Morris Dees, Founder of Southern Poverty Law Center, to Speak at School of Law

UPDATE 8/19/2009: Several media outlets covered yesterday’s remarkable keynote speech by Morris Dees, including Channel 40/29 television: http://www.4029tv.com/video/20451721/index.html, and The Morning News: http://www.nwaonline.net/articles/2009/08/19/news/081909fzuadees.txt.

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Morris Dees, pioneering civil rights attorney and founder and chief trial counsel of the Southern Poverty Law Center, will give a presentation at the University of Arkansas School of Law at 9 a.m. Tuesday, Aug. 18. The talk is open to the public and will take place in Leflar Law Center in the E.J. Ball Courtroom.

“I am thrilled to welcome Morris Dees — a great, personal hero to me and so many others, to the School of Law,” said Cynthia Nance, dean and professor of law. “Truly, I can think of no better person to exemplify the monumental positive difference our profession can make than Morris Dees. I have no doubt he will inspire and educate us all.”

The son of an Alabama farmer, Dees achieved remarkable success as a lawyer and publisher in the 1960s. While snowed in at an airport in 1967, Dees decided to change course in his life and devote himself to helping others.

As he wrote in his autobiography, A Season for Justice, “I was ready to take that step, to speak out for my black friends who were still 'disenfranchised' even after the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Little had changed in the South. Whites held the power and had no intention of voluntarily sharing it. ... I had made up my mind. I would sell the company as soon as possible and specialize in civil rights law. All the things in my life that had brought me to this point, all the pulls and tugs of my conscience, found a singular peace. It did not matter what my neighbors would think, or the judges, the bankers, or even my relatives."

Following this epiphany, Dees began taking on highly controversial civil rights cases across Alabama and the South, including, in 1969, filing suit to integrate the Montgomery YMCA. In 1971, he and his law partner Joseph J. Levin Jr. founded the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala. Civil rights activist Julian Bond was the center’s first president.

The Southern Poverty Law Center works to educate the public about tolerance while its legal team fights discrimination and hate groups. The center’s Intelligence Project tracks and monitors hate groups and provides updates to law enforcement and the public. Its Teaching Tolerance program is one of the world’s most comprehensive resources for anti-bias information and education.

Contact:

Andy Albertson, director of communications
School of Law
(479) 575-6111, aalbert@uark.edu