The founder of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama recounts his experiences as a lawyer working to assist those desperately in need, reflecting on his pursuit of the ideal of compassion in American justice.

Carter narrates the life story of his exceptional grandmother, Eunice Carter, an African-American attorney who masterminded the sting operation that resulted in the imprisonment of mobster Charles "Lucky" Luciano. Working under governor Thomas Dewey, Dewey repeatedly passed her over when making appointments. The author provides analysis on this time in history in which most African-Americans moved from voting Republican to Democrat. Carter also provides...

In just a few generations, Michelle Obama's family has blazed a path from a slave cabin to the White House. She's now writing a new chapter in history as a fresh kind of first lady, old-fashioned in many ways, yet so genuine and natural that she constantly surprises and inspires.

Thurgood Marshall became the first African American appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but it's his life leading up to that point--from school troublemaker to passionate lawyer--that makes him both accessibly real and a role model to Americans of every color.

Black Americans have always relied on the oral tradition--storytelling, preaching, and speechmaking--to assert their rights and preserve and pass on their history and culture. In the pulpit, courtroom, or cotton field, they have understood the power of words, distinctively delivered, to educate and inspire. Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., one of the nation's finest speakers, imbibed this tradition as a young man and has given it his own unique inflection from...