The meaningful accomplishments and the demise of the Children's Bureau have much to tell parents, politicians, and policy makers everywhere.

Account of the critical role students played in the history of an urban public law school. Most histories of law schools focus on the notable deans and professors, and the changes in curricula over time. In Detroit’s Wayne State University Law School: Future Leaders in the Legal Community, Alan Schenk highlights the students and their influence on the school’s development, character, and employment opportunities. Detroit’s Wayne State University Law Schoolbegins by placing the school in historical context. Public law schools in major American cities were rare in the 1920s. WSU Law School started as a night-only school on the brink of the Great Depression. It was administered by the Detroit Board of Education’s Colleges of the City of Detroit and was minimally funded out of student tuition and fees. From its opening days, the school admitted students who had the required college credits, without regard to their gender, race, or ethnic backgrounds, when many law schools restricted or denied admission to women, people of color, and Jewish applicants. The school maintained its steadfast commitment to a racially and gender-diverse student body, though it endured significant challenges along the way. Denied employment at selective law firms and relegated to providing basic legal services, WSU law students pressed the school to expand the curriculum and establish programs that provided them with the credentials afforded graduates from elite law schools. It took the persistence of the students and a persuasive dean to change the conversation about the quality of the graduates and for law firms representing the largest corporations and wealthiest individuals to start hiring WSU graduates who now heavily populate those firms. In the twenty-first century, the school gained strength in international legal studies and established two law centers that reflect the institution’s longstanding commitment to public interest and civil rights. While much of the material was gathered from university and law school archives, valuable information was derived from the author’s recorded interviews with alumni, deans, and professors. This book will strike the hearts of WSU law school students and alumni, as well as those interested in urban legal education and history.

Just as Confederate naval action is commonly overshadowed by the land battles of the Civil War, the navy's originator, Stephen Mallory, is often overlooked in favor of more famous leaders. Mallory had served as one of Florida's U.S. senators for ten years before becoming navy secretary in the Confederate government, challenged to create a valid military force where none had existed. This biography chronicles Mallory's formative years in Key West, his decades of public service, and his declining days. It discusses his career in the United States Senate, where he chaired the Committee for Naval Affairs, helping to strengthen--in an ironic twist of fate--the very navy he would later attempt to defeat. The work also examines the challenges and obstacles Mallory faced in creating a navy for the South. Special attention is given to Mallory's family relationships. Primary sources include autobiographical documents and archival records.

In Why the Vote Wasn't Enough for Selma Karlyn Forner rewrites the heralded story of Selma to explain why gaining the right to vote did not bring about economic justice for African Americans in the Alabama Black Belt. Drawing on a rich array of sources, Forner illustrates how voting rights failed to offset decades of systematic disfranchisement and unequal investment in African American communities. Forner contextualizes Selma as a place, not a moment within the civil rights movement —a place where black citizens' fight for full citizenship unfolded alongside an agricultural shift from cotton farming to cattle raising, the implementation of federal divestment policies, and economic globalization. At the end of the twentieth century, Selma's celebrated political legacy looked worlds apart from the dismal economic realities of the region. Forner demonstrates that voting rights are only part of the story in the black freedom struggle and that economic justice is central to achieving full citizenship.