ANN ARBOR—William A. McClain will be awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree at the University of Michigan’s Spring Commencement on April 27. The degree recognizes his courage and dedication in overcoming barriers to the study and practice of law to become now, at the age of 89, the oldest living African American graduate of the U-M Law School.

McClain, who practiced law as a corporate attorney in Cincinnati, Ohio, also served as city solicitor for Cincinnati and twice served as acting city manager. His career included many “firsts.” He was the first African American member of the Cincinnati Bar Association, the first African American lawyer to serve as the city attorney of a major American city (Cincinnati), the first African American partner in a major Cincinnati law firm and the first African American judge in the Court of Common Pleas in Hamilton County, Ohio.

In 1934, he enrolled as the only African American student at the U-M Law School, in a class of approximately 450 students. He encountered a number of race-based obstacles while a student here: he could not live in the Law Quad and was prevented from joining study groups so essential to a legal education. But he earned the respect of classmates and faculty and was honored with the School’s Henry M. Campbell Case Club and Student Judgeship Award.

He graduated from the U-M Law School in 1937 after earning a B.A. degree from Wittenberg College, in Springfield, Ohio, in 1934, where he also was the only African American student in his class.

McClain is a strong supporter of education for minority students and has taught at the University of Cincinnati Law School, Salmon P. Chase Law School, and the University of Toledo’s Ohio Legal Center Institute. The Cincinnati Bar Association established the William A. McClain Scholarship Fund for deserving minority law students in 1994 in his honor.

He has served on the U-M Law School Committee of Visitors for more than three decades. Among his numerous awards are the Ellis Island Gold Medal of Honor, Certificate of Honor from the board of directors of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and the Distinguished Public Service Award of the National Institute of Municipal Law Officers. He is a member of the National Bar Association Hall of Fame.

Law SchoolEllis Island Gold Medal of Honor