< Previous70 ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 UNLIKELY CHAMPION OF EQUITY: JUDGE JAMES B. MCMILLAN Jim McMillan — who grew up in the 1920s on a farm in Robeson County, North Carolina, and attended all- white schools until arriving at Harvard Law School — never expected to become a precedent- setting champion of racial equity. As a courtroom lawyer in the 1950s, he represented small businesses, often defending Charlotte’s Yellow Cab Co. He became a partner in Helms, Mulliss, McMillan & Johnston, the predecessor of Helms Mulliss & Wicker, which merged into McGuireWoods in 2008. He was embedded in Charlotte’s establishment. BY BRAD KUTROW A STORY OF USA STORY OF US ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 71 But when McMillan became a federal district judge, he swore an oath to “do equal right” to all parties and to “faithfully and impartially” discharge his duties under the Constitution. And when presented with incontrovertible evidence that Charlotte’s school board had consciously maintained a segregated system, crafting assignment plans, siting new schools, and busing white students to maintain all-white and all-Black schools, McMillan did not hesitate to address that inequity. After years of litigation, in 1969 he ordered the board to remedy segregation and to eliminate racially identifiable schools. In Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education (1971), the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously affirmed McMillan’s orders and endorsed busing as a potential remedy for school segregation. Although McMillan’s Swann decision is now seen as a courageous, crucial step forward for educational equity, in 1969 it provoked “fierce and bitter resistance.” As former Charlotte Observer reporter Frye Gaillard described in “The Dream Long Deferred,” a history of Charlotte’s school desegregation, white parents formed a “Concerned Parents Association” to oppose busing and McMillan. More than 2,000 white people picketed the courthouse and hanged McMillan in effigy. Dozens picketed his home in Charlotte’s Midwood neighborhood. He received death threats, which his mentor Fred B. Helms — founding partner of Helms, Mulliss, McMillan & Johnston — recalled were serious enough that the FBI once asked McMillan to take his family out of the county for a few days. McMillan found himself ostracized by much of polite, white Charlotte. Judge McMillan wrote this letter during the Swann litigation in response to a letter from a Black South Carolina lawyer.72 ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 Before joining the bench, McMillan had been among the best-regarded lawyers in town. He arrived at Helms & Mulliss in Charlotte after his World War II service. Still in his U.S. Navy uniform — the only suit he had — he met Helms at a State Bar meeting and asked for a job on the spot. From the late 1940s onward, McMillan was a trial lawyer. Among his cases: defending the mom-and-pop owners of a livestock company for “injuries caused by the kick of defendant’s mule.” Wiry and about 5 feet, 7 inches tall, McMillan won cases by conveying authenticity and credibility. Juries loved him. Opponents said trying a case against McMillan was like trying a case against a Boy Scout. Why was McMillan — perhaps more boldly than any other Southern district judge — able to set aside his preconceptions, listen to evidence and arguments with an open mind, and order a controversial remedy for past segregation? As professor Glenda Gilmore, a Yale University historian, asked, “What life experience gave him the courage to do what he then came to see as the right thing?” In 1989, as a Ph.D. student at UNC-Chapel Hill, Gilmore interviewed McMillan for UNC’s Southern Oral History Program. Years later, at a Mecklenburg County Bar event honoring McMillan, Gilmore argued that McMillan’s formative years on the family farm and the McMillan family’s unusual history of literacy left him with the capacity to understand the perspectives of his Black neighbors and a deep faith in education. Gilmore’s research revealed that McMillan’s maternal grandfather survived the Battle of Gettysburg, returning to North Carolina to father 17 children. McMillan’s mother grew up in Goldsboro, a town that by 1909 had a high school for white students that she attended before becoming a public school teacher herself. Meanwhile, McMillan’s paternal grandfather was a farmer in Robeson County, which was made up of roughly equal numbers of white, Black and Lumbee Indian residents. In the 1910s and 1920s, about 60 people lived on the McMillan farm, and only eight were white. The rest were Black sharecropping families and a few Lumbees who lived, worked and played together. It “was a sharecrop farm and a no money economy,” McMillan told Gilmore. “We had a swimming hole, and . . . there would be Blacks and Indians and whites all swimming together ‘au naturel.’ ” Yet the county had separate school systems for white, Black and Lumbee residents. McMillan told Gilmore that his childhood playmate, William Carson Lennon, attended a Rosenwald School for Black students funded In 1969, Judge James B. McMillan ordered the Charlotte school board to eliminate segregated schools. A STORY OF USONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 73 A STORY OF US by a Northern philanthropy. There was no Black high school, and the white high school was 13 miles away. McMillan’s mother raised money for an aged Model T bus to get him and his classmates there. After high school, McMillan attended a nearby junior college before transferring to UNC. Although McMillan had planned to attend UNC’s law school, history professor Howard Beale urged him to apply to Harvard. Beale even loaned McMillan the money to pay his tuition. Years later, as a Harvard-educated federal judge, McMillan listened to undisputed evidence that the North Carolina Legislature’s actions “regulating schools, zoning, taxing, and appropriating” funds had enforced racial segregation “from the cradle to the grave.” Because the force of law had maintained all-white and all-Black schools, McMillan concluded, the force of law was essential to dismantle the segregated school system. McMillan also had the benefit of the relentless advocacy and moral authority of Julius Chambers, the Black Charlotte lawyer who represented the Swann family and the NAACP. Chambers had strategically reopened the desegregation case when McMillan went on the bench, sensing that McMillan was a fair judge who would listen to his evidence about the slow pace of desegregation and apply new, more favorable Supreme Court rulings. Chambers persisted despite death threats and white supremacist bombings of his car, home and law office. Gilmore concluded that what McMillan heard in Chambers’ evidence resonated with his own history. “All of the arguments and facts that he listened to in the Swann case made sense to him because he knew what it’s like to be poor; how literacy mattered to his forebears; how easily children got along together at [their swimming hole]; how his childhood playmate went to the Rosenwald school. . . .” When McMillan learned that his controversial Swann ruling had been unanimously affirmed by the Supreme Court, he simply smiled in satisfaction and relief. According to Gaillard, McMillan then turned to his law clerk and said, “I got it right, didn’t I?” This article is based on Gilmore’s unpublished monograph “The Education of James B. McMillan,” as presented at the Mecklenburg County Bar’s annual McMillan Dinner, which raises funds for law student public interest fellowships and features the presentation of the bar’s Julius Chambers Diversity Champion award. It also draws on Gaillard’s “The Dream Long Deferred” (UNC Press 1988), and the unpublished memoir of Fred Helms. 74 ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 Former McGuireWoods partner Michael T. Bradshaw passed away Jan. 13, 2021, in Richmond after a long battle with multiple sclerosis. He was a real estate partner with the firm for 30 years. Bradshaw received his undergraduate degree from Notre Dame and his law degree from the University of Virginia. He joined Boothe, Prichard & Dudley in 1969 and became a partner in 1977. Firm historians report that space was so limited at Boothe, Prichard when Bradshaw joined that his first office was in a trailer in the parking lot. Bradshaw contributed mightily to the successful merger of Boothe, Prichard and McGuireWoods & Battle. He then left the firm in 2001 for a job in the legal department of Freddie Mac from which he retired in 2008. Those who knew him say Bradshaw’s greatest talent was his ability to form and maintain close and lasting personal friendships. Tysons office managing partner says Bradshaw was “foundational to the early growth of the firm.” He notes that Bradshaw served as a managing partner of the Tysons office in the 1990s and was particularly generous in his contribution to the bar. “Mike’s history and legacy is and was an integral part of the culture of the Tysons office,” Riegle says. Bradshaw was as an excellent real estate lawyer and mentor of associates — “many of whom became some of our most productive partners in NOVA,” Riegle said. Bradshaw also was a tenacious tennis player, a big Notre Dame fan, a “real Southern gentleman and all-around terrific fellow.”ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 75 Remembering Michael T. Bradshaw76 ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 Remembering Boyd C. Campbell Jr.ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 77 On Dec. 12, 2020, McGuireWoods retired partner Boyd C. Campbell Jr. passed away peacefully at home surrounded by his family. Campbell first joined McGuireWoods in Charlotte as part of the firm’s April 2008 merger with Helms Mulliss & Wicker. With a law degree from the University of Virginia and a bachelor’s degree from Davidson College, he practiced with McGuireWoods’ Securities & Capital Markets Department, representing public and private companies in mergers and acquisitions, securities, the regulation of financial institutions and debt finance. His practice shifted to general corporate matters in 2013, and he retired at the end of 2017. Campbell is remembered for his legal brilliance and for his never-ending kindness and caring for all — family, friends and total strangers. His friends in Charlotte shared some of their experiences with Campbell (affectionately known as BC) over the years that speak to what a wonderful human being he was, as well as good friend, mentor, teacher and cohort to so many. Retired partner Loy McKeithen met Campbell at Davidson College in the 1960s. McKeithen, as did many others, remarks on the impressive success Campbell achieved in building a corporate practice just four years out of law school. In that time, he captured most of the major corporate clients in the Concord area. McKeithen calls it Campbell’s “magic power” with clients who remained “super loyal” to Campbell and the firm. work with Campbell straight out of law school, remembers him as quiet and larger than life, with a brilliant understanding of legal as well as business issues. Calling Campbell her “life mentor,” she recalls a story from her beginning years working with him that demonstrates the kind of person he was: I had the opportunity to travel for work with BC to various places, including Boston and London. When I realized that I had left some important medication at home, he sought out the nearest drugstore in Boston, postponed our first meeting and made sure that I had that medication on hand before we settled down to business. In London, he was incredibly beneficial in making sure that I did not wear too much color for a black dress business world. met Campbell at a lunch in Concord while he was a summer associate with Helms Mulliss. When Marshall joined Helms Mulliss after law school and six years of military service, he found in Campbell a willing teacher who would always, in his own way, help him solve some of the complex legal problems that challenged him. Marshall was perplexed, however, that Campbell always “answered” his questions with a question. “I don’t recall him ever giving me a straight answer to any question that I asked,” said Marshall, who was never sure if Campbell was teaching by Socratic method, or if that was just his way of thinking a problem through. Despite the methodology, Marshall says, he always left Campbell’s office “a little smarter than when I went in.” Deputy managing partner with Campbell regularly until he retired, says Campbell handled some of the most meaningful matters at the law firm. He also was a brilliant lawyer with a knack for finding and taking good care of clients, Viola says. Campbell was a go- to partner for tough legal questions who almost always offered a fresh perspective, and one who cared about his colleagues. “He was nearly always the smartest person in the room but he never let on,” Viola says. “He was a man of few words — but the ones he said made you smarter.” in January 1986 due to a merger between his old firm and Helms Mulliss, remembers the welcome he received from the Charlotte office and from Campbell in particular. “I was a litigator and Boyd was a corporate lawyer, so we didn’t initially work together on a daily basis, but when he and Loy McKeithen found out I was a runner, they took me out every available weekday for a 4-5 mile run where they educated me about the city, the firm and life in Charlotte. “BC was wonderful to work with and I could tell that his clients felt confident working with me — not because of me, but because their longtime lawyer and friend vouched for me. I owe him so much for that confidence,” Covington says. He adds: “We will all miss him terribly. I hope that I and others can use his example of how to live and work together successfully for the benefit of all our families, friends, co-workers and those we will meet in the years to come.”78 ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 Former partner John Woloszyn passed away Jan. 7, 2021, after a long illness. He joined the firm then known as McGuire, Woods, Battle & Boothe in February 1994 as part of the Cable, McDaniel merger. As a corporate partner in the Baltimore office, his accomplishments included representing Polk Audio in its IPO, as well as several prominent Maryland REITs. In June 2001, Woloszyn left the firm to co-found Intralytix, a biotechnology company specializing in the use of bacteriophages for controlling bacterial pathogens in environmental, food processing and medical settings. He retired in 2020 for health reasons, but continued as chairman of the board of directors of Intralytix until his death. Intralytix remains a McGuireWoods client to this day. Woloszyn’s peers remember him as “soft-spoken, but a wonderful fellow.” He loved playing squash and golf, and was an avid fan of film, history and science publications. Born in Allentown, New Jersey, he graduated from Rutgers University in 1966 and received a law degree in 1969 from the University of Maryland.ONE McGUIREWOODS | Summer 2021 79 Remembering John J. WoloszynNext >