WARWICK –– Retired Chief Justice Frank J. Williams of the Rhode Island Supreme Court will deliver the commencement address May 15 at the Community College of Rhode Island, the college announced Friday.

Williams is an author, educator and Abraham Lincoln scholar. His address will commemorate the 200th anniversary of Lincoln’s birth.

More than 1,000 students will receive associate degrees and certificates at the ceremony, at 4:30 p.m. in the Vincent A. Cullen Field House on the Knight Campus.

Public Access will air the ceremony from noon to 2 p.m. on May 23 and 30 on Channel 15.

Appointed as chief justice in January 2001, Williams retired on Dec. 30, 2008, when he took senior status as a jurist with no administrative duties.

As one of the nation’s leading scholars on the life and times of Lincoln, Williams has served on the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission since Congress appointed him in 2000. Born and raised in Cranston, Williams received his bachelor’s degree in government and history from Boston University in 1962.

Upon graduation, he served in the Army, rising to the rank of captain.

Williams obtained a law degree from Boston University Law School in 1970 and was admitted to the Rhode Island Bar that year. He was admitted to the U.S. Supreme Court bar in 1976.

He is an adjunct professor at Roger Williams University School of Law and the Naval War College.

In 2003, Williams was appointed to the Military Commissions Review Panel for tribunals to be held in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, with the rank of major general.

The Military Commissions Act of 2006 created the Court of Military Commission Review on which Williams serves as chief judge.