Constance Baker Motley Dies-1st Black Woman Federal Judge;Civil Rights...

[buzzsaw_23]

Constance Baker Motley, Civil Rights Trailblazer, Dies at 84
By DOUGLAS MARTIN
Published: September 29, 2005

Constance Baker Motley, a civil rights lawyer who fought nearly every important civil rights case for two decades and then became the first black woman to serve as a federal judge, died yesterday at NYU Downtown Hospital in Manhattan. She was 84.

The cause was congestive heart failure, said Isolde Motley, her daughter-in-law.

Judge Motley was the first black woman to serve in the New York State Senate, as well as the first woman to be Manhattan borough president, a position that guaranteed her a voice in running the entire city under an earlier system of local government called the Board of Estimate.

Judge Motley was at the center of the firestorm that raged through the South in the two decades after World War II, as blacks and their white allies pressed to end the segregation that had gripped the region since Reconstruction. She visited the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in jail, sang freedom songs in churches that had been bombed, and spent a night under armed guard with Medgar Evers, the civil rights leader who was later murdered.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/29/nyregion/29motley.html?hp&ex=1127966400&en=374b3a155d298eef&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[nofurylike]

1. rest in Peace, heroic, inspirational Judge Motley. sigh..... eom

[goclark]

2. A True Champoion For Justice! RIP

[nofurylike]

3. thank you for posting this, buzzsaw_23. nominated. eom

[Karenina]

15. Thank you.

[nofurylike]

4. kick

[nofurylike]

5. good nyt article you posted. i love this piece:

-snip-
"Mrs. Motley's style could be deceptive, often challenging a witness to get away with one lie after another without challenging them," she wrote in her book "In My Place," published in 1992. "It was as if she would lull them into an affirmation of their own arrogance, causing them to relax as she appeared to wander aimlessly off into and around left field, until she suddenly threw a curveball with so much skill and power it would knock them off their chair."
-snip-
***

sigh


peace

[burrowowl]

6. RIP Baker Motley!

A Great Woman!

[Tsiyu]

7. RIP

You deserve peace, for sure, Your Honor. :patriot:

[nofurylike]

8. kick. everyone should get to read this. celebrate her life! eom

[populistdriven]

9. She lived her life as well as anybody could. She made a Difference!

[nofurylike]

10. yes. and better than most. i dream of living values as strongly. eom

[TacticalPeek]

11. A life to admire.

Bigtime.

:kick:

[Karenina]

12. It's quite stunning

to receive the first news of a family member's death on DU...
:cry::cry::cry::cry::cry::cry::cry::cry::cry:

[Karenina]

13. Please do rate the article on Yahoo...

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20050929/ap_on_re_us/obit_baker_motley

[Karenina]

14. And I do thank you all

for your understanding and condolences to our family. Of course, I do understand most of you never heard of her. But we are VERY PROUD of what she achieved. And when she and Joel attended a concert I played at Lincoln Center and told me how PROUD she was of me... :cry::cry::cry:

Hey THANX, DU!!! After so many years here I really feel a part of the community in this time of grief!

[nofurylike]

16. i am sorry for your, and your family's added personal loss, Karenina.

i can see why you would be very proud.

you have some great stories to tell. i hope to hear more some day.


peace

[Karenina]

17. It's really only us here...

My dear cousin Connie has passed on to the great beyond. She was a public figure and I received the first news of her death via the internet. It was quite a freaky experience. She dedicated her life to the civil rights movement and was the "first black woman to..." as are many in our family.

The real story is that our family reunions look like a United Nations convention. Picking up my son one day from school, his classmate exclaimed, J! YOUR MOMMY IS BROWN!!! J-man gave him a searing are-you-stoned-or-stupid look and said simply, "WE have ALL the colours." And races and nationalities and religions. Diss one of us disses ALL of us.

And it's really only us here.

Growing up in the psychiatrist's housing on the grounds of the hospital at which my father worked, I always thought that having neighbors from England, Trinidad, Hungary, Poland, Panama etc. etc. etc. was NORMAL as they reflected the diversity of our family. We kids were a tribe controlled by whoever's mom caught us in whatever language. LOL! It was only when I integrated the elementary school that the "us & them" paradigm was unloaded onto my head. Our family reality was about human rights. Constance Baker Motley manifested that reality in her public life.

That is why the discussion of "fear of the other" is so crucial. Who is "other?" Upon what criteria is that designation made? The Europeans and Africans converged in Nevis and the rest is history. Or Herstory. Or who begat whom. Or what colour they came out. And how come THAT is such an overriding issue? We're family.

It's really only US here...

Last kick for Constance Baker Motley. She served her country well.