Professor Breckenridge honored as one of 2018’s Most Influential Black Lawyers
Legal Leadership The summer edition of Savoy Magazine celebrates Professor Tillman Breckenridge, Director of W&M Law School's Appellate and Supreme Court Clinic, as one of 2018’s “Most Influential Black Lawyers.” Photo by David F. Morrill
Professor Tillman Breckenridge has been named one of 2018’s “Most Influential Black Lawyers” in the summer edition of Savoy magazine.
The magazine’s listing celebrates “African-American men and women who have been recognized for their legal leadership and expertise in national and global-leading corporations.”
A partner at Bailey & Glasser LLP in Washington, D.C., Breckenridge also serves as an adjunct professor of law and as managing attorney of William & Mary Law School’s Appellate and Supreme Court Clinic.
Breckenridge’s practice at Bailey & Glasser includes a diverse array of appellate litigation matters at all levels. He has represented companies, organizations, individuals, and foreign, state and local governments before the United States Supreme Court, every U.S. Courts of Appeals, and the Supreme Court of Virginia, the California Courts of Appeal and the Illinois Courts of Appeal.
Breckenridge’s work at William & Mary Law School begin in 2011, when he approached Dean Davison Douglas with the idea of forming an Appellate and Supreme Court Clinic. The clinic takes cases to the Court of Appeals after someone has lost in a federal district court.
Students get a full appellate practice experience, writing the briefs and traveling across the country arguing the cases under his supervision.
The result has been an extremely successful clinical program. Since its inception, the clinic has completed 20 cases in the US Court of Appeals for clients who could not otherwise afford specialized appellate counsel and in cases that usually had little hope of appellate success without it. Fifteen of those cases were granted oral argument, with students arguing in nine different circuits.
Thus far, the clinic has received 17 final dispositions, winning more than half of them.
Breckenridge has also been a lecturer at DePaul University on the subjects of Constitutional Civil Liberties and First Amendment law.
The past 10 months have been award winning for Breckenridge at William & Mary. At the beginning of the fall 2017 semester, he received the St. George Tucker Adjunct Professorship Award during a luncheon in the Great Hall of the Sir Christopher Wren Building. The annual award recognizes an outstanding member of William & Mary Law School’s adjunct faculty for service on behalf of students, and is selected by nomination from the Law School Community.
And in May, 2018, during this year’s graduation awards ceremony, the Law School recognized him with honorary membership in The Order of Barristers for his attainment of distinction in the legal profession.
“It is quite an honor to be listed among so many people I know of high character and achievement,” Breckenridge said, “And with appellate practice being so hard to break into for African-Americans, it is particularly gratifying to be recognized for success in that realm.”
The full listing of the 2018 Most Influential Black Lawyers can be viewed online at SavoyNetwork.com. The print edition of Savoy’s summer 2018 issue can be ordered on Amazon and purchased in Barnes & Noble bookstores nationwide.
About William & Mary Law School
Thomas Jefferson founded William & Mary Law School in 1779 to train leaders for the new nation. Now in its third century, America's oldest law school continues its historic mission of educating citizen lawyers who are prepared both to lead and to serve.