Legendary Lawyer Doris Brin Walker Dies; Represented Angela Davis, Smith Act Defendants
Doris "Dobby" Brin Walker, the first woman president of the National Lawyers Guild, died on August 13 at the age of 90. Doris was a brilliant lawyer and a tenacious defender of human rights. The only woman in her University of California Berkeley law school class, Doris defied the odds throughout her life, achieving significant victories for labor and political activists.
Doris's legal and political activism spanned several decades and some of the most turbulent but significant periods in US history. She organized workers, fought against Jim Crow and McCarthyism, was active in the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements and actively opposed the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan...
... During the McCarthy era, Doris was called to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee and she also represented several HUAC witnesses. From 1956 to 1961, Doris successfully defended William and Sylvia Powell, who faced the death penalty, against Korean War sedition charges. The US government charged that articles Powell had written reporting and criticizing US biological weapons use in Korea were false and written with intent to hinder the war effort. When a mistrial ended the sedition case, the government charged the Powells with treason. Attorney General Robert Kennedy dismissed the case in 1961.
A partner with the NLG firm of Treuhaft & Walker in Oakland, California, from 1961 to 1977, Doris's practice focused on civil rights, free speech and draft cases during the Vietnam War. She also defended death penalty cases. Perhaps best known for her defense of Angela Davis, Doris was part of a legal team that secured Angela's acquittal on charges of murder, kidnapping and conspiracy. In that case, which Harvard Professor Charles Ogletree in 2005 called "clearly the trial of the 20th century, and one that exemplified the vast and diverse talents of the true Dream Team of the legal profession," the defense pioneered the use of jury consultants...
... In 2004, Doris submitted a resolution on behalf of the NLG Bay Area Chapter to the Conference of Delegates of the California Bar Association asking for an investigation of representations the Bush administration used to justify the war in Iraq for possible impeachment...
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Doris's legal and political activism spanned several decades and some of the most turbulent but significant periods in US history. She organized workers, fought against Jim Crow and McCarthyism, was active in the civil rights and anti-Vietnam War movements and actively opposed the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan...
... During the McCarthy era, Doris was called to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee and she also represented several HUAC witnesses. From 1956 to 1961, Doris successfully defended William and Sylvia Powell, who faced the death penalty, against Korean War sedition charges. The US government charged that articles Powell had written reporting and criticizing US biological weapons use in Korea were false and written with intent to hinder the war effort. When a mistrial ended the sedition case, the government charged the Powells with treason. Attorney General Robert Kennedy dismissed the case in 1961.
A partner with the NLG firm of Treuhaft & Walker in Oakland, California, from 1961 to 1977, Doris's practice focused on civil rights, free speech and draft cases during the Vietnam War. She also defended death penalty cases. Perhaps best known for her defense of Angela Davis, Doris was part of a legal team that secured Angela's acquittal on charges of murder, kidnapping and conspiracy. In that case, which Harvard Professor Charles Ogletree in 2005 called "clearly the trial of the 20th century, and one that exemplified the vast and diverse talents of the true Dream Team of the legal profession," the defense pioneered the use of jury consultants...
... In 2004, Doris submitted a resolution on behalf of the NLG Bay Area Chapter to the Conference of Delegates of the California Bar Association asking for an investigation of representations the Bush administration used to justify the war in Iraq for possible impeachment...