Symposium on Race

The Franklin H. Williams Judicial Commission’s hosted its Symposium on Race: Illuminating Modern Systemic Racism’s Roots in Slavery and Legally Codified Discrimination on June 16, 2022.

The Williams Commission featured Pulitzer-winning historian Professor Annette Gordon-Reed and Hon. Denny Chin, Senior Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit as keynote speakers. The full-day event centered on illuminating modern systemic racism’s roots in slavery and legally codified racial discrimination, and included two panel discussions with leading legal academics, practitioners, and historians. The Symposium was granted four credits of Continuing Legal Education in partnership with the remarkable team at the Judicial Institute led by Commissioner and Dean, Kathleen Davidson.

The morning panelists focused on professional practice, with in-depth analysis of the Lemmon Freedom Case and America’s framework for de jure racial discrimination. Commissioner Paula Johnson was an outstanding moderator for the morning’s panel and synthesized multiple complex legal perspectives into an informative and thought-provoking session. The afternoon session sought to identify solutions for eliminating racial inequities through the law, as well as the Court’s role in advancing equal justice. Judge Shahabuddeen Ally led an engaging and insightful discussion into how the law can be used to advance equal justice. The Symposium also featured the Lemmon Case documentary and exhibit courtesy of the Historical Society of the New York Courts. The program was a hybrid program with the option to view virtually via Teams or limited in person viewing at the New York State Judicial Institute in White Plains. We had over 150 attendees across mediums.

Additional featured speakers included:
• President Frank Wu, President of Queens College, CUNY;
• Professor Natalie Gomez-Velez, CUNY School of Law; Professor Randolph M. McLaughlin, Pace University Elizabeth Haub School of Law;
• Professor Sarah Gronningsater, University of Pennsylvania School of Arts and Sciences;
• President Lourdes Rosado, Esq., President and General Counsel, Latino Justice PRLDEF;
• Professor Vincent Southerland, Clinical Law Professor and Co-Faculty Director of the Center on Race, Inequality, and the Law at NYU School of Law;
• Professor Elaine Chiu, Professor of Law at St. John’s University School of Law and Faculty Director of the Ronald H. Brown Center for Civil Rights;
• Yannick Wood, Esq., Director of Criminal Justice Reform Program at the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice

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