2017 Plenary Address: Deval Patrick

Deval Patrick is a politician, civil rights lawyer and businessman who served as the 71st governor of Massachusetts from 2007 to 2015. He is the only African-American to have served as governor of Massachusetts.

Born to and raised by a single mother on the South Side of Chicago, Patrick attended Harvard University and Harvard Law School, where he was president of the Harvard Legal Aid Bureau. After graduating, he practiced law with the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund and later joined a Boston law firm, where he was named a partner, at age 34. In 1994, Bill Clinton appointed him as the United States assistant attorney general for the civil rights division of the United States Department of Justice, where he worked on issues including racial profiling and police misconduct.

During his governorship, Patrick oversaw the implementation of the state's 2006 health care reform program; increased funding to education and life sciences; won a federal Race to the Top education grant; and raised the state's minimum wage from $8 per hour to $11 per hour by 2017. Under Patrick, Massachusetts joined the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative in an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Patrick is now a managing director at Bain Capital and currently serves as the chairman of the board for Our Generation Speaks, a fellowship program and startup іnсubаtor whose mіѕѕіоn іѕ to bring together young Israeli and Palestinian leaders through entrepreneurship. Deval Patrick is a politician, civil rights lawyer and businessman who served as the 71st governor of Massachusetts from 2007 to 2015. He is the only African-American to have served as governor of Massachusetts. Co-sponsored by the AAR and the Memorial Church of Harvard University.

Eddie Glaude, Princeton University, presiding
Jonathan L. Walton, Harvard Divinity School, presiding

This audio was recorded at the 2017 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion on November 18 in Boston, Massachusetts.