President’s Column

A Tribute to Charles Hamilton Houston
By: Charles J. Ogletree, Jr. – Guest Columnist

On September 3rd, 2010, we will celebrate the 115th anniversary of the birth of Charles Hamilton Houston.  It is hard to imagine anyone who contributed more to advancing the issues of race and justice in the 20th century than Charles Hamilton Houston.  The legendary Harvard Law School graduate and teacher of such luminaries as Justice Thurgood Marshall and civil rights attorney Oliver Hill, Houston had a prominent impact on the lack of justice in the legal progress for African Americans in ways that no one could easily follow.  As Justice Thurgood Marshall said after winning the historic Brown v. Board of Education case in 1954, none of them would have been there without Houston’s guidance, tutelage, and leadership.

I’m certain that Houston is looking down from heaven today and smiling over the Washington Bar Association, as it continues to recognize his legacy.  To imagine that at the Washington Bar Association’s annual dinner, both Elaine Jones, the first woman to serve as director-counsel and president of the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, and John Payton, who currently serves in that capacity, will be attending the dinner, speaks volumes about Houston’s legacy.

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