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Created page with "{{Infobox officeholder | name=William Steele Sessions | office=4th Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation | president=Ronald Reagan<br>George Herbert..."
{{Infobox officeholder
| name=William Steele Sessions
| office=4th Director of the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]]
| president=[[Ronald Reagan]]<br>[[George Herbert Walker Bush]]<br>[[Bill Clinton]]
| term_start=November 2, 1987
| term_end=July 19, 1993
| preceded=William Hedgcock Webster
| succeeded=Louis Freeh
| office2 = Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas (based in [[San Antonio]] with branch divisions in [[Austin]], Del Rio, [[El Paso]], [[Midland]], Pecos and [[Waco, Texas|Waco]]
| term_start2=1980
| term_end2=1987
| preceded2=Jack Roberts
| succeeded2=Lucius Desha Bunton, III
| office3=Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas
| term_start3=December 20, 1974
| term_end3=November 1, 1987
| president3=[[Gerald Ford]]<br>[[Jimmy Carter]], Ronald Reagan
| preceded3=Ernest Allen Guinn
| succeeded3=Emilio M. Garza
| office4=United States Attorney for the Western District of Texas
| term_start4=1971
| term_end4= 1974
| president4=[[Richard M. Nixon]]
| preceded4=Segal Wheatley
| succeeded4=Hugh Shovlin
| birth_date=May 27, 1930
| birth_place=[[Fort Smith, Arkansas|Fort Smith]], [[Arkansas]]
| death_date=June 12, 2020 (aged 90)
| death_place=[[San Antonio]], [[Texas]], U.S.
| party=[[Republican Party|Republican]]
| spouse=Alice Lewis Sessions (married 1952-2019, her death)
| children=William Lewis Sessions<br>
Peter Anderson "Pete" Sessions<br>
Mark Sessions<br>
Sara Sessions Naughton<br>
'''Parents'''
William "Will" Anderson, Jr., and Edith Almetta Steele Sessions
| alma_mater=Northeast High School ([[Kansas City]], [[Missouri]])
[[Baylor University]]
Bayor Law School (Waco, Texas)
}}
'''William Steele Sessions''' (May 27, 1930 – June 12, 2020) was an [[United States|American]] [[attorney]] and [[judge]] who was the director of the [[FBI]] from 1987, when appointed by [[U.S. President [[Ronald Reagan]], until 1993, when dismissed by President [[Bill Clinton]]. He was previously a U.S. Attorney and U.S. District Judge for the Western District of [[Texas]].
He was the father of [[Republican Party|Republican]] former [[U.S. Representative]] Pete Session of Texas' 5th and later 32nd congressional districts, and a 2020 candidatefor the open seat in District 17.
==Background==
Sessions was born in [[Fort Smith, Arkansas|Fort Smith]], [[Arkansas]], to the former Edith Almetta Steele (1907-1985) and the Reverend William "Will" Anderson Sessions, Jr., (1905-1998), a [[Church of Christ]] pastor and author who was born in [[Jackson]], [[Mississippi]]. He also pastored in the [[Presbyterian]] denomination<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/33910312/william-anderson-sessions|title=Dr. William Anderson "Will" Sessions, Jr.|publisher=Findagrave.com|accessdate=June 19, 2020}}</ref
The family of four also lived in [[California]], [[Nebraska]], and [[Missouri]]. Will Sessions authored "Greater Men and Women of the Bible,'' ''The Week of the Cross,'' and the ''God and Country Award Handbook" for the [[Boy Scouts]]. Son William Sessions was an [[Eagle Scout]] and a 1948 graduate of Northeast High School in [[Kansas City]], Missour. He enlisted in the [[United States Air Force]] and in 1952 received an officer's commission. He remained on active duty for three years. He attended [[Baylor University]] in [[Waco, Texas|Waco]], Texas, at which he received in 1956 a Bachelor of Arts degree and in 1958 a Bachelor of Laws.<ref name=fjc>{{cite web|url=https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/sessions-william-steele|title=Sessions, William Steele|publisher=Federal Judicial Center|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref>
==Career==
From 1963 to 1969, William Sessions was a partner in the Waco law firm of Haley, Fulbright, Winniford, Sessions, and Bice, now Fulbright and Winniford. In 1969, President [[Richard M. Nixon]] named Sessions the Government Operations Section of the Criminal Division of the [[United States Department of Justice]] in [[Washington, D.C.]], a post that he filled until his nomination and confirmation in 1971 as U. S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas, based in [[El Paso]].<ref name=fjc/>
In 1974, Nixon's successor, [[Gerald Ford]], nominated Sessions to a seat on the U. S. District Court for the Western District of Texas]. He was Chief Judge of the court from 1980 to 1987. <ref name="auto"/> President [[Ronald Reagan]] nominated Sessions to succeed William Hedgcock Webster (born 1924 in [[St. Louis]], Missouri) as FBI Director. He was sworn into office on November 2, 1987.<ref name="Atlas"/> As director, Sessions sought to improve the public image of the agency and proposed pay increases for the agents. President Reagan appointed him as a commissioner of the new holiday in honor of [[civil rights]] martyr, [[Martin Luther King, Jr.]] Though a [[Republican Party|Republican]], his nonpartisan stance in office was often at odds with more [[conservative] members of his own party. Sessions had an uneasy relationship with Attorneys General [[Richard Thornburgh]] and [[William Barr]], who filled the office at the end of the first term of President [[George Herbert Walker Bush]] and returned nearly three decades later as attorney general in the [[Donald Trump]] administration. Sessions' strongest support came from [[liberal]] [[Democratic Party|Democrats]] when he supported [[affirmative action]] to boost the number of minority FBI agents.<ref name=death>{{cite web|url=https://www.lmtonline.com/news/article/William-Sessions-FBI-head-fired-by-President-15337421.php|title=William Sessions, FBI head fired by President Clinton, dies|publisher=''The Laredo Morning Times''|date=June 13, 2020|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref> He also automated the FBI fingerprints office.<re>{{cite web|url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/211352749/william-steele-sessions|title=William Steele Sessions|publisher=Findagrave.com|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref>
Sessions was FBI director during the 1992 massacre at Ruby Ridge, [[Idaho]], at which the unarmed Vicky Weaver was shot dead by an FBI sniper. The next year, the FBI launched a 51-day siege of Ruby Ridge encouraged by the administration of Bill Clinton which ended with deadly assault of more than eighty Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas.<ref name=Danner>{{cite web|title=Former FBI director, wife call off San Antonio divorce|url=https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/Former-FBI-director-wife-call-off-San-Antonio-14562868.php|date=October 25, 2019|accessdate=June 20, 2020|author=Patrick Danner|publisher=''The San Antonio Express-News''}}</ref>
Clinton then claimed that Sessions had engaged in ethical improprieties, such as using an FBI airplane to visit his daughter on more than one occasion, and errors in judgment. Clinton asked for his resignation. When Sessions refused to leave on grounds that he had done nothing wrong, Clinton fired him. He had served just over half of his 10-year appoin ted term.<ref name="Time's Up for William Sessions">{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/22/opinion/time-s-up-for-william-sessions.html |publisher=''[[The New York Times]]''|title=Time's Up for William Sessions|date=January 22, 1993| accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref>
==Family==
In 1952, Sessions married his former classmate, Alice June Lewis (1931-2019), a native of Independence, Missouri, the 1948 high school class valedictorian, an ardent liberal Democrat, and a patron of theater arts and [[Planned Parenthood]]. The couple had four children: William Lewis Sessions, former U. S. Representative Peter Anderson "Pete" Sessions, Mark Sessions, and Sara Sessions Naughton.<ref name=alicedeath>{{cite web|url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/206457164/alice-june-sessions|title=Alice June Lewis Sessions|publisher=Findagrave.com|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref> Sessions was accused of relying too much on his wife, who publicly defended him against the allegations of "ethical improprieties." Sessions himself said that the real dispute center on the dissatisfaction of ten FBI employees who railroaded him.<ref name=death/>
In 2018, Sessions filed for divorce after sixty-six years of marriage but dropped the suit on October 11, 2019.<ref name=Danner/> Alice died two months thereafter at their home in Washington, D.C.<ref name=MacCormack>{{cite web|title=Bill Sessions: former prosecutor, judge and FBI director, dies at 90|url=https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/Bill-Sessions-Former-prosecutor-judge-and-FBI-15336506.php|author=John MacCormack|publisher=''The San Antonio Express-News''|date=June 12, 2020|accessdate=June 19, 2020}}</ref>
Sessions died in June 2020 in San Antonio at the age of ninety.<ref name=death/> Details of the burial were not announced,<ref name=MacCormack/> but Alice was [[Cremated|cremated]].<ref name=alicedeath/>
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sessions, William}}
[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:Arkansas]]
[[Category:Missouri]]
[[Cateogyr:District of Columbia]]
[[Category:Attorneys]]
[[Category:Judges]]
[[Category:Republicans]]
[[Category:Moderate Republicans]]
[[Category:United States Air Force]]
| name=William Steele Sessions
| office=4th Director of the [[Federal Bureau of Investigation]]
| president=[[Ronald Reagan]]<br>[[George Herbert Walker Bush]]<br>[[Bill Clinton]]
| term_start=November 2, 1987
| term_end=July 19, 1993
| preceded=William Hedgcock Webster
| succeeded=Louis Freeh
| office2 = Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas (based in [[San Antonio]] with branch divisions in [[Austin]], Del Rio, [[El Paso]], [[Midland]], Pecos and [[Waco, Texas|Waco]]
| term_start2=1980
| term_end2=1987
| preceded2=Jack Roberts
| succeeded2=Lucius Desha Bunton, III
| office3=Judge of the United States District Court for the Western District of Texas
| term_start3=December 20, 1974
| term_end3=November 1, 1987
| president3=[[Gerald Ford]]<br>[[Jimmy Carter]], Ronald Reagan
| preceded3=Ernest Allen Guinn
| succeeded3=Emilio M. Garza
| office4=United States Attorney for the Western District of Texas
| term_start4=1971
| term_end4= 1974
| president4=[[Richard M. Nixon]]
| preceded4=Segal Wheatley
| succeeded4=Hugh Shovlin
| birth_date=May 27, 1930
| birth_place=[[Fort Smith, Arkansas|Fort Smith]], [[Arkansas]]
| death_date=June 12, 2020 (aged 90)
| death_place=[[San Antonio]], [[Texas]], U.S.
| party=[[Republican Party|Republican]]
| spouse=Alice Lewis Sessions (married 1952-2019, her death)
| children=William Lewis Sessions<br>
Peter Anderson "Pete" Sessions<br>
Mark Sessions<br>
Sara Sessions Naughton<br>
'''Parents'''
William "Will" Anderson, Jr., and Edith Almetta Steele Sessions
| alma_mater=Northeast High School ([[Kansas City]], [[Missouri]])
[[Baylor University]]
Bayor Law School (Waco, Texas)
}}
'''William Steele Sessions''' (May 27, 1930 – June 12, 2020) was an [[United States|American]] [[attorney]] and [[judge]] who was the director of the [[FBI]] from 1987, when appointed by [[U.S. President [[Ronald Reagan]], until 1993, when dismissed by President [[Bill Clinton]]. He was previously a U.S. Attorney and U.S. District Judge for the Western District of [[Texas]].
He was the father of [[Republican Party|Republican]] former [[U.S. Representative]] Pete Session of Texas' 5th and later 32nd congressional districts, and a 2020 candidatefor the open seat in District 17.
==Background==
Sessions was born in [[Fort Smith, Arkansas|Fort Smith]], [[Arkansas]], to the former Edith Almetta Steele (1907-1985) and the Reverend William "Will" Anderson Sessions, Jr., (1905-1998), a [[Church of Christ]] pastor and author who was born in [[Jackson]], [[Mississippi]]. He also pastored in the [[Presbyterian]] denomination<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/33910312/william-anderson-sessions|title=Dr. William Anderson "Will" Sessions, Jr.|publisher=Findagrave.com|accessdate=June 19, 2020}}</ref
The family of four also lived in [[California]], [[Nebraska]], and [[Missouri]]. Will Sessions authored "Greater Men and Women of the Bible,'' ''The Week of the Cross,'' and the ''God and Country Award Handbook" for the [[Boy Scouts]]. Son William Sessions was an [[Eagle Scout]] and a 1948 graduate of Northeast High School in [[Kansas City]], Missour. He enlisted in the [[United States Air Force]] and in 1952 received an officer's commission. He remained on active duty for three years. He attended [[Baylor University]] in [[Waco, Texas|Waco]], Texas, at which he received in 1956 a Bachelor of Arts degree and in 1958 a Bachelor of Laws.<ref name=fjc>{{cite web|url=https://www.fjc.gov/history/judges/sessions-william-steele|title=Sessions, William Steele|publisher=Federal Judicial Center|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref>
==Career==
From 1963 to 1969, William Sessions was a partner in the Waco law firm of Haley, Fulbright, Winniford, Sessions, and Bice, now Fulbright and Winniford. In 1969, President [[Richard M. Nixon]] named Sessions the Government Operations Section of the Criminal Division of the [[United States Department of Justice]] in [[Washington, D.C.]], a post that he filled until his nomination and confirmation in 1971 as U. S. Attorney for the Western District of Texas, based in [[El Paso]].<ref name=fjc/>
In 1974, Nixon's successor, [[Gerald Ford]], nominated Sessions to a seat on the U. S. District Court for the Western District of Texas]. He was Chief Judge of the court from 1980 to 1987. <ref name="auto"/> President [[Ronald Reagan]] nominated Sessions to succeed William Hedgcock Webster (born 1924 in [[St. Louis]], Missouri) as FBI Director. He was sworn into office on November 2, 1987.<ref name="Atlas"/> As director, Sessions sought to improve the public image of the agency and proposed pay increases for the agents. President Reagan appointed him as a commissioner of the new holiday in honor of [[civil rights]] martyr, [[Martin Luther King, Jr.]] Though a [[Republican Party|Republican]], his nonpartisan stance in office was often at odds with more [[conservative] members of his own party. Sessions had an uneasy relationship with Attorneys General [[Richard Thornburgh]] and [[William Barr]], who filled the office at the end of the first term of President [[George Herbert Walker Bush]] and returned nearly three decades later as attorney general in the [[Donald Trump]] administration. Sessions' strongest support came from [[liberal]] [[Democratic Party|Democrats]] when he supported [[affirmative action]] to boost the number of minority FBI agents.<ref name=death>{{cite web|url=https://www.lmtonline.com/news/article/William-Sessions-FBI-head-fired-by-President-15337421.php|title=William Sessions, FBI head fired by President Clinton, dies|publisher=''The Laredo Morning Times''|date=June 13, 2020|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref> He also automated the FBI fingerprints office.<re>{{cite web|url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/211352749/william-steele-sessions|title=William Steele Sessions|publisher=Findagrave.com|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref>
Sessions was FBI director during the 1992 massacre at Ruby Ridge, [[Idaho]], at which the unarmed Vicky Weaver was shot dead by an FBI sniper. The next year, the FBI launched a 51-day siege of Ruby Ridge encouraged by the administration of Bill Clinton which ended with deadly assault of more than eighty Branch Davidians in Waco, Texas.<ref name=Danner>{{cite web|title=Former FBI director, wife call off San Antonio divorce|url=https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/Former-FBI-director-wife-call-off-San-Antonio-14562868.php|date=October 25, 2019|accessdate=June 20, 2020|author=Patrick Danner|publisher=''The San Antonio Express-News''}}</ref>
Clinton then claimed that Sessions had engaged in ethical improprieties, such as using an FBI airplane to visit his daughter on more than one occasion, and errors in judgment. Clinton asked for his resignation. When Sessions refused to leave on grounds that he had done nothing wrong, Clinton fired him. He had served just over half of his 10-year appoin ted term.<ref name="Time's Up for William Sessions">{{cite web|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/22/opinion/time-s-up-for-william-sessions.html |publisher=''[[The New York Times]]''|title=Time's Up for William Sessions|date=January 22, 1993| accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref>
==Family==
In 1952, Sessions married his former classmate, Alice June Lewis (1931-2019), a native of Independence, Missouri, the 1948 high school class valedictorian, an ardent liberal Democrat, and a patron of theater arts and [[Planned Parenthood]]. The couple had four children: William Lewis Sessions, former U. S. Representative Peter Anderson "Pete" Sessions, Mark Sessions, and Sara Sessions Naughton.<ref name=alicedeath>{{cite web|url=https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/206457164/alice-june-sessions|title=Alice June Lewis Sessions|publisher=Findagrave.com|accessdate=June 20, 2020}}</ref> Sessions was accused of relying too much on his wife, who publicly defended him against the allegations of "ethical improprieties." Sessions himself said that the real dispute center on the dissatisfaction of ten FBI employees who railroaded him.<ref name=death/>
In 2018, Sessions filed for divorce after sixty-six years of marriage but dropped the suit on October 11, 2019.<ref name=Danner/> Alice died two months thereafter at their home in Washington, D.C.<ref name=MacCormack>{{cite web|title=Bill Sessions: former prosecutor, judge and FBI director, dies at 90|url=https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/Bill-Sessions-Former-prosecutor-judge-and-FBI-15336506.php|author=John MacCormack|publisher=''The San Antonio Express-News''|date=June 12, 2020|accessdate=June 19, 2020}}</ref>
Sessions died in June 2020 in San Antonio at the age of ninety.<ref name=death/> Details of the burial were not announced,<ref name=MacCormack/> but Alice was [[Cremated|cremated]].<ref name=alicedeath/>
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sessions, William}}
[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:Arkansas]]
[[Category:Missouri]]
[[Cateogyr:District of Columbia]]
[[Category:Attorneys]]
[[Category:Judges]]
[[Category:Republicans]]
[[Category:Moderate Republicans]]
[[Category:United States Air Force]]