Justice Clarence Thomas To Speak To Chosen Few At Vanderbilt

Clarence Thomas will be the sixth Supreme Court Justice (sitting and former) to speak as part of Vanderbilt’s Cecil Sims Lecture Series.

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas will be speaking in Nashville next month, but most Tennesseans won’t get the chance to hear him.

Thomas, who has been a member of the high court since 1991, will give a lecture at Vanderbilt Law School on March 18. His address is part of the Cecil Sims Lecture Series, which has featured five other Supreme Court Justices since its inception in 1972.

The lecture will not be open to the public. Nearly 550 students will enter a lottery for about 180 seats in The Law School’s Flynn Auditorium. About sixty tickets will go to Law School faculty and staff.

Though he’s a frequent lecturer, Thomas isn’t known for his comments during high court sessions. He broke a 7-year silence last year to crack a joke about Yale University, his alma mater, but has not said anything in the courtroom since then.