Dougherty County Bar Association honors Judge Herbert Phipps, state Sen. Freddie Powell Sims

ALBANY – The Dougherty County legal community honored two leaders during the annual May Law Day Meeting on Wednesday, with the Dougherty County Bar Association handing the Liberty Bell Award to retiring state Sen. Freddie Powell Sims.

Former Dougherty County Chief Superior Court Judge and retired Court of Appeals Judge Herbert Phipps was honored for his contributions during the luncheon held at the Albany State University West Campus.

Phipps, the son of a Baker County sharecropper who attended a three-room schoolhouse and later Morehouse College for his undergraduate degree due to the racial segregation in universities at the time, played a large role in expanding civil rights, Court of Appeals Judge Ken Hodges said. 

Hodges, who tried cases in front of Phipps and later served on the Court of Appeals while Phipps was a senior judge, is a former Dougherty County district attorney.

“He has held every trial court position in Dougherty County,” Hodges said. “I had the honor of appearing before him a number of times.”

Phipps, who was unable to attend in person, and his wife, Connie Curry Phipps, watched the presentation, which included a recorded message from Gov. Brian Kemp, from their home in Albany. Their daughter, India Phipps Epps, accepted a copy of a congressional statement from U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop, D-Albany, that he will enter into the congressional record during the next session of Congress.

Several Appeals Court judges and Georgia Supreme Court Justice Charlie Bethel were among those in the audience.

“I’m really blown away by the attention, the words that were shared about my dad, all the stories about him,” India Epps told an Albany Herald reporter following the meeting. “He really valued the friendships he had with everybody.”

After he became an attorney, Bishop said, he was fortunate to spend time with Phipps, and after that work with Phipps the NAACP helped the future congressman to set up a practice in Columbus, where he handled civil rights cases himself “like Herb and C.B. King in Albany.”

“It’s a real privilege and honor for me to be able to stand and honor my mentor, Judge Phipps,” Bishop said.

Sims, a Dawson Democrat who has represented District 12 in the Georgia Senate since 2009, withdrew from the election after her husband became ill and passed away. She is retiring at the end of the year. She was elected to the state House of Representatives in 2004.

“I’m totally at a loss for words,” Sims said of the award. “Ken Hodges is the reason I went to the Senate. He bugged me and bugged me and bugged me about going from the House to the Senate.

“One morning on a Sunday, somebody was at my back door. I live on a dirt road. I said (to Hodges), ‘If I say yes, would you just go away?’ It has been an honor.”

During her time in the legislature, Sims said that she learned one lesson that served her throughout her more than 20 years in elected office: “If you forget you are a public servant while you are there, then you are lost,” she said. “You are done for. It’s all about integrity and being a person of your word.”