[2] Williams’ first cousin, Thurgood Marshall, was the chief lawyer for the Legal Defense and Educational Fund of the NAACP.
Additionally, he was an active alumnus of the Omega Psi Phi fraternity and served as a Reserve lieutenant colonel in the United States Army Judge Advocate General's Corps.
Williams was extremely active in school desegregation, long serving as a plaintiff's counsel in Nashville's long-running (40 year plus) school desegregation lawsuit which resulted in forced busing, making him extremely unpopular with elements of Nashville's white community and even the subject of death threats by white supremacists.
[3] In 1967 Williams represented the I-40 Steering Committee in their legal battle to stop Interstate 40 from dissecting North Nashville (Jefferson Street).
[4] In 1969 Williams was elected as a Democrat to the Tennessee State Senate from a newly configured district centering on the historically black section of North Nashville.
As a high-profile African American legislator, he was, perhaps even more than most of his peers, a lightning rod for both criticism and praise, depending upon the observer's point of view.