office was marked by high-profile struggles with the Republican-controlled state legislature and a near-shutdown of the state government. He therefore chose not to seek reelection in 1960. Williams left office on January 1, 1961. Post-gubernatorial years After leaving office in 1961, Williams assumed the post of Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs in the administration of President John F. Kennedy. His remark at a press conference that "what we want for the Africans is what they want for themselves", reported in the press as "Africa for the Africans", sparked controversy. Whites in South Africa and Rhodesia, and in the British and Portuguese colonies contended that Williams wanted them expelled from the continent. Williams defended his remarks, saying that he included white Africans as Africans. Williams was defended by Kennedy at a press conference, saying that "Africa for the Africans does not seem to me to be an unreasonable statement." Kennedy said that Williams made it clear he was referring to Africans of all colors, and "I don't know who else Africa should be for." He served in this post until early 1966, when he resigned to unsuccessfully challenge Republican United States Senator Robert P. Griffin. Two years later, he was named by President Lyndon B. Johnson to be U.S. ambassador to the Philippines, where he served less than a year. In 1969 he wrote a book on the emergence of modern Africa, Africa for the Africans. Michigan Supreme Court Williams was elected to the Michigan Supreme Court in 1970 and was named Chief Justice in 1983. Thus, like William Howard Taft in the federal government, he occupied the highest executive and judicial offices in Michigan government. Retirement and death Williams left the Court on January 1, 1987, and died the following year in Detroit at the age of 76, just three weeks before his 77th birthday. He was temporarily entombed at Evergreen Cemetery in Detroit and there was a formal military funeral for him. After winter his remains were interred at the Protestant Cemetery on Mackinac Island. His New York Times obituary said of Williams's diplomatic service: "Traveling widely, he studied the needs of countries in the birth pangs of independence and brought their pleas for American investment and trust to Washington." Honors The state government's law building, G. Mennen Williams Building in Lansing, constructed in 1967, was dedicated in Williams's honor in 1997. A G. Mennen Williams dinner