Abstract: THE BLACK LA W JOURNAL PAGE 115 THE B ROWN STRATEGISTS Introduction by CLINTON L. BURCH 1934, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, with the assistance of a $10,000 grant from the Garland Fund, undertook a systematic cam- paign of legal action and public education against unequal apportionment of public funds for education and discrimination in public transportation. The campaign was spearheaded by the legal staff of the NAACP (soon to become the nucleus of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund) under the skillful guidance of Mr. Charles H. Houston and his successor the now Mr. Justice Thurgood Marshall. This forty-year crusade on behalf of the millions of men and women who suffer from the insidious effects of racial discrimination in America has been highlighted by the passage of far-reaching civil rights legislation at both the federal and state level, and the handing down of numerous landmark Supreme Court decisions. The research and prior published materials of many American educators and social scientists (as codified in the appendix to the appellants' brief in Brown) served as the foundation for the Court's bold new venture into the field of statistical sociology as a rationale for judicial decision-making in civil rights cases. In fact, a rather august list of authorities in the fields of sociology, anthropology, psychology and psychiatry af- fixed their signatures to the appendix to the appelants' brief, which presented many of the sociological theories ultimately embraced by the Court. N I many amici curiae briefs were filed. The groups that cooperated in this mammoth effort included the Congress of Industrial Organizations, the American Jewish Congress, the American Civil Liberties Union, the American Federation of Teachers, the American Veteran's Committee and the Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith. In the end, however, the responsibility for carrying the litigation forward rested squarely upon the shoulders of the men and women who comprised the staff of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund. It was their individual and collective skills as advocates, political and legal, and as litigators, that ultimately proved to be the cutting edge on which successful and lasting results were fashioned. It is in recognition of the significance of their contributions that the Editorial Board of the Black Law Journal has chosen to dedicate this issue's Profiles section to the members of the Legal Defense and Education Fund who participated in the drafting of the appellate brief in the Brown case. Unfortunately, the unusually large number of contributors to that brief, coupled with our rather stringent space limitations, made painfully difficult our selection in this issue of only a few for special recognition from among the more than twenty contributors to the brief. N ADDITION, UR SECTION begins with profiles on Messers, Arthur D. Shores, Harold Boul- *ware, Louis Redding, Frank Reeves, and Oliver Hill. Members of the Fund who have received recognition in past issues of the JOURNAL include Mr. Justice Thurgood Marshall, Messer. Robert Carter (Judge S.D.N.Y.), Loren Miller, William Cole- man, and Ms. Constance Baker Motley (Judge S.D.N.Y.). Other participants on the brief included Mr. Spotswood Robinson III (Judge, D.C. Cir.), Mr. Jack Green- berg (current head of the Defense Fund), and Messers. George Hayes, William Ming,
Publication Year: 1973
Publication Date: 1973-01-01
Language: en
Type: article
Access and Citation
AI Researcher Chatbot
Get quick answers to your questions about the article from our AI researcher chatbot