Vernon E. Jordan, Jr, most recently a Senior Managing Director of Lazard Frères & Co LLC in New York, previously practised general, corporate, legislative and international law in Washington, DC. Prior to that he held a variety of positions with the National Urban League, the United Negro College Fund, the Voter Education Project of the Southern Regional Council and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; he was also an attorney in private practice in Arkansas and Georgia. His presidential appointments included the Secretary of State’s Advisory Committee on South Africa, the Advisory Council on Social Security and the Presidential Clemency Board, and in 1992 he chaired the Clinton Presidential Transition Team. He held a slew of corporate and other directorships. A graduate of DePauw University and the Howard University Law School, he held honorary degrees from more than 60 colleges and universities and was a member of the Bars of Arkansas, the District of Columbia, Georgia and the United States Supreme Court, and also of the American Bar Association, the National Bar Association, the Council on Foreign Relations and The Bilderberg Meetings.