Law: Off the Hook

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Coleman went on to top his class at Harvard Law School, and in 1948 became the Supreme Court's first black clerk, under Felix Frankfurter. A few years later he helped write the winning brief in Brown vs. Board of Education, which outlawed separate-but-equal schools. But he believes the battle is far from won. In a recent article, he wrote: "For black Americans, racial equality is a tradition without a past. Perhaps one day America will be colorblind. It takes an extraordinary ignorance of actual life in America today to believe that day has come."

For all his civil rights work—and the two "satisfying" years in the Ford Cabinet—the portly Coleman, 61, has spent most of his career as a high-salaried advocate for corporate clients like Ford and IBM. With his connections, chances are Coleman will hardly miss the Government's help as he prepares his school argument. "This firm has 285 lawyers," says he. "We will put all the resources on this case that it needs. And before I finish, I know I'll heavily involve some of my classmates and colleagues at Harvard Law School." There seem to be plenty of precedents for them to cite. Five federal cases have involved tax privileges for schools that discriminate. The schools have lost every time. Perhaps with Coleman's help, the Supreme Court can finally lay the matter to rest.