FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Philip S. Anderson, past president of the American Bar Association, will speak at the University of Arkansas School of Law class of 2002 commencement. 

The ceremony will begin at 1:30 p.m., Saturday, May 18, at the Walton Arts Center in Fayetteville.

Anderson is a 1959 graduate of the University of Arkansas School of Law and is a partner at Williams & Anderson, a general civil practice law firm in Little Rock.  In addition to serving as ABA president from 1998-1999, he has been active in the Pulaski County Bar Association, the Arkansas Bar Association, The Arkansas Bar Foundation, and the American Law Institute. 

For 35 years he sat on the Arkansas Supreme Court Committee on Civil Jury Instructions, which authored the Arkansas Model Jury Instructions.  President Jimmy Carter appointed Anderson to serve on the United States Circuit Judge Nominating Commission's Panel for the Eighth Circuit from 1978-79.  He is a former member and co-chair of the Federal Advisory Committee to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.  In 1999, he received awards for his advocacy work on behalf of detained immigrants from the American Immigration Foundation, the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund and the Political Asylum/Immigration Representation Project in Boston. 

Anderson is only the third Arkansan to be elected president of the American Bar

Association, succeeding Uriah M. Rose (1901-02) and his father-in-law, Edward L. Wright (1970-71).

While at the University of Arkansas School of Law, Anderson was editor-in-chief of the Arkansas Law Review.  He is married to the former Missy Wright.  They have three children and several grandchildren.

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