With sadness, I have to report that Judge J. Dickson Phillips of the Fourth Circuit passed away on Sunday. He was 94. I clerked for him in 1990-91 and I can't imagine having had a richer year. Judge Phillips was as fine and kind a human being as you could hope to meet. He had a wry sense of humor, a sharp intellect, a deliberative manner, and a passion for barbecue. Eastern Carolina barbecue, that is.
Judge Phillips mentored several clerks who would later become law professors, including former Cornell Dean Stewart Schwab, Mitch Berman at Penn, Theresa Newman at Duke, Gerry Leonard at BU, Janet Moore at Cincinnati, and Tom Kelley and Melissa Saunders at UNC. I'm sure there are other full-time and adjunct faculty whom I'm missing. His obituary gives the details of his remarkable life so I won't repeat them here. Suffice to say, he will be missed.
The image is from Judge Phillip's earlier days as Dean of the University of North Carolina School of Law.
I'm sorry to hear about this, Dan. His passing represents the end of an important era for NC and for UNC. I feel particularly these days about how the generation of people who served in World War II and those who came to adulthood during World War II is passing and how much we will miss them.
Posted by: Alfred Brophy | August 29, 2017 at 06:15 PM
Dan, thanks for posting. One month court week began the Monday after Thanksgiving, and I drove up from home in the Norfolk area, stopping at Pierce's in Williamsburg for some BBQ I could brink to the Judge. It was the red sauce stuff, and I'm pretty sure he never tried it. Jim Wheaton (1985-1986)
Posted by: Jim Wheaton | August 29, 2017 at 09:40 PM