ATLANTA, August 30, 2002 - Internationally known political philosopher, Preston King, Ph.D., D.L.L., FRSA, has joined the faculty of the Morehouse College Leadership Center as Scholar in Residence and Distinguished Professor of Political Philosophy. King began his new duties on Wednesday, August 28, 2002.

Dr. King made international news in February 2000 when President Bill Clinton granted him full clemency, expunging convictions related to his disputed induction into the armed forces in 1958.

King was convicted in 1961, by an all-white jury in “Jim Crow” Albany, Georgia, for refusing to report for a physical exam. He was sentenced to 18 months in prison after insisting he be addressed as “Mister” as were white recruits at that time. He fled to England, and subsequently lived and worked in universities around the world—in Ghana, Kenya, Australia and New Zealand.

Clinton’s clemency erased all convictions and indictments against King clearing his return to the United States.

King spent 15 years in England as a professor of political philosophy at Lancaster University. He was also a visiting professor in politics and sociology at Binbeck College at London University over the past three years. He is presently honorary professor in philosophy at the University of East Anglia (England).

“We are honored to have professor Preston King as part of the development academic program of the Leadership Center at Morehouse College,” said Dr. Walker Fluker, director of the Morehouse College Leadership Center. “His appointment is a collaborative effort between Morehouse and Emory University.”

King will alternate between Morehouse and Emory on a semester basis beginning initially at The Leadership Center at Morehouse where he is housed.

“It has been a long and unwelcome absence,” said Preston King. “It is pure pleasure to be back home again and to work in the community that first nurtured me.”

The broad parameters of King’s program will include serving as a resource for faculty and students at Morehouse College, coordinating public seminars on leadership at local, national, and international levels, completing two manuscripts and co-editing a volume on leadership with the executive director of Leadership Center.

King is also the editor of the journal of Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy.

Ranked the number one college in the nation for educating African American students by Black Enterprise magazine, Morehouse College is the nation’s largest, private liberal arts college for men. Founded in 1867, the College enrolls approximately 3,000 students and confers bachelor’s degrees on more black men than any other institution in the world. The College offers 26 majors in three academic divisions: Humanities and Social Sciences, Science and Mathematics, and Business and Economics. Morehouse offers a number of programs and activities to enhance its challenging liberal arts curriculum through the Leadership Center at Morehouse College, Morehouse Research Institute, and Andrew Young Center for International Affairs. Morehouse is the only Historically Black College or University to produce two Rhodes Scholars, Nima A. Warfield, who was the first African-American Rhodes Scholar from Historically Black College or University, and Christopher Elders who received the honor in 2001.

Prominent alumni include Martin Luther King Jr., Nobel Peace Prize laureate and civil rights leader; Dr. David Satcher, former U.S. Surgeon General and director of the National Center for Primary Care at the Morehouse School of Medicine; Sheldon “Spike” Lee, filmmaker and president of 40 Acres & A Mule Productions; Maynard H. Jackson, president of Jackson Securities and the first African-American mayor of Atlanta.

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