The Honorable Ann Claire Williams, US Court of Appeals, 7th Circuit, does not mince words.  “We are all here, in part, because the people that came before us made sacrifices,” she said, surveying the crowd that filled Shearman & Sterling’s second floor conference room in New York. “We all have an obligation, then, to give something back toward the greater good.” 

Invited to speak on January 28th by Lawyers Without Borders, an event hosted by Shearman & Sterling, Judge Williams, a strong believer in public service, talked about her involvement with legal training and educational programs in Africa, urging the audience of mainly young associates to “pursue justice” and to “think globally.”

Introducing her was litigation partner Stephen Fishbein, with whom Judge Williams worked at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania, in 2006. Fishbein noted her extraordinary talents as a judge and a teacher, and her inspiring, seemingly limitless, reserves of energy.

Indeed, even a quick perusal of Judge Williams’s judicial duties and domestic advocacy work would make a workaholic blanch. Just a few of her activities include a two-year stint as president of the Federal Judges Association, an organization dedicated to preserving the independence of the federal judiciary, and Chair of the Court Administration and Case Management Committee, where for seven years she was responsible for making policy recommendations in this area for the federal judiciary. She was appointed to the job by Chief Justice Rehnquist of the United States Supreme Court. Additionally, Judge Williams has taught trial advocacy with the National Institute for Trial Advocacy (NITA), the United States’ premier trial advocacy program, for more than 20 years and is also a member of NITA’s board of trustees, as well as co-founder of Minority Legal Education Resources, Inc.

Judge Williams’s commitment to “planting the seeds for hope and change” and her experiences as an African-American attorney and judge (she is the first and only African-American to serve on the Seventh Circuit), are what led her to work in several countries in Africa. In 2002 and 2003, she led delegations to Ghana to train members of the Ghanaian judiciary, where she found judges taking notes by hand during trials because court reporters were then nonexistent. She taught trial and advocacy courses in 2005 and 2006 at the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia at The Hague and also at the ICTR, in collaboration with Shearman & Sterling attorneys. Moreover, she has co-led a constitutional law conference in Nairobi, Kenya, and organized and led the Kenyan Women’s Trial Advocacy Program in 2007. Working with Lawyers Without Borders, Shearman & Sterling lawyers, and others, she has also conducted trial advocacy training in Liberia.

“It is very difficult when you see such poverty and strife,” Judge Williams remarked. “When people languish in jails for years without being brought to trial and corruption is rampant, it is hard to think of how things can change. But they can. And we can make a difference by working together to create sustainable training programs that really make a difference in people’s lives.”