Philadelphia Freedom, Memoir of a Civil Rights Lawyer
University of Michigan Press, 2008
43 Pages Posted: 1 Dec 2008 Last revised: 29 Jan 2009
Abstract
Philadelphia Freedom, Memoir of a Civil Rights Lawyer analyzes and critiques civil rights law, practice and history from the perspective of a civil rights lawyer and in the form of a memoir. It takes the reader inside the lawyer's (David Kairys) head - it is a memoir - as he searches for arguments, theories, remedies and solutions first in 1968 as a novice public defender and later as a partner in a small civil rights firm. This excerpt is chapter 1 (along with the short introduction and the table of contents), "Georgia on My Mind," about a convicted murderer who escaped from a Georgia chain gang in 1945 and was discovered almost 25 years later gainfully employed in construction and living with a wife and four children in Philadelphia. After a series of sometimes wild theories and strategies and unpredictable events, the governor of Pennsylvania refused Georgia's extradition request, a first in Pennsylvania's history. Cover comments: "David Kairys is one of the grand long-distance runners in the struggle for justice in America. His brilliant legal mind and superb lawyerly skills are legendary. This marvelous book is his gift to us!"-Cornel West, Princeton University, award-winning author of Race Matters; "With engaging, insider stories of innovative legal strategies of a truly creative lawyer, this book evokes the ebullient spirit of progressive social change launched in the 1960s and should be read by aspiring and practicing lawyers as well as anyone interested in American social history. Philadelphia Freedom reads like a suspense novel and reveals how novel legal and political thinking can and does make a real difference to individuals and to the quality of justice."-Martha L. Minow, Harvard Law School.
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