Deputy Attorney General: Joseph T. Sneed III

Joseph Tyree Sneed III was the 12th Deputy Attorney General of the United States. He served as the Department’s second-ranking official from February 1973 to August 1973.

Mr. Sneed was nominated for the post of Deputy Attorney General in January 1973 while serving as Dean and Professor of Law at Duke University School of Law. Between 1947 and 1971, he taught law at several institutions, including the University of Texas, Cornell University, and Stanford University. 

Mr. Sneed engaged briefly in the private practice of law in Austin, Texas, from 1954 to 1956.

A native of Texas, Mr. Sneed received a bachelor’s degree from Southwestern University in 1941 and served in the U.S. Army Air Forces from 1942 to 1946. He received an LL.B. from the University of Texas in 1947, an S.J.D. from Harvard University in 1958, and a LL.D. from Southwestern University in 1968.