Howard- The Brown Decision Part II #203

Uh. Oh. And you are. At Howard. In the 50s the country was indeed where much of the world was recovering from the devastation of World War 2. America was boasting of its free economy of this country were languishing under a strict system of racial segregation and legalized. Jim Crow alive for the United States unanimously determined that the Constitution did in fact rewrite the constitution a document that had a rigid and codified perpetual servitude of Africans and their descendants centuries proclamation. But

with the historic Brown vs. Board of Education the Supreme Court. It was unconstitutional. It was a moment in time. For Howard University and its law school. The struggle that begun with its. Last home and third in the middle. Tonight we focus on the events that led to the Brown decision and the people many of our of the forces of this nation and a.

Talk about the Constitution and the law.

It's there. You salute it. Well they said it had to change. And Charles Hamilton Houston with his team of faculty with students as a as he was a part of the Legal Defense Fund they developed a strategy to change that precedent. Since the Depression years when Charles Hamilton Houston thrust Howard Law into the center of the legal struggle against segregation legions of law students former graduates and faculty at labored to chip away at segregation in education. They started with the law schools and the graduate schools in terms of the cases because they felt like the judges would really understand if a law school was not equal. I think that's good. You have to structure you not to stretch your mind too much on this one. You don't have to imagine what elementary schools look like. Just look at law school she been through law school and

if you see a law school that has a library and a law school without a law library and you appreciate as a lawyer and as a judge the importance of a law library then you will see that they are not separate and equal. And Plessy versus Ferguson says separate but equal so it has to be unconstitutional. And they move through the schools the different levels of schools that way. Insisting basically that separate but equal in the course and each time it with fail. And then at it they decided to just with those with those planks in place to take on the segregation in public schools. When Houston died suddenly in 1950 the generation that had grown up thinking of Howard law as the crossroads in the struggle against segregation assumed responsibility for the five different cases that would become known as brown. Thurgood Marshall later to become a Supreme Court justice was the new leader

of this dynamic team which was to change the lives of African-Americans in the course of American history. Of course George Marshall was the one who has gotten most of the publicity. But among all of the cases this let me outline who the players were. That was Robert Carr a 1940 graduate of Howard University's Law School and Briggs that was Harold. Columbia South Carolina 1938 graduate of Howard. In the Virginia case Davis that was Spottswood Robinson the class of 30. Now all of a hero of the class of 33 of Howard University and in the bowling case there was joy GZ Hayes class of 1980 and Howard University and Jim Nabors who was the secretary of the university at the time and a law school teacher who later became the president of the university.

The only case that did not have a Howard presence was the lower case. There were five cases in BROWN I think that most people don't realize that there are five cases actually four of them involving the 14th Amendment of the Constitution and one involving the Fifth Amendment. And that's because the one that involved the Fifth Amendment was the District of Columbia Public Schools. Of course the District of Columbia is not a state. And so the Fifth Amendment is what applied. However the other four schools are the other four states or Kansas which is the brown reference. The Briggs case in South Carolina there's Delaware and then Virginia. And so those are all of the jurisdictions so we talk about Brown as though we're only talking about one case and we are talking about one bottom line. Those who were following the civil rights litigation of the early 1950s like

Journalist Carl Rowan the brewing battle the struggle of lawyers in a family attacking the educational inequities that threaten to hinder. Yet another generation of African-Americans and. Parents on behalf of their children brought in five places. And for every location there was a team of lawyers. Most often with ties to Howard. They were good at is and would be. So Bob gets to go out to help the Scotts in Topeka the hood goes down to Columbia and Charleston to help our boy who had been selected by the people of South Carolina.

What I do remember from the 40s in the 50s is that my father made a lot of speeches and a lot of churches. And I remember being in those churches I specially remember the ones in the summertime because it was so hot and we'd be sitting in a church and everybody would be fanning and he would you know because they had these little hands. And I remember he would end his speeches and he would say. I will walk up to you no back door no mall. I will walk up to your very front door and no matter what the breeding bee I will not mister you unless you invest in me. Making speeches was only part of Harold. Where is job. There was a World War 2 veteran who worked his way through Howard law after graduating. He became counsel for the South Carolina chapter of the NWA CPC and a practicing attorney in Columbia the state capital. He spent much of his time traveling the state and representing clients but most of all

he was working on the front lines of the legal struggle against segregation. No simple task. In the 1940s and 50s South Carolina look at separate schools separate lunch counters separate neighborhoods. None of them equal. Did not welcome those who wanted to equalize the races and give black children the same education as whites. Parable where he came to meet with people wanting to be plaintiffs. And I don't know whether he was the one who got in touch with end up Lacy P. legal defense fund or a boa who was a leader's journey at that time. The local attorney at that time. I had known while I was a student as I was going out of state college when I would go up to visit in Columbia. I would go to his little two room office over the bank on Washington Street and go. My father had a reputation for not talking about anything about it so he

carried that practice over it to his whole life we never knew what he was working on but just that he was working. My sister and I used to go down to his office on Saturdays. My father had his office in Columbia but growing up it was very small they had one street there with three general stores you know and that's where everybody bought their feed and their grain in their sea and their food. People walked not many people had cars. But because of the presence of Harbison there was a large intellectual population among black people. And that's what I grew up in and that's what my father grew up in. He got to Howard lawyer by working his way through. He was a waiter in Asbury Park. That's where he met my mother. She was also a

Johnson C. Smith when he was there and they met and they worked together. In Asbury Park and that's where their courtship flourished. But they didn't get married until he finished law school here. Terrible Ware who had to live in Columbia which was fifty six miles away to be involved in litigation. How brave That must have been for him when he came down into these little southern towns to meet with people and also to argue the case and yet have to live there under what kinds of threats. I don't I don't really know. One story I heard was that some people told my father. Stand you have to. Have. Things like that. But I didn't know about that. I know it. But it also made a man and it also gave him.

And of course my parents protected us from what would be seen as you know the unpleasantries of life at that time so I was for the most part until I got older completely unaware of the problems and so to me it was quite a deal like we were isolated in that people lived far apart. OK so that's when I started reading I love to read and so I would go off in my world of reading and and the problems of the world were remote when I did find out about how perf a sieve racism is and and how. Destructive it is. I really get really made. When Harold boa representing Mr. Pearson sought to get some bus transportation boys kids it went to trial

and it was just missed on a jurisdictional basis. But that was just the beginning of the fight I was forty seven or a year later in 1948. There was this groundswell on the part of the people in Clarendon County to see the equalization of school facilities beyond bus transportation and that's to begin a Briggs. The battle was moving from higher education law schools to the public school districts around the country. And the names of parents children and public schools in counties like Clarendon South Carolina were beginning to supplant universities and law schools. The inequities that existed in the schools were painfully obvious.

Thurgood Marshall and his team of lawyers would travel to Somerton South Carolina to evaluate the conditions of black schools. Despite past failures in the courts martial continued the filing of another suit named Briggs versus Elliott that directly attacked segregation rather than the equalization of schools. No one could have predicted that summer 10 would be the place for the battle for civil rights would commence eventually leading to the demise of racial segregation. Well there was actually no cases. We call civil rights cases before breaks we think brigs was the beginning of the civil rights cases as we describe them. You know what you have to know is that there really was

not a lot of attention on the Briggs case after it was filed and combined with the cases that went to the Supreme Court. Those cases were combined and became Brown vs. Board. So really no one paid attention to the fact that there were five cases totally Barry breaks his wife's name was legalized. And they had four children and ages parallel to Harry Jr. and I were in the same class together and his name is the one on the on the quays Harry Briggs was a gas station attendant. And this just being a mechanic a gas station attendant and I think James Brown did heating oil or something of that nature so does every man. Does this sound significant but in this little community it was. For generations following emancipation blacks in the south could still feel the residual effects of slavery which almost reinvented itself in the Jim Crow laws. Many blacks were not allowed equal access to educational

opportunities which resulted in economic hardships. It was common practice for the all white school board in Clarendon to give most of the resources to white schools barely leaving enough for the salaries of black teachers which was smaller than the salaries received by whites because of these inequities. Black parents and teachers began to come together to organize a petition demanding equality in the school system. I believe the first petitions were signed in 1947. So I would have been six years old. I remember the meetings in churches and I remember them particularly because they were on school nights. And yet we were allowed to go on some of the older children could sleep on the pews in the back and our parents were meeting at the time of course I probably had no clue as to what that was about. But I doing member signing the petition I was old enough to remember standing in very proudly signing the petition because everyone was so happy to do this.

Oh year later Briggs and a group of parents formed another petition that went far beyond the question of school buses but the quality of facilities per se. The problem with the schools in South Carolina was the fact that they were by law segregated and they were. I think there was a doctrine of separate but equal but they certainly were not equal. I can remember conversations about the condition of school books or someone taping books together because we were using the books that the white schools had finished with. I can remember high school girls coming and talking with my mother and just overhearing the conversation. And I remembered I had the comments about a graduating diploma being mimeographed and the talks about that not so much in Kansas law. You had to make sure people understood what they were. Well they weren't.

When I go down and talk to them you know what is the place. There are always people coming up and sure they're going to go there we're going to be pressure put on me might lose their jobs. So I think oh yes. Literally. I just think it's sum it all off I think everyone got fed up fed up with the inequality the gross inequality between their schools for their children for black children and those for white children fed up paying taxes to support schools for white kids that their children cannot even come into. Fed up with the fact that their children the black children had to walk past miles sometimes these white schools. I think they were fed up. And they they were unbelievably courageous people. I think some of them this was in 1950. We know segregation was the law the

land not just in schools but everywhere. And. Forward for the parents to put their jobs their lives on the line. I think it's just we need to not just be thankful but really take a lesson from their books on what it takes courage the kind of courage they exercised. Judge what he's wearing was the district judge presiding in Charleston South Carolina in 1050. He heard his first case attacking segregation. Briggs versus Elliott Thurgood Marshall knew of Waring's reputation as a liberal judge but he was not confident his team would win the break's case. In the end however Waring would play a pivotal role in the case and set the direction of things to come. Judge Waring's just sent in the first Briggs case where he said to the attorneys and everyone involved that I am sick and tired of you

coming over here with these equalization suits I want you to bring me back a lawsuit that will raise the question of the abolition of segregation per se. If I got anything out of our breaks and all these other cases it was George Waring's descent that stays with me which really projected to the lawyers a direction in which they should go. One we decided for example that we were going to we want to go out of the suburb but we weren't going for equal facilities. And just for you know I'm going to fight segregation. We're going to just don't seem to sell to you other work for equal but wrong ideas even if they were equal that segregation was unconstitutional. We lost some water some somewhere but our lawyers decided that

this was not a good thing because they knew you know back when I'm in 1950. You remember pickle. Well we were going to stay on next with my Gone case for example cause a great deal of consternation you know among million middle class people blacks because I thought. Google is going too fast because what we are going to go on was that all of the DI had the same teachers and so forth. But he's put in the back as being a special C and so forth and this is is unconstitutional. Oh my God. If we lose the kids. But see my theory was well within you you think oh by They're not going to do anything other than what the status quo is. So you lose nothing. But there was a great deal of

consternation and agitation in the US about the very nature of this endeavor. There was just a group of lawyers who had become concerned with what they called the school cases. Whenever there was an overburden on any one of them on any one point they would call themselves together in a number of these attorneys all meeting here at Howard University to decide on these particular points so there wasn't any of that separateness that was a commonality of thought that all these cases are aimed at one thing. Ultimately aimed at one thing. The abolition of segregation as you might imagine. These are very strong personalities. Thurgood Marshall very strong personality. The folks around him so many other attorneys and with strong personalities

and colorful personalities. Obviously there was many incidents and colorful stories that came about but they were they all I think shared a deep commitment that they were on a mission and the stories that he would tell about not I won't use the word conflict but about some of the incidents and circumstances were not petty were not about who those first or second or third but about how can we best get to a particular point. There were some lawyers who. Wanted to proceed more deliberately than others others were for others favored a more direct frontal assault on on state mandated segregation or state supported segregation. I think it's fair to say that the Howard lawyers if you will pretty much favor an all out straight a straight ahead attack ad been much controversy going on within the legal community

into Willie's EPA and other lawyers as to whether or not it would be timely to put this issue before the court. There was a group of people who thought that we ought to do it incrementally. Case by case by case by case I was standing with his fist really ready to go was Mr. Nabors who says hey if not now when we are going to put this before the court and let the court make the decision we can no longer dodge it. According to Judge Waring Clarendon was a very backward County in his words one of the most backward counties of the state. It's ruled by a small white minority very limited in their viewpoint and education. You could drive through Clarendon County as I often did and see those awful looking wooden shacks in the country that where the negro schools.

I remember her talking about Judge Waring who was one of the three judges on the case and apparently did not vote but the other two and apparently because of his commentary the case was revised to to challenge the segregation aspect of it rather than the separate but equal. At the risk of his career and reputation judge Waring wrote a six page dissent indicating that racism must go and must go now. This acted as the catalyst needed by the young lawyers for bricks. But it was the last time Judge Waring would preside as a district court judge. Well between the first decision in Briggs and the second Briggs case he retired from the bench. And one of the reasons they say he retired

was that he had been ostracized by the white community and he needed to get out of them because of his definite stand on behalf of blacks. So that's always a very courageous man in South Carolina demanding equal rights for blacks. And 1940 was the year of Spawn Thurmond left the Democratic Party in South Carolina. And became the hero of the segregationist Dixiecrat Party running for president under their banner. On the strength of his segregationist views Thurmond became a leading political figure in the state and a favorite among Southern whites. His views reflected the racial prejudices of the time and his popularity demonstrated the challenge faced by civil rights lawyers and black parents looking for change.

My father was and they everyone called him my mother. Martin had been born in Clarendon County and the town Somerton daddy was a mechanic. I think the thing that amazes me is how young they were. Because in 1940

7 when the first petition with sign or even in 1949 my parents were still in their 20s so they had married right out of high school. Daddy having three children by the time the war was on was spared military service until the very end he was drafted in the military in 1945 I believe. And I was released in October of that year because the men with children were the last taken in and the first release. My father was one of those typical products of small southern towns. He had a black mother and a white father so white father was a very prominent person in the town. Everyone in the town black and white knew who my father's father was. But he was never acknowledged and I didn't discover this information until well after I was 20 because people did not talk about this. They were very very careful to try to pick people who were taxpayers who would

not be so hurt by the recriminations. And Dad Daddy lost his job I remember that very very vividly when he came home with this face red and flushed and he had been fired from his job and it was in December I later learned when I remember things like leaving the house one Sunday morning or going to play in the yard with my brothers and finding white pieces of paper littered all over the front yard. And I picked it up and read it ran into the house to my parents to show it to them. And it was a note saying take your name off the petition. If you take your name off the budget petition you may have your job back. And it said you and your darkie supporter and one of the reasons I remembered that note so well I didn't know what a darkie supporter was I didn't know what a darkie was or supporter and mother tried to explain that to me and I asked her about it years later.

But it was signed the KKK. They did fine I know there were investigators that came in I remember it the community being very upset about that and I remembered my father loading two shotguns with one by the front door and one by the back door and I had double instructions because by now there were two younger children in the household that I had to watch them to make sure that no one touched them and that was frightening too. To live with these two guns but of course as children do we. You just adjusted to it and that became the norm. It's interesting I never realize how courageous they were. I have because I think they had a way that my mother and father were very courageous I think. And the older I get the more I realize what opportunities they have what chances right that they took or in order to make ends meet he managed the farm of my mother's uncle who had reared her and he took in jobs in the backyard.

And he was repairing a car headlocks and at the car our Jack and at the car I was washing dishes a notice from the back window that he had not moved which was normally his pattern. And mother I could call for her when she looked she immediately started running in screaming and the two of us tried to lift the front of the car up off him until neighbors came. And I remember when they pulled my dad out by this one like there was only a little bit of blood trickling from his head so I thought he was fine. And the doctor who had then arrived mentioned that the Porsche portion of the car hit him directly on the temple so he was able to assure my mother that it was very very quick and that he had not suffered. But that happened in 1951 soon after the death of her father. Daniel's mother migrated north to Philadelphia to build a better life for her children and

give them a reason to look forward to the future. I guess you died because he was black at that time. I'm sure it's something to do with that that he had lost his job and was doing the work at home. I guess it was later. That I realized. When I went back when I was 16 I had a great time but I was happy not to be living there because I could see the conditions of living there. And. What they did vs. what I was. Lucky. Not to be in Somerset. Instead of being wistful wanting to return there and be there I was. Happy we got out of there. And I've often wondered what my life would have been like had.

My. Mother. Never really. Talked about regretting the decision they believe firmly in what they were doing and even though she lost her husband she thought that that was the right thing to do. They were making a difference not only for their children but children. Apparently it was a coordinated event. Everybody was fired at the same time and the whites told the others I don't care who is work for you how many

years any person whose name is on that list has to be fired and all you had to do to get your job back was to take your name off the list. Well the negroes in town decided that they were sticking together also know one was going to take their name off the list. It began with Rev. Alaina having attended a meeting at which Mr Hinch spoke to James then all who at that time. Reverend DeLaine Joseph Armstrong to Lane was a product of the Deep South. Born in 1898 just outside the small town of Manning South Carolina he was one of 12 children six boys and six girls. The boys were expected to work the land only the girls were encouraged to pursue their education. But Delaine saw education as

his ticket out of the oppression of South Carolina and he also believed God helps those who help themselves. He went to Allen University in Columbia a school started by the African Methodist Episcopal Church. After graduating in 1031 he began a teaching career. And he also served as pastor of an Amie church in Somerton in 1039. He became president of the end of the chapter in Clarendon County. From that position he led the black community of Somerton in its fight to change the substandard schooling their children were receiving. It's interesting that the attention the brig's case stick at had to do with the personality of Rev.. JJ Lane who was a local minister but he was college educated and really someone that pulls a group together. Listen to their complaints he was able to pull it together. Reverend DeLaine of course was and am a preacher and also a teacher

in the public schools of Clarendon County. He was a principal as a matter of fact. It took a lot of courage because as history will tell you not only did he lose his job his house was burned down. He lost his church he had to move to another church but as bishop really the bishop was trying to be helpful to him keep getting killed and ultimately you ran out of the state. What I remember about Reverend Jim Lane And what happened with him was everyone being very very excited and upset one morning. And people were riding on bicycles or coming on cars I guess spreading the information. And what had happened there had been a fire at his house. And he I don't know whether the two things happened at the same time. He was

spirited out of town some say and heard some say in the trunk of a car. But I think one of the reasons that he was targeted is because the white leadership thought that if they could get the leader and they had earmarked him as leader but she probably was along with the others it would all go away. But it didn't work. He was persistent in his fight for the equality of teachers salaries and Sockeye which was a big thing because as you know most of the opportunities for blacks at that time was as teachers as I told you earlier. I had gotten my Bachelor of Science degree in secondary education. I was to become a high school principal. So teaching was one of the routes to freedom. You could see fear you know something terrible had happened. No one really talked very much

and I asked my mother later about it well of course she wouldn't tell children about someone's house being firebombed I guess we call it today because that would put fear in them that their health could be far gone. But they did relocate I think they had to get him out of town immediately because there were threats against his life. When the Delaine house went up in flames that night in Somerton the fire trucks came to the side but the white firefighters did not put out the flames. They stood and watched the house burn to the ground. Reverend DeLaine had homeowners insurance that entitled him to twenty seven hundred dollars to cover damages but he never received it. The authorities confiscated his money because of a judgment in an earlier case one that was filed by white town leaders in order to intimidate the civil rights leader. They were such strong segregationists that they just did not want out. This interaction the thought that their children

would go to school and sit next to black children was too much of not it. It's very ironic and I could never understand how you could have this the mother of this black child fixing your food. I don't imagine anything more intimate than that. Taking care of everything that you didn't want your child to sit in a classroom next to them. So it never made sense to me and as a child and it does not make sense to me as an adult. The presence of Thurgood Marshall and his team of lawyers gave hope to Reverend DeLaine and the blacks in Clarendon County Thurgood Marshall would come to town and he was totally delightful man in my memory. I think we called him uncle T. Thurgood I think what what I remember as awful to him and he was like that he was full of fun too. And how are you girls though and pretty. And my sister Barbara and I were you.

Purdy Yeah. Like I said I was six and she was three. So it was it was made. We were made to feel that everything was as it should be. But I knew of situations where it wasn't as it was should be if nothing more than the threats. Maybe nothing happened but the threat the idea of wondering before you went in as you were making your trip borish you were preparing your papers wondering about your personal safety so really when you look at heroes there are lots of heroes whose names don't get associated with these with these cases. There are lots of other people ancillary people who were involved in this. And my heart goes out to all of them. My thanks go out to all of them. And I think I have often said. It's an indication to me how committed my parents and the other people were

as well as people like Reverend DeLaine and Thurgood Marshall to me. You had to feel in your soul that this was inherently wrong and that you had to do something about it. Otherwise I don't know whether you would have taken all of those risks. I don't know whether you would have pursued. So I think when you think about Thurgood Marshall and I remember when he became Supreme Court Justice Marshall. The phone calls that went back and forth. I was a military wife at the time calling Mother because I knew what her reaction would be and I just thought that she had come in contact with someone like that with something that that thrilled her. So they didn't really do it for recognition or any other reason that I think they thought it was something that had to be done and they were in a position to do it and thank God they felt that way.

Uh. Uh. The day had finally come. 1054 the Supreme Court handed down the historic decision overturning Plessy versus Ferguson was unconstitutional. Justice Earl Warren said in the field of public education the doctrine of separate but equal has no place separate educational

facilities are inherently unequal. It was a day of triumph for the lawyers students parents and children who had fought the difficult battle started many courtrooms ago. For those who lived to see it such as Thurgood Marshall and those who sacrificed their lives. Charles Hamilton Houston. The memory of that day was in the minds of those who lived through the days of Jim Crow. And if you 54. I was 11 years old and living in thought word. So I got out that Supreme Court had done something it wasn't quite clear to an 11 year old or what the Supreme Court had done. But I knew from overhearing my parents and some of the older folk in the community and a little bit of what I heard at school that the Supreme Court it done something about schools about public education. And I my sense was that it was a real good thing that happened. I remember having a celebration when the news came down and people were

just overjoyed in talking to each other and saying how wonderful it was that was. When I knew how important all that he had been doing was what I remember about it it must have been on a school day because I remembered coming in and my mother was just jumping for joy as she was on the telephone. Face just so excited eyes just rhyming with tears and and shouting and calling everybody that she knew to tell them about us and we all remembered hugging and jumping in the living room with her and then I remembered the reporters coming in to talk to her it was probably a few days later the Brown case in 1954 and when that opinion was issued in May 17th 1954 found that separate but equal could not be equal in the School of Public and in addressing public schools. That as Warren Chief Justice Warren said for a unanimous court on May 9 Oh when's the last time you've seen a 9 0 unanimous

Court in 1954 ruled that it was unconstitutional to segregate. I don't believe we were moved to. There are the you know there was too much to say. I couldn't see the country at that time are you saying that segregation was was appropriate. I just said that. You know. Still you have feel like that if you could you say you don't think you can lose but obviously the reality is that you could that we could have separate but equal could of been declared to be still civil war. BUT I JUST TO could see that I and the decision itself.

You know you thought you felt just a roofer. And sometimes I want just thought of course as you know being a lawyer and being other kinds of social action and the group reach of Upper and Lower like you you can count progress by the cases you're willing to but others think you can do it so you know that I was regarded as a breaker re celebrators And and so forth. It was there was a heavy break yes. Brown vs. Board of Education was decided. And some people didn't realize how sweeping the decision was at the time. Some did. But this is not just a story that's for the legal community. This is not just a story in the Supreme Court. It's a story on the streets of Washington D.C. and it's a story on the streets of cities throughout Africa and Asia. I remember it being a headline in the newspaper and I

remember it wasn't that David was a few days later talking about it at the dinner table. My parents often talked about things that happen in Washington or elsewhere in the world at dinner and they the entire discussion was that this is going to be a major major event. There was still when you go back to April of 1054 there was still discussion that well maybe this wasn't going to be the end and of course it wasn't the end. There was resistance. North and South again going forward 10 years to the 1960s when I was in school in college in Boston and you had a well-organized vociferous and violent resistance to school desegregation. In New England and so

on was the beginning. But it certainly was by no means the end. Yeah people tell us they take it easy man. May. I remind you what you got to do. Careful of these people you say. Take it from me it is not some hands you know. And if you don't. They will. Please join us next week for the conclusion of the Howard University School of Law and the Brown decision.

I am going.

To play it for you just has been the most gratifying experience of my pro professional career. And every day I go to that law school and I walk through the law school and see our students and they speak to me. Some of it's I thank God I'm willing to make that happen. Now I think wow I want to build on the great legacy of Howard University School of Law it's a legacy of fighting for civil rights and social justice not only in this country but around the world. So I want this law school to always be known as a center of educational excellence. And I want people to be able to be leaders not only in the law but in a lot of other fields. So our idea is to have a great legal education a commitment to social justice and involvement in communities not only in the United States but around the world.

I am honored to be a part of the Howard University Law School friends family. And because what it means to me is that I get to contribute in some small way to the development of future leaders who will those who will be available for communities of color and others to protect our rights to in the courts those who will be leaders in our government in all aspects of our government and all aspects of our community. There is no place there is no where our students will not there. And I'd like to think that in some small way I'm a part of helping to really truly prepare them. You see we're working to prepared our students for a future that we may not actually see. When we came to Howard. The better. That was a coming. Was he. And it has never gotten better.

It's just been sweeter. But nothing in my life is equal to the experience learning the depth of feeling bad that I was able to have the opportunity to steal from Howard University. She is irreplaceable. Absolutely irreplaceable.