TBA Law Blog


Posted by: Stacey Shrader Joslin on Dec 16, 2022

A portrait of attorney, civil rights advocate and former Shelby County commissioner Walter L. Bailey Jr. recently was unveiled at an event at the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis. The portrait, by internationally acclaimed artist Carl F. Hess, will be installed in the Walter L. Bailey Jr. Criminal Justice Center at 201 Poplar, the Tri-State Defender reports. That facility was named after Bailey in 2018. Bailey was a young attorney who challenged the racial and economic inequities in Memphis and Shelby County more than 50 years ago. He gained national prominence when he took on the case desegregating Shelby County Public Schools, and handled the legal defense of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1968.