 Phillips was a school teacher and newspaper reporter, then editorial consultant and freelancer for national magazines, before starting Socrates cafes, Socratic discussion meetings in a variety of venues such as cafés, nursing homes, churches, schools (where the gatherings are sometimes called Philosophers' Club, also the name of his first children's book), and prisons.Phillips' idea of having open-invitation meetings in cafes to discuss philosophy was inspired in part by Matthew Lipman, the founder of the Institute for the Advancement of Philosophy for Children who advocated introducing philosophy into schools and under whom Phillips studied, as well as by Marc Sautet, whose Café Philosophique Phillips became aware of after reading an article about Sautet while teaching in the Mississippi Delta.In his penultimate book "Constitution Café", Phillips details a journey across the US promoting discussions with a version of the Socratic Method that he developed for the Socrates Cafés, combined with the Jeffersonian idea of democratic freedom and inclusiveness.