Letter to the Editor

To the Editor:

Tom Kirvan’s biographical account of Wade McCree (“Renowned Judge Used Storytelling to Share Lessons,” January 10, 2020) recalls the night then-Governor G. Mennen Williams announced his appointment to the Wayne County Circuit Court (I was there).

The Governor was the principal speaker at a Democratic Party dinner that evening in the Detroit Leland Hotel. Few in the audience knew who McCree was.

McCree, as Kirvan describes, went on to an illustrious career. After his appointment, he was elected to the Wayne County Circuit Court bench and then re-elected. He moved upward to the federal district court and then the U.S. Court of Appeals.

When he resigned in 1977 to become Solicitor General, there was no doubt he was on his way to the Supreme Court. Unfortunately, President Jimmy Carter in his four years in office never had the opportunity to fill a Supreme Court vacancy. McCree, like his admirers, always regretted this.

Avern Cohn
Ret. U.S. District Judge