Virtual Book Club: Answering The Call

JOIN: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/82507528316

An American attorney, judge, and law professor, Jones was born in the Smoky Hollow section of Youngstown to parents who had moved to Ohio to ensure a better life for their children.   Jones realized his parents’ dreams, and devoted his life to ensuring that future generations of African Americans would enjoy the full protection and privileges of the United States Constitution.

As general counsel for the NAACP, Jones fought to end segregation in the schools and military and to preserve civil rights legislation.  He made history as the first African-American U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, and as counsel to the Kerner Commission, which infamously concluded that America was moving toward two societies, one white and one Black, that were separate and unequal.   President Jimmy Carter appointed Jones as a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, which is the federal appeals court that decides cases from Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky, and Tennessee.   Judge Jones retired from the judiciary in 2002 and resumed private practice in Cincinnati, which he actively maintained until his death in 2020 at the age of 93 years.  The federal courthouse in Youngstown now bears Judges Jones’s name.

The special event features Judge Jones' daughter, Stephanie Jones, who will share her perspective of the Judge's work and also as a father who inspired his children and so many others.  The program then turns to a discussion of Judge Jones’s acclaimed book, Answering The Call,  led by Jenn Dye, JD, Ph.D.    Our special guests  - Kanisha Ervin, the Dinsmore and P&G Fellow at OIP, Lindsay Ford Ellis, associate general counsel at OhioHealth, and Ashley Nkadi, a current law student at the University of Cincinnati College of Law – will pay tribute to Judge Jones’s many legacies.

This program is sponsored by Chagrin Arts, the Jones Center for Race, Gender and Social Justice at the University of Cincinnati College of Law, and the Ohio Innocence Project.