The College of Law paid tribute to the namesake of the Julian Blackshear, Jr. Gala at the 20th annual scholarship event on Saturday.
The event, hosted by the Black Law Student Association, celebrates the College’s commitment to diversity and recognizes pioneers like Blackshear whose experiences influenced positive change.
Interim Dean Doug Blaze honored Blackshear with the RBJ Campbelle Award for his extraordinary efforts in advancing the cause of equality and justice.
“We celebrate, recognize, and thank those who went before us to make us the law school we are today,” Blaze said. “The spirit and tenacity of those pioneers was critical to the law school becoming what it is today, and to what we hope it will be in the future. That spirit was personified by Mr. Blackshear when he purposefully came to a still effectively all white law school in 1964.”
Incoming College of Law Dean Lonnie T. Brown, Jr., who served as the keynote speaker for the event, shared some of the experiences he endured as a child of color growing up in the 1960s and how those experiences have informed his leadership style.
“The times were pretty dark in many ways. Segregation, though legally dismantled, was still a strong de facto reality,” Brown said. “Throughout my early childhood, we lived in a part of town that was exclusively Black, not because we chose to—though we might have anyway— but because we had no realistic choice.”
So many of the people who influenced him “recognized the importance of diversity, but more importantly they understood that diversity in terms of composition was not enough,” Brown said. “Unless an environment is created and maintained that enables people from diverse backgrounds to feel like valued members of a community, true diversity can never be achieved.”
Brown said he looks forward to becoming the dean at the University of Tennessee College of Law because he believes it values diversity and is committed to cultivating an environment in which “all students, faculty, and staff, no matter who they are, what they look like, who they love, or what they believe, feel supported and experience a true sense of belonging.”
Third-year law students were also recognized at the event for their leadership and overall excellence.
Mecca Shabazz received the Roy BJ Campbelle Leadership Award; Zaria Walker received the Julian Blackshear Outstanding Student Award; and Mikayla Swinson was honored with the Frank Ennix Award for Excellence.
Lillian Blackshear, daughter of Julian Blackshear and a College of Law alumna, accepted the award on her father’s behalf. While the annual gala bears Blackshear’s name, he had not been honored previously at the event, Blaze said.