William Kunstler
William Moses Kunstler (* July 7, 1919 in New York; † September 4, 1995 in Manhattan, New York) was in the 1960s and 1970s, the most famous civil rights attorney in the United States. He was a board member of the American Civil Liberties Union ( ACLU ) and the co-founder of the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR ).
Personality and well-known clients
At Art Jewellers clients included, inter alia, Martin Luther King, Larry Davis, Malcolm X, Phillip and Daniel Berrigan, Abbie Hoffman, H. Rap Brown, Stokely Carmichael, Adam Clayton Powell Jr., Filiberto Ojeda Ríos, Leonard Peltier, Bobby Seale, Angela Davis, the Freedom Riders, Assata Shakur and the Chicago Seven. He maintained because of a prison revolt in Attica defendants and the American Indian Movement. Kunstler was a highly polarizing figure - he described himself as a " philosophical anarchist ." While he met with conservatives on rejection and indignation, he enjoyed great recognition among left-liberals. He likes to let himself on the way to court date photographed with highly stretched right fist ( so also shows him the cover of his 1994 autobiography "My Life as a Radical Lawyer" ) in his left hand the thick case file: "My vision of America is idealistic as our Constitution ". The New York Times called him "the most hated and most loved lawyer in America" ( the most hated and most loved lawyer in America ). Kunstler also defended maligned members of society as rapists and murderers, but refused to defend right-wing groups like the Minutemen anti-communist. He justified this by saying: " I only defend Those Whose goals I share. I'm not a lawyer for hire. I only defend Those I love " ( I only defend those whose goals I share. I'm not for sale. I defend only the ones that I love).