bar Journal.

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