Matthew J. Perry: The Man, His Times, and His Legacy - Hardcover

by William Lewis Burke (Author), W. Lewis Burke (Editor), Belinda F. Gergel (Editor)

Matthew J. Perry: The Man, His Times, and His Legacy chronicles the life and accomplishments of the attorney who led the struggle for desegregation in South Carolina, served as a primary legal advocate in the national civil rights movement, and became South Carolina's first African American U.S. District Court judge. In this volume, scholars of the civil rights era, fellow civil rights activists, jurists, attorneys, a governor, and an award-winning photojournalist join together to produce a multilayered biography of Matthew J. Perry. Collectively they bring to light the remarkable achievements of a man well known in his home state but sometimes obscured on the national stage by the shadows of Thurgood Marshall, J. Waties Waring, and Charles Hamilton Houston.

Author Biography

Belinda F. Gergel is the coauthor of In Pursuit of the Tree of Life: A History of the Early Jews of Columbia, South Carolina, and the Tree of Life Congregation and other articles on local history in South Carolina. A former chair of the department of history and political science at Columbia College, she also resides in Columbia.