The 2019 film Just Mercy dramatizes the early career of Bryan Stevenson, a young, black social justice attorney right out of Harvard law school. In Alabama he founds the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) and in prison meets Walter “Johnny D” McMillan, a Black man wrongfully convicted of the murder of a white woman. Fighting an uphill battle, Stevenson enlists the help of the family of McMillan and of a family friend, who is intimidated by police, as is Stevenson himself at gun point by two white sheriff deputies. Even though on appeal a judge refuses a new trial for McMillan, Bryan Stevenson persists and finally gets the Supreme Court of Alabama to grant a new trial. Then with unrelenting determination he gets the original prosecuting attorney against McMillan to join him and they succeed in getting all the charges against McMillan dropped and the case dismissed.

While the film depicts Bryan Stevenson’s determined work and success with this case, since then he has continued his social justice work with significant other successes. For your 4th English 1A essay assignment this semester I want you to research those successes of Bryan Stevenson and document and describe, in some detail, two of them. Then conclude your essay with at two lessons we can learn from him about social justice problems and their solutions.