HARRISBURG (April 19, 2004) � Michael H. Reed, a partner in the Philadelphia office of the national law firm of Pepper Hamilton LLP, will become president of the Pennsylvania Bar Association during the organization�s Annual Meeting May 12-14 in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Reed will be the first African-American lawyer to lead the 109-year-old professional association.

Reed will receive the gavel of office May 13 at the PBA Annual Dinner at which American Bar Association President Dennis Archer will be the guest speaker. Archer is the first African-American to lead the ABA.

Reed said his top priorities as PBA president will be to promote and maintain diversity in the association, to enhance the public�s trust and confidence in lawyers and the justice system and to ensure that the PBA�s 29,000 voluntary members receive value for their membership.

An active member of the PBA, Reed currently sits on the PBA Board of Governors. He is a past chair of the PBA House of Delegates and served for three years as the zone one (Philadelphia) governor on the PBA Board of Governors. He co-founded and served as the first chair of the PBA Minority Bar Committee. In 1988, he helped to organize the first PBA Minority Attorney Conference, which is in its 16th year. Reed also served on the executive committee of the Conference of County Bar Leaders and as a member of various PBA committees.

Early in his career, Reed served on the executive committee of the Young Lawyers Section of the Philadelphia Bar Association and as the first vice president of The Barristers Association of Philadelphia. He also chaired various committees of the American Bar Association.

From 1990-1993, Reed served on the Pennsylvania Judicial Inquiry and Review Board by appointment of Gov. Robert P. Casey. He served for six years as a member of a hearing committee of the Disciplinary Board of the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. In 2000, he was appointed by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit to chair the Merit Selection Committee to fill the bankruptcy judgeship vacancy in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. A fellow of the American College of Bankruptcy, Reed also served as chair of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania Bankruptcy Conference. He was an adjunct professor of law at Temple and Rutgers-Camden schools of law and is a member of the American Law Institute.

Reed serves on the boards of the Academy of Natural Sciences and the Committee of Seventy in Philadelphia, and he is a member of the board of advisors of the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia. For 10 years, Reed served as a co-advisor for the Philadelphia Law Explorers Post of The Boy Scouts of America.

Temple University�s College of Arts and Sciences honored Reed in 1995 as Alumnus of the Year, and he received the Award of Excellence in 2003 from the Thurgood Marshall Scholarship Fund Inc.

Reed is a 1969 graduate of Temple University. He graduated from Yale Law School and was admitted to law practice in 1972. He and his wife, Yalta Gilmore-Reed, have two children, Alexandra and Michael Jr.