Judge Thelton Henderson

"Judge Thelton Henderson, Senior Judge of the Federal Circuit for Northern California, began his legal career with the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department in 1962. He was the first African American Justice Department attorney to work in the South, where he became an important liasion between the Justice Department and civil rights leaders. Later, Judge Henderson engaged in private practice, worked as a legal services attorney, and became an Assistant Dean at Stanford Law School, where he established one of the first successful law school minority admissions programs in the country. President Carter appointed him to the federal bench in 1980, and during his tenure Judge Henderson has issued a number of notable and sometimes controversial decisions. Judge Henderson has been the recipient of numerous honors and awards including the American Bar Association's Thurgood Marshall award, the Bernard Witkin Medal from the California Bar Association, and the Anti-Defamation League's Pearlstein Civil Rights Award"--