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Chief Judge Solomon Oliver Jr.: I think the main thing that Wooster gave me, or the Wooster
experience gave me, was confidence. I came away from the College feeling like I could
succeed at whatever I chose to do, and I think that’s part of the Wooster philosophy. Wooster
really encourages every student to reach his or her full potential. There is no sense at
Wooster that some people are going to achieve and others are not. It was this kind of egalitarian
approach to success that caused me to believe that I could do whatever I wanted to do.
I didn’t know any lawyers, I never met any judges, and so really, I was just making the
decision without a lot of knowledge, but I grew up in Alabama, as I said before, in Bessemer.
It was very segregated there in the 60s, and in the 50s, at least in the early 60s. And
so there were a lot of protests going on, things were starting to change, and I saw
that lawyers were very much involved in that change. So I saw law as a way of helping to
change society for the better.
Well, I have one photograph of William Henry Hastie and the other photograph is of Thurgood
Marshall. Most people know of Thurgood Marshall, the first African American who served on the
U.S. Supreme Court. And, of course, before he did, he argued many cases before the Supreme
Court and one of those was Brown vs. Board of Education, which is one of the most important
Supreme Court cases in our history. In that case, most people know, was one where the
Supreme Court said that “separate but equal” educational facilities were unconstitutional.
William Henry Hastie was a mentor of Thurgood Marshall. He was the very first African American
appointed to the federal court and I had the privilege of serving as his last law clerk.