
Very soon after I became a judge, I was invited to serve on the judicial education committee of the Alabama Association of Circuit Judges, and I served on that committee sixteen of the eighteen years that I was on the bench. So I had the opportunity form the outset to help plan for the education of judges. I also had the opportunity to participate in the judicial education courses, and participated in over 500 hours of the course work prepared for Circuit Judges in Alabama. I also had the opportunity in 1984 to attend the 4 week general jurisdiction course at the National Judicial College in Reno Nevada. Because of my strong interest in Judicial Education, I decided to pursue a Master’s Degree in Judicial Studies, and earned that degree in 1999. In the meantime, I had the opportunity to attend 3 different two week sessions on Law and Economics, at the University of Kansas. I also attended a program that provided training for Judicial educators at the National Council of Juvenile and Family Court Judges. I found the opportunity to participate for several years in law and literature seminars at Montevallo University extremely helpful in the development of my thinking.,
I had the opportunity to provide leadership in Judicial education programs. I assisted several times with orientation of new Alabama Judges on several different topics. Based on the Law and Literature idea, I developed the Foundations in Pluralism Seminar for judges at Tuskegee University, base on the writings of Black authors. That seminar resulted in an invitation to participate as a presenter in a National Symposium on the Future of Judicial Branch Education in St. Louis. Which in turn led to an invitation to make a presentation to the Pennsylvania Conference of State Trial Court Judges. The Foundations in Pluralism seminars also led to an invitation to make a presentation about the program to the National Conference of State Trial Court Judges in Tucson. I was also invited by the Justice Department to participate in a one day symposium on law and race during the Clinton Administration. I was also instrumental in preparing a seminar for judges about how to properly try capital murder cases, and prepared a manual for the use of judges in those cases.
Before losing my bid for reelection in 2000, I had been selected co-chair of the Judicial Education Committee of the National Conference of State Trial Court Judges, and was seriously engage in a project to revamp and upgrade judicial Education nationally. This Website includes a description of the preliminary work on that proposal.
The following menu will take you to the papers indicated. The tabs will provide more details concerning my work and the organizations involved in judicial education.
The Circuit Judges of Alabama are members of an association, with officers, and various committees, including a continuing judicial education committee. The Alabama Judicial College works with both the Circuit Judges Association and the District Judges Association to educate and train judges.
Your content goes here. Edit or remove this text inline or in the module Content settings. You can also style every aspect of this content in the module Design settings and even apply custom CSS to this text in the module Advanced settings.
Your content goes here. Edit or remove this text inline or in the module Content settings. You can also style every aspect of this content in the module Design settings and even apply custom CSS to this text in the module Advanced settings.
Your content goes here. Edit or remove this text inline or in the module Content settings. You can also style every aspect of this content in the module Design settings and even apply custom CSS to this text in the module Advanced settings.
Your content goes here. Edit or remove this text inline or in the module Content settings. You can also style every aspect of this content in the module Design settings and even apply custom CSS to this text in the module Advanced settings.