Amos Mazzant
President of Texas Young Lawyers Association
by Anita Davis

"I don't think I can talk about myself that long," Amos Mazzant said when asked to do a 90-minute interview for this article. A soft-spoken, modest attorney from Sherman, Mazzant will be sworn in this month as president of the Texas Young Lawyers Association. Serving as TYLA president, he says, "is something I never dreamed I would have the opportunity to do."

Mazzant appreciates every opportunity. He grew up in Pennsylvania and worked his way through school. He graduated magna cum laude from the University of Pittsburgh with a degree in history. He had been a debater in high school, and in his freshman year at Pitt he joined the debate team and was awarded a debate scholarship. When he was looking for a law school, he saw that Baylor University awarded three Leon Jaworski Debate Scholarships, and so he applied for one and won it. He has been in Texas ever since.

"I enjoy living in Sherman," says Mazzant. "The people are great. It's a wonderful small town - a good place to raise our family." Mazzant and his wife, Michelle, have two daughters, Katelyn, 5, and Alexandra, 3.

"Michelle and I were high school classmates and I remember her telling me that I was the least likely guy she thought she would marry," related Mazzant. Michelle was a cheerleader, and Amos was a debater and played alto sax and trombone in the band. They went to different colleges, but began dating seriously when Mazzant headed off to Baylor Law School in Waco. Two weeks after he took the bar exam, they were married and moved to Sherman, where Mazzant clerked for U.S. District Judge Paul Brown for two years. He was in private practice for a year before becoming briefing attorney to Robert Faulkner, U.S. Magistrate Judge for the Eastern District of Texas.

"Amos works very, very hard and does a great job on every project he undertakes," said Judge Faulkner, who has worked with Mazzant for eight years. "He has made a name for himself in Sherman, becoming president of the Kiwanis Club, active in his church, and now president of Texas Young Lawyers Association. We are very proud of him."

When he started practicing law, Mazzant had barely heard of TYLA. He and another young attorney, Randy Fluke, began talking about getting together with lawyers in the area, and in 1994 they formed the Grayson County Young Lawyers Association; Fluke and Mazzant served as the first two presidents.

When their TYLA representative did not seek re-election, Mazzant ran and was elected a TYLA director.

"I was appointed to the Needs of Senior Citizens Committee," recalled Mazzant. "It just happened to coincide with my personal life and had real meaning for me." His mother, who had been divorced from his father when Amos was eight years old, had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's.

"You would think that I, as a lawyer, would have had mom's papers in order," said Mazzant. "But she was only in her 50s, and the disease progressed very rapidly, so we really had to scramble."

His mother lives in Pennsylvania, where Amos grew up with his two sisters. She is now in a nursing home and does not realize that her son will become TYLA president. Most of Amos' extended family will be at the swearing in ceremony in Austin, however, it is his mother who Amos wishes could be there.

"My mother's illness made me realize the need for advanced planning, so I helped design a program of educational seminars to help not only senior citizens but people of all ages," explained Mazzant. For his work, he was honored as the outstanding TYLA director in 1997 and presented with the TYLA President's Award in 1998.

Mazzant was elected secretary of TYLA, then vice president, and in 2000, president-elect. Mazzant has chaired or advised a dozen TYLA committees, among them the Supreme Team, which received a first place award from the ABA Young Lawyers Division.

As president of TYLA for 2001-02, Mazzant plans to continue many existing TYLA programs, but is also excited about new ones. Sitting on the edge of his chair, he leans forward and eagerly ticks off some of his plans, which he quickly adds are "still in the developmental stage."

"I want to focus even more on senior citizens, to help put advanced directives in order," he said. "Abigail Kampmann has done a phenomenal job this year along with Amy Sanders. But, we still have work to do."

He wants to develop an elementary school curriculum project, similar to TYLA's Crossing the Line program.

"Any time you can touch children and educate them about the law, what is right and wrong, it helps those children," said Mazzant. "I have a great interest in education. My wife, in-laws, and my father are teachers."

And, Mazzant wants to emphasize TYLA member services. "In addition to low cost CLE, I would like to do more for our members, like having a money management seminar or a destressing the legal profession seminar like the Dallas Association of Young Lawyers put on last year."

The hardest thing about being TYLA president, Mazzant admits, will be the travel that will take him away from his family. Mazzant, as a government lawyer, takes vacation days to attend TYLA meetings. He treasures his time with his family. He loves to bake cookies with his girls - chocolate chip cookies are his personal favorite. The family also likes outings to the park, playing memory games, and reading together. And occasionally, Mazzant gets in a quick game of tennis. "I've promised my family," says Mazzant, "when this year is over, we're going to Disneyworld!"