Oliver W. Hill, 100, Civil Rights Lawyer, Is Dead

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Oliver W. Hill, 100, Civil Rights Lawyer, Is Dead
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: August 6, 2007


Oliver W. Hill in 1999

RICHMOND, Va., Aug. 5 (AP) — Oliver W. Hill, a civil rights lawyer who was at the forefront of the legal effort that desegregated public schools, died Sunday at his home here. He was 100.

Mr. Hill’s death was reported by a family friend, Joseph Morrissey.

In 1954, Mr. Hill was involved in the series of lawsuits against racially segregated public schools that became the Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision.

“He was among the vanguard in seeking equal opportunity for all individuals, and he was steadfast in his commitment to effect change. He will be missed,” said L. Douglas Wilder, who in 1989 became the nation’s first elected black governor and was a confidant of Mr. Hill’s. Mr. Wilder is now the mayor of Richmond.

(snip)

Though blind and in a wheelchair in recent years, Mr. Hill remained active in social and civil rights causes and in the operations of his law firm until 1998. The next year, he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor, from President Bill Clinton.


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/06/washington/06hill.html

Presidential Medal of Freedom Recipient Oliver White Hill



OLIVER WHITE HILL
By
William Jefferson Clinton
August 11, 1999

A courageous civil rights advocate, Oliver Hill has devoted his life to building a more just and inclusive America. As a trial lawyer, he won landmark cases that secured equal rights for African Americans in education, employment, housing, voting, and jury selection. Successfully litigating one of the school desegregation cases later decided by the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education, he played a key role in overturning the “separate but equal” doctrine. For his unyielding efforts to improve the lives of his fellow Americans and his unwavering dedication to justice for all, our Nation honors Oliver Hill.




Biography

OLIVER WHITE HILL: Liberator of Virginia
by
Dr. J. Clay Smith, Jr.
Professor of Law

When Oliver White Hill matriculated at Howard University School of Law, the world was dramatically different than it is today. And, yet, challenges remain to correct the imbalances of justice and equality all over the world. Oliver White Hill was born in Richmond, Virginia in 1907 under the shadow of Plessy v. Ferguson. This means that his parents were born under the shadow of the Dred Scott decision of 1857. Yet, he strived to make something out of himself, and he did.

Mr. Hill earned dual degrees at Howard University as an undergraduate and from the Law School in 1933. He brought with him the songs of the South in his soul, as did his classmates. No one could hear them sing, but their souls sang songs of liberation, and their hearts beat like the drums of their native land and their feet danced their way into the library headed by A. Mercer Daniel. With two Howard degrees under his belt, and the bar examination of the Commonwealth of Virginia behind him (1933), Mr. Hill set out to make the world a better place to live for all Americans.

Threats against his life made the task of making a better world to live in a daunting task. Mr. Hill's life teaches us more than history may uncover. His life teaches us how to live a life with dignity, purpose and resolve. We have much to learn still from Mr. Hill's life experiences. Fortunately, we can learn much from his recently published autobiography: The Big Bang: Brown v. Board of Education, The Autobiography of Oliver W. Hill, Sr. (2000), edited by Professor Jonathan K. Stubbs. The book reveals the life not of a man who is weak of heart but one strong in his desire to eradicate the inequities that limited the advancement of black people in the nation. Mr. White has taught us to combine legal forces and unite our strategies to overcome barriers to economic and social advancement.

Thus, it was with the skill of lawyers like Mr. Hill, not luck, that African Americans are freer today than they were in 1907, the year he was born. It was his superior legal skills and full commitment to make a difference, even in the face of death, that warrant tributes to Mr. Hill.

Mr. Hill instructs us to pay equal tribute to Spottswood William Robinson III, a former Dean of th Law School and another son of Virginia, and to Samuel Tucker his law partner, for their heroic work in Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, one of the five school desegregation suits decided in the 1954 by the U.S. Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education.

The nation owes much to Oliver White Hill. He has given unselfishly the whole and entire of his professional life to secure the real values of the nation. T he law students present at this occasion will tell their children and grandchildren that during the Fall Semester 2000 they were in the presence of one of America's greatest patriots, one of its greatest lawyers, one of its noblest men, and one of Howard Law School's greatest sons.

Recently, the American Bar Association and William Jefferson Clinton, the President of the United States, presented Mr. Hill with medals acknowledging his exceptional achievements to the nation and the rule of law. Thus, he stands as tall in character and principle as other notable distinguished medal winners such as Justices Thurgood Marshall and Felix Frankfurter. These medals are mere symbols of Mr. Hill's human sacrifice for over sixty years to make the United States Constitution an inclusive instrument for all Americans.

In July, 2000, Mr. Hill received the American Bar Association Medal. In announcing the award, William G. Paul, the President of the ABA stated, “Oliver Hill has toiled for more than two generations to make equality and justice living realities for all the people of the United States.”

We thank Mr. Hill for the work that he has done for our freedom and for being the liberator of the Commonwealth of Virginia. On August 11, 1999, the President of the United States, William Jefferson Clinton, powerfully demonstrated the nation's gratitude to Oliver Hill when he presented him with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest honor the nation can bestow on a citizen. Speaking eloquently of Oliver Hill's contribution to the nation, President Clinton stated:

Throughout his long and rich life, {Oliver White Hill} has challenged the laws of our land and the conscience of our country. He has stood up for everything that is necessary to make America truly one, indivisible and equal.

The songs of freedom that Oliver White Hill brought to Howard University School of Law still ring out of generations that have followed in Hill’s path. In this century, many more will follow.


http://www.medaloffreedom.com/OliverWhiteHill.htm