i'm carla hayden and i'm very pleased to welcome you to the law library of congress, 190th anniversary celebrate nation. it was on this day in 1832 that the law library congress was created as a depart of the library of congress by statute. since that time, the law library has grown to be the largest law library in, the world featuring an unparalleled collection of domestic, foreign, international and comparative legal materials. this collection so large that the sub basement stacks of the

madison building, which contains most of law library's collection, is an incredible one and a half football in length. but of course, the impressive are only half the story. the law library's dedicated staff is what makes this collection accessible to patrons who come from a wide variety of backgrounds ranging from members of all three branches of our government legislative, executive and judicial, to members of the public. they make the collection accessible by providing reference services and issuing reports for congress on both u.s. and foreign international and comparative law, providing webinars on how to research the law maintaining and describe a vast collection of legal materials in a wide variety of languages, is and through large digitization projects such as

digitizing the united states serial set to celebrate this momentous occasion. we are so pleased to have with us dean tamiko brown. megan dean brown. megan is dean of harvard radcliffe institute. daniel pierce paul professor of constitutional law at harvard law school and member of the history department. in 2019, she was appointed chair of the presiding annual committee on harvard and the legacy of slavery. she is a member of the american academy of and sciences. the american institute and the american philosophical society. a fellow of the american bar and a distinguished lecturer for the organization of american historians, the law library of congress. ashland below will interview her today, discuss her book, civil rights queen constance baker

motley and the struggle for equality. civil rights queen is a book that explores the life and times of constance baker motley, the pathbreaking lawyer and judge dean brown. nagin. once again, we are so pleased you could join us today. and with that i will turn it over to. law librarian of congress. happy anniversary, law. library of congress. thank you, dr. hayden. afternoon to our audience, our patrons and colleagues, and, of course, to our guest of honor the hill, michael brown. nagin, dean brown. nagin, thank you for helping us. celebrate the library of congress 190th birthday. i just want to remind the audience that they can type their questions into the q&a box at the bottom of the screen. and we will address the questions at the end of the

program. so our first question is, could you tell us a bit about constance baker, motley and your book, civil rights queen? constance baker motley and the struggle for equality. what drew you to tell johnson baker motley's story. thank you so much. i'm delighted to be here to celebrate the law library of congress anniversary and to be in conversation with you about my book, civil rights queen. the book is life and times of constance baker motley, who was a path breaker in three different realms. first, she was a civil rights lawyer who helped to litigate cases such as brown versus board of education. the case that desegregated ole miss, universe of alabama, university of georgia. and through her work, a civil rights lawyer, she brought, us, the world that we know today, one in which racial

discrimination is proscribed under law and the achievement by achievement is open to everyone, regardless of and gender. after she had litigated all of those cases changed the world for us. constance baker motley broke barriers in politics. she was the first woman elected manhattan borough president. she was the first black woman elected to the new york senate. and then after all of that, in 1966, president lyndon johnson appointed her a federal, making her the first black woman to occupy such a role. she was appointed to the u.s. district court and then and what drew me to this life. well it was because when i was researching a prior work, i came to understand that motley had not received the attention, the

scholarly attention that she deserves. there had been relatively little written about her. and i thought that the absence of her story in the literature was a kind of historical malpractice. and i also concluded that, unfortunately, her erasure of her lowered visibility likely came down to two gender arms race because in western society its historical significance tends to be accorded to males and women's stories are not highlighted. that's true of women of all backgrounds. and yet it's it was especially notable to me that motley, who was a protege of thurgood marshall, worked alongside him and martin luther king jr, who was her client? well known to them, but had been

that been featured in the history like these individuals were and thought i wanted to correct that oversight and i thought it particularly unfortunate that the erasure of this woman occurred within the civil rights literature and the legal history, just the same as erasure of women is apparent in other areas of history. so thurgood marshall was one of the most influential people in motley's life, hiring her at a time when it was very difficult for a female, a law school graduate, to find work as an attorney. but ultimately, she also had to fight even in own place of work for equal pay within the organization and doubt. she was disappointed when

marshall chose jacqueline berg, a white civil rights attorney as his successor. she also faced significant professional setback in that she never did get appointed to the federal court of appeals. how did constance baker motley to these challenges and what can we learn from it? sure. well, there's a there's a lot there. and let me unpack a little bit first as to the challenges she encountered as a law student, she graduated from columbia law school. and in 1946 and when she went to apply for jobs with law firms, new york city law was the most sector of legal profession. she had the closed in her face because she was a woman and, also because she was african

american. and this a common experience. it just happen to her. in fact, this continued to happen years later when ruth bader ginsburg came along and sandra day o'connor. so this was the fate of women even those who performed well in law school and who went to these brilliant careers as lawyers. motley did not let it discourage her that that being shut out of the law firm? in fact, it created an opportunity for her in public interest law in 1945. well she even graduated from law school. she went to the icp legal defense fund, asked thurgood marshall for a job. she hired her on the spot. it was her dream job because. she had been a person with strong social consciousness from, a very young age, and she was delighted to work at the fund. marshall was a mentor to her and

she learned so much from him and in many ways he was progressive on gender, for instance, when she became pregnant around the same time that the acp was litigating versus board of education and it went and down to the supreme court twice. he permitted her to go on leave and then come back and i say, permitted might not sound so progressive, but for that era, in fact, it was pretty progressive to have a woman in the office much less, you know, have her going out on maternity and returning to the job. and this really hectic time, the law firm. nevertheless, thurgood, as you mentioned, also denied her the

promotion to his position when he was set to be appointed to the federal bench and was disappointed. she thought that gender was a factor, that race was a factor. so in the denial of her promotion and yet for all of her life, she lifted up thurgood marshall. she praised thurgood marshall for giving her her big break. in fact, she said, had it not been for thurgood marshall, no one ever would have heard of constance baker motley. and so she handled it in the way that she handled everything she kept going. she kept going. she was incredibly and of course the failure to that promotion actually an opportunity for her. she was she went into politics after working at the naacp legal

defense fund for more than 20 years and was a barrier there. and of course she was appointed to the u.s. district court. she was not able to make it to the court of appeals. there are many stories there. i'm not sure how much you want me to tell. suffice it to say that, her practice background as a civil rights lawyer was weaponized against her and also there were those who just didn't want a woman on the court of appeals. nevertheless, mottley achieved great things and ultimately she was pleased with the history that she had made. so one of the things i noticed in your book, which was really interesting, is that you discussed the intense pressure placed on plaintiffs in civil rights cases, not just the attorneys, but also the clients,

and to caught my attention were authoring lucy, who sought admission to study library science at the university of alabama and james meredith, who sought admission to the university of mississippi. and both of these clients were under tremendous pressure from communities that sought resist desegregation with violence. client management and emotional intelligence are often an underappreciated skill set in the law. how did constance baker motley help these clients through such trying situations? and what do you think attorneys learn from that? hmm. well, thanks for question. i like it a great deal because it does give me the opportunity. discuss one of the themes of my and that is how much pressure what costs these pioneering

plaintiffs had to endure in the course of struggle for civil rights and the case of authoring lucy and her in the her copeland played for a while holly and maya. it the university of alabama case and james meredith in the university of mississippi or ole miss case point in different directions and here's why offering lucy had been prompted to file the case to enter the university of alabama because her friend polly and maya who more of a more of a social activist and something really unfortunate happened to polly and maya during the course of that litigation such that she ended up no longer being a plaintiff in that was that the officials at the university

discovered that she had become pregnant before she was married and accused her on that basis of being a person low moral character and the ecp upon being faced with this situation the circumstance dropped maya. and so was left to fight as a plaintiff on her own. it was very difficult for her. she not only was subjected to epithets and threats of violence from whites, but was subjected to criticism from some african-americans for daring to on this role. because, of course, in these civil rights cases, the entire

community could could be subject to blowback from whites, even if only one individual was, the face of a civil rights case. and so ultimately authoring lucy said that she had had enough and. the university of alabama case, the first one, mottley, was involved in ended without success. it took a second case years during the early 1960s to ultimately desegregate the university of alabama. and what about the james meredith? so this was another one in which meredith's faced tremendous obstacles. and everyone knew that would be the case in fact, when james meredith wrote a letter to acp legal defense fund saying that

he wanted to challenge segregation at. ole miss. thurgood and everyone else said he has to be crazy because white supremacy was such a factor in every sector of in mississippi that it was clear someone might get killed might be murdered in the course of this case. and in fact there were, individuals who lost their lives as result of the desegregation of ole miss. and yes, motley was with him all along she had to incur him to go on when the state mississippi argued that he was unstable mentally unstable because what kind of black person would want to challenge the state that really what the what was embedded behind that claim what

they were using his records from the armed forces to to to make that claim they argued that she had he unlawfully voted which was not true but at the full weight of the state mississippi was brought to bear james meredith and one of the things that we did was she actually invited him to her apartment in new york city to talk about what he was going through, you know, a context where could taste freedom instead of being left in mississippi, where he had to be in fight mode all the time. and so she was she made the difference for him she helped him manage his emotions even as she was managing her own

emotions. they both were up against quite lot in mississippi disrespects. it the state just being ideologically opposed to desegregation making claims in the court that ridiculous but nevertheless had to be litigated did and so meredith is just one of the many plaintiffs that motley worked with whom she had to support and. she she almost was like, one could think of it as a kind therapy or. some of it might be characterized as maternal. she did that because she had to, because these were hard cases, hard for the plaintiffs, hard the communities, black communities. and, of course difficult for

mottley other civil rights lawyers as well. so justice catanese, brown, jackson acknowledge the influence of those who inspired her, stating i stand on the shoulders of so who have come before me in her senate confirmation hearing, including judge constance baker, motley during her time as a district judge. constance baker motley, presi cited over cases ranging from the rights of persons in solitary confinement under the eighth amendment to a case that turned on whether a female reporter interview baseball players the locker room which was the location where male reporters typically got the inside scoop. did constance baker motley a case that she presided over that she was particularly proud of and felt it defined legacy on the bench? mm hmm. that's a good question and a complicated question.

and that's because the cases that tended to define her legacy were civil rights cases. and yet it was her background as a civil rights lawyer that had been weaponized against her to deny her, say, the appointment to the court of appeals. and so there was a legacy associated with her. her expert in civil rights. nevertheless, the cases that i would cite as being particularly meaningful to her and indeed to us relate to discrimination because essentially what she did was as a lawyer she paved the way for the passage of the civil rights of 1964. and that a judge she implemented the civil rights act through cases that were brought. and let me tell you about two of them.

the first defining case was blake versus sullivan and cromwell. this was a claim brought by female school graduates against the law firm sullivan. cromwell. i am sure we all know of of the white shoe firms. and in new york city arguing that firm would not hire women. would not if they did, a handful would promote them or give them the kind of assignments that, would allow them to show their mettle and stand for partner is what the title seven case and a judge motley drew the case by random back a long time ago. the court in the southern district actually had a wheel and. the clerk would spin the wheel

and and get a name, reach out and get a name of one of the judges. and motley was it the law firm's attorney was not happy as he argued that she had been a civil rights lawyer. she was a woman and she was biased, he argued. he wrote her a letter this. then he filed a motion for recusal and motley rejected of the motion. and she did so in the opinion that to have resonance and continues to be cited by judges who asked to recuse on the basis of identity. what held there was that the identity alone was not enough and did not amount necessarily to bias. in fact, she turned the argument on head and said that if or gender or practice alone were to

disqualify a judge, then no judge on the court could hear the case. right? because men corporate, for instance, have a practice background and a gender and a race. it was a brilliant opinion and has been cited time and time again. now what was the sole substantive result there? the firm settled ultimately and motley approved a settlement that opened the doors of these lucrative positions in law firms to women. and i should say that sullivan and cromwell was hardly alone in its practices. the case really could have been brought any of the firms at that time, all of whom denied entry to two women and to people of

color and. thanks to motley, that changed. i will tell you about one other case that was defining and this was the case involving martin sjöström, who was what was called a jailhouse lawyer, a black puerto rican man who had landed in attica on trumped up drug charges and, is in solitary confinement. he brought a lawsuit arguing that solitary confinement constituted and unusual punishment and that some other things had happened during the course of his confinement. for instance, his mail, not letting communicate privately with his lawyers were unlawful and. mottley ruled in his favor. it was a cause celeb, and it was very controversial and.

i will tell you that it's the kind of case no one would have been surprised or particularly upset outside of. the prisoner's rights movement if mottley not ruled in his favor. so this was a very courageous decision on her part. the second circuit upheld her part, but but not whole. and it's because it shows was courageous. she was. and that she called them like saw them. she called them and she saw them. if martin zoster had made his case, she was going rule in his behalf. although it really didn't win her very many friends. so i'm sure we can relate to that at some point in our life. if constance baker motley were here, what words of, wisdom do you think she would want to leave us with? and do you think is a particular aspect of her life that is

underappreciated? and you would like to mention, hmm, well, first i want to go back to the first thing you you mentioned and the prior question that was that associate justice brown, jackson cited mottley as a role model when she was introduced to the country. i was very happy that she did because. of course there is a link between mottley and justice jackson. clearly motley's pave the way for not the handful of women of color judges but women judge us generally and women lawyers and people of color lawyers. and yet the in answer to your current question, the thing that i would say about her is that

she was a lovely person, just a lovely person. and i wanted in my book to show her her full personhood, her full humanity and to show, for instance, how she mentored law clerks and other judges. she was very welcoming to associate justice sotomayor when she joined began her judicial career on the southern district of new york and kimba wood and so many other judges. she always stayed in with her family and was helpful to her family. she reunions. she traveled back to nevis, which is where her parents had immigrated from in the early 20th century.

and so she was just a very decent person. i think that it's important to said you convey to readers that this is a person of high achievement but she wasn't just that she. she also was just a terrific human. and i think it's important have examples of that combination and then in terms of what she might to us today. well, i. she might look around and see the many problems legal and social problems confronting us. and she might observe that in a career that spanned decades, that included three different phases and roles. she had done her part. and she would say to us that should do our part to ensure

that democracy and that people are able to achieve despite their identities that's why swartz yes. words of wisdom. the the discrimination faced by constance baker motley as a woman and minority and a child of working class family required an incredible amount of perseverance overcome and to become the civil rights attorney, federal district judge and leader and new york state senator. based on your extensive research on motley's life, what advice would you glean her experience to give to people pursuing career in law who come from similar backgrounds that are underrepresented in the law and who may face obstacles similar to constance baker motley? that's a good question, and i

will quote motley, who described herself as a person who would not be put down. she just would not be defeated. she was determined she was rising client. she knew who she was. she understood that she was a person of great ability and despite all the setbacks, she continue to pursue goals. they were goals that she had had since she was a teenager growing up in new haven and the shadow of yale university. and so i would say that she would encourage people to endure people who can gen who know that they have talents. she also would say that individual who are pursuing

goals certainly in the law to be prepared and that preparation starts long before law school. of it's something that requires preparation from in k through 12 and thus that back not just to the individual to institutions and structures we as a society and as decision makers and leaders in educational institutions and in the legal profession need to ensure that barriers are removed, that those who are talented or who show ability can achieve despite what might be humble beginnings. that was the case for constance biggar motley, one particular challenge you have discussed the

difficult balancing act of being a working mother even though she got her maternity leave. how did how did constance take her motley balance? being a mother with being an attorney who had to travel frequently. a across the country. yeah well, maternity leave is just the beginning of it, right? that's right. so she came back to work and she was at a very different position than her male colleagues. and i describe in the book how when the infant lawyers were litigating around her sort of education, they were expected to be at work all the time to, not see their families to litigate to do the work, the research, to write the briefs for hours at a time. and speaking of law firms, certainly those who have worked in law firms know this life and motley couldn't really do that.

and so she to she had to do what she to to spend some time with her young son at the same time she also hired help was not shy saying so she counseled women who were who were in the professions to hire help to to play the the domestic roles that one cannot when one is in the workforce and she also had a supportive an eagle rotarian marriage before that was really a phenomenon and she had siblings who helped her out and so you know there's that saying the proverb it taking a village i think that was true of and yet also want to note that at the

end near the end of her life when she was asked what she was proudest of, she said her son, who turned out well, although his mom was always working. and that's bittersweet, isn't it? that she was so proud of being a mother. and yet she was acknowledging her uneasy relationship with conventional motherhood. and so one juggles that there's always until child care responsibility are more evenly distributed for women at least there there may always be that sort of sense of sacrifice. so a little bit of just regret. so i must ask you, since we are celebrating the law library's 90th anniversary, i am curious whether you ran across any

quotes by constance baker motley about libraries or law libraries, what role do you think libraries can play in? ensuring the words that are etched above the portico on the u.s. supreme court? equal justice under law, which is such a dominant theme in the life of constance baker, becomes, you know, closer to reality. sure well, i can't say that i came across any quotes about law libraries. i must say that one of the unfortunate of these early civil rights lawyers that they were denied entry to, various libraries, even in northern states. and so there's not a very happy history there. however, years later when i was

doing research not only for this, but for a prior one on the history, a legal history, the history, the civil rights movement and, uncovering histories of civil rights lawyers, not well known. i did research at the library of congress and was happy to do and know about the unparallel resources that are available in the at the library of congress including the law library congress and also just a professionalism of the staff was astounding to me and frankly when i was first researching there i was graduate student so it was a little scary little, intimidating with all of the procedures. but of course the staff doing exactly what needed to be done to protect the materials and it is the case that we, in doing

our research and recovering this history, it's vital to have resources like those that are available at the library of congress. well, thank you so much, dean brown, and what a remarkable legacy and what a role model for all us. now it's time to answer questions from our audience and we have a few. i see in our q&a. so the first one is could you discuss how constance baker motley's parents felt her involvement in the civil rights movement. yes. well, let me add some context. the answer by noting first that her parents were from the west indies and considered themselves special and the father considered himself and all west

indians different from black americans, from black migrants from the south and in fact, would not allow his children to play with the children of black migrants. so his understanding race was and and racism was to pretty. it's not it's not it was as they say, common. but just just sort of unhappy unfortunate to it. and yet i in my book either because of or despite of her father's teachings, motley grew up to be the civil rights queen and was a person who had tremendous social consciousness. she grew up the great depression and was exposed to civil rights

lawyers, to social activists. her mother was an important influence on her life and lived much longer than her father and to see her daughter become a civil rights and, a politician, new york city. and she was delighted that she played that role. and i was happy to talk about that background in my book. it's really important understanding motley's relationship to social activism and to the law. i can't say that her parents expected her to become a lawyer. in fact, they didn't. they didn't even think that it was a logical for her to pursue a college education because. women didn't do that. little girls of color from

working class backgrounds didn't aspire to such things. and yet motley baker motley was to pursue that course with the help of a philanthropist in new haven, clarence blakeslee. and our other question here i see is, how would you describe judge motley's as a manhattan borough president on new york city politics? hmm. good question. well, she was able to break and enter politics in manhattan, new york politics, despite a woman. i can't that everyone welcomed her. and indeed they did not. there were those who thought she should stay in her lane as a civil rights lawyer and that she wasn't the most authentic

representative of african-american kids, including in harlem. and yet she did break through. and that was partly because had the not only of liberal democrats but when she ran for manhattan borough president all of three parties supported including the republican party and this another third party. and so she was just very well respected she did break through and in terms of her impact, i point to two things. first, there was the symbolism of her as as we all know, being a politician, you know, a lot of chicken and representing the and the state. and she did that. and it was something to see baker motley being the represent ative of the city of new york and then more substantively, as

ben had a president, she sat on the board estimate which that she was able to influence had a lot of influence on the budget of the city. and using that influence was able to ensure resources for welfare programs to support women in particular single mothers, people from modest backgrounds who were striking and she supported revitalized in harlem and so this second part of her advance the struggle for equality using different means and i wanted to tell the story of her brief time and politic because i do think it's notable that in each of her professional roles she was able to engage and

activities that allowed her commitment to social justice, to defined expression. there's a related question. the q and perhaps in answering this one, we focus on her work as a state senator. so how much impact on new york did kansas baker motley have as as a state. so i would say i would answer in much the same way and also point out when motley in the state senate, she was is battling against like no knock laws and police police violence so issues are still relevant to us today. she was not winning so. she was not in the winning

position. there are and yet it's important that she was a representative that she was a barrier breaker. she was in legislature overlapped with shirley chisholm and was a model for people like shirley chisholm and other women who came after her in new york politics also was a classmate of bella abzug, who, of course, was elected first woman elected to congress from new york. and so she was a part of a network of women, early politicos sometimes prevailed. the liberal positions that they took, but not always. and so i think that not winning is a an important legacy of its own. when she was standing up for positions that years, many

later, others have come around. so she was she was ahead of her time on those criminal justice issues. so i think that was our last question. i want to thank you so much, dean brown nagin, for sharing the story of constance baker motley's extraordinary life and career with us. this certainly was inspiring conversation. and thank you all for being with us today as we celebrate the 190th anniversary of the library of congress, the largest law library in the world. i hope you