- Collection:
- Social Change Collection
- Title:
- Millard C. Farmer oral history interview, 2012-11-2
- Creator:
- Farmer, Millard
- Contributor to Resource:
- Roberts, Peter
- Publisher:
- Atlanta, Ga. : Georgia State University Library
- Date of Original:
- 2012-11-02
- Subject:
- Lawyers
Women Lawyers
Capital punishment
Criminal defense lawyers
Procedure (Law)
Civil rights movement
Jury selection
Team Defense Project
Criminal Justice Coordinating Council (Ga.) - People:
- Farmer, Millard
- Location:
- United States, Georgia, 32.75042, -83.50018
United States, Georgia, Cook County, Adel, 31.13727, -83.42408
United States, Georgia, Fulton County, Atlanta, 33.749, -84.38798
United States, Louisiana, 31.00047, -92.0004 - Medium:
- oral histories (literary works)
interviews - Type:
- Sound
Text - Format:
- audio/mpeg
application/pdf - Description:
- Born in 1934, noted death penalty defense attorney Millard C. Farmer, Jr. grew up in Newnan, Georgia. A University of Georgia graduate (1956), he worked in the family business and attended Woodrow Wilson College of Law during the evenings. He was admitted to the Georgia Bar in 1967, built a successful practice in Newnan, and was a co-founder of the Bank of Coweta there. Farmer also represented disadvantaged clients, and came to question whether African American defendants could be tried fairly before all-white juries. By 1970, he and his associates were challenging jury composition on the grounds of race. In 1976, he co-founded the Team Defense Project (TDP) with social psychologist Courtney J. Mullin and Morris Dees of the Southern Poverty Law Center. TDP was dedicated to the representation of indigent persons in death penalty cases and enjoyed many high-profile successes in the 1970s and 1980s, notably the case of the “Dawson Five” in Dawson, Georgia. Most of Farmer and Team Defense Project’s work was intended to bring attention to the inequities in the way capital punishment is used, and many of TDP’s litigation strategies, such as jury composition challenges and motion filings it developed, have become widely adopted tactics. Farmer and his colleagues taught and lectured on these strategies to numerous legal groups and audiences. An acknowledged expert in capital cases, Farmer has also represented clients bringing racial discrimination suits. He has received numerous honors from legal and civil liberties advocacy organizations.
Farmer recalls the standard procedure and schedule for criminal cases at the time he began practicing law. He expresses his regrets about winning an acquittal for an African American prowler by exploiting the sentiment and racial stereotypes of the jury. He explains the importance of having extensive knowledge about the jury. He notes that his father’s fair treatment of African Americans influenced him in seeking fairness for them in the courts. He mentions his partner Steve Fanning and describes the early days of jury composition challenges in Georgia county courts when their requests for random sampling were inadmissible. He describes his "migration" from the standard legal procedures to jury composition challenges and filing motions with witnesses and supporting evidence. He notes how fairness in the courts encouraged people to speak out on racial discrimination. He recollects the expanding role of women in the legal profession. He provides more details regarding a white female client who would not allow a jury composition challenge; how he was recruited for the Georgia Criminal Justice Council; the founding of the Team Defense Project; and the importance of community involvement and pressure. He describes receiving his first judge disqualification in the Henry Willis case; making a personal plea to Louisiana Governor Edwin Edwards; advantageously utilizing “conflictineering” to expose an unrelated conflict in the community; and the importance of helping everyone connected with the trial to better understand each other. He notes that at present friends of politicians get appointed to government-funded programs for indigent defense. - Metadata URL:
- http://digitalcollections.library.gsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/schange/id/14
- IIIF manifest:
- https://digitalcollections.library.gsu.edu/iiif/2/schange:14/manifest.json
- Language:
- eng
- Additional Rights Information:
- Copyright to this item is owned by Millard Farmer. Millard Farmer has made this item available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License. Please see http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ for more information.
- Bibliographic Citation (Cite As):
- Millard Farmer, interviewed by Peter J. Roberts, 2 November 2012, Y2012-03, Social Change Collection, Special Collection and Archives, Georgia State University Library, Atlanta
- Extent:
- 1 hour, 37 minutes, 39 seconds of audio and a 46 page transcript.
- Original Collection:
- Social Change Oral Histories
Social Change Collection - Holding Institution:
- Georgia State University. Special Collections
- Rights:
-
