Oral history interview with Adolpho A. Birch, Jr., 22 June 2005.
(Document/manuscript/pamphlet/archival material)

Materials housed in Special Collections Division of the Main Library, Nashville Public Library.

The interview consists of a transcript and sound recordings in two formats: 2 original audio cassettes recorded in 2002; and a set of 3 data CDs containing MP3 files (a master, a copy master, and a use copy). The original cassettes were digitized during a conversion project in 2006.

In library use only. Available by appointment.

Scope and content: Oral history interview with Nashville Civil Rights Movement participant Adolpho A. Birch, Jr., conducted on 22 June 2005 by John Egerton as part of the Nashville Public Library's Civil Rights Oral History Project. During the ca. 1 hour interview, Birch discusses such topics as his family; his education in Washington, D.C.; growing up in segregated Washington, D.C.; his service in the Navy; coming to Nashville to practice law in 1958; working with other Afican American leaders in Nashville, including Robert Lillard, Z. Alexander Looby, Avon Williams, Jr., and Coyness Ennix, Sr.; the YMCA Law School; his appointments to various positions, from assistant public defender for Davidson County to Chief Justice of the Tennessee Supreme Court; and his perception of Nashville today.

Cite as: Oral history interview with Adolpho A. Birch, Jr., Civil Rights Oral History Project, Special Collections Division, Nashville Public Library.

This material may be protected by copyright law (Title 17 U.S. Code)

Born in 1932 in Washington, D.C., Adolpho A. Birch, Jr. was the son of an Episcopal priest who had immigrated to the US from Belize just before World War I. Birch's mother died when he was five. He graduated from Washington, D.C.'s Dunbar High School in 1950 and went on to attend Lincoln University from 1950 to 1952. He received his BA and JD degrees from Howard University in 1956 and served as a member of the Howard Law Review. Almost immediately upon graduating, he entered the U.S. Naval Reserve, serving on active duty from 1956 to 1958 in the Mediterranean. While on leave in 1957, he took and passed the the Tennessee Bar exam. Birch moved to Nashville in 1958 to work with local African American real estate lawyer J.F. McClellan. He taught legal medicine at Meharry Medical College and lectured in law at Fisk and Tennessee State University. He maintained a private law practice from 1958 to 1966, working occasionally with other local lawyers such as Robert Lillard. Brich was appointed assistant public defender for Davidson County in 1963 and assistance district attorney general in 1966. He was appointed General Sessions Court of Davidson County judge in 1978, Trial Courts of Davidson County presiding judge in 1981, and a member of the Court of the Judiciary in 1983. In 1987, Birch was appointed to the Court of Criminal Appeals. In 1991, Birch joined the teaching faculty of the Nashville School of Law and has served as University of Memphis Distinguished Jurist in Residence. He was appointed to the Tennessee Supreme Court in 1993 and made Chief Justice in 1996, becoming the first African American to serve in this capacity. He retired from the Supreme Court in 2006, during which year the A.A. Birch building, which houses the Davidson County Criminal Courts, was dedicated in his honor in downtown Nashville.

In English.

Transcript available in repository.

Forms part of: Civil Rights Oral History Project.