Deval Patrick is not a "self-made" man

Deval Patrick grew up in a South Side Chicago tenement, sharing one of two beds with his mother and sister, and went on to become the first Black governor of Massachusetts. But in this conversation with Harvard Dean David Deming, he keeps correcting the version of that story people like to tell. His life did not begin with the scholarship to Milton Academy, he insists, but years earlier, with the teachers in crowded Chicago classrooms who decided he was worth the trouble — a lottery ticket, he says, is only as good as what you make of it. Along the way he saved a man ninety minutes from execution, sued Bill Clinton and then went to work for him, became the country's top civil-rights official before forty, and ran for president for about fifteen minutes. Holding it together is the line his grandmother gave him: we are not poor, we are broke, because broke is temporary.Patrick served as Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights under President Clinton and two terms as Governor of Massachusetts. He returned to Harvard in 2022 to teach at the Kennedy School.For show notes and full episodes, subscribe to The Context Window with David Deming: https://thecontextwindowpodcast.substack.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thecontextwindowpodcast.substack.com