[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 138 (Tuesday, October 23, 2012)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1716]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    HONORING PEARL ALICE MARSH, PhD

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. BARBARA LEE

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Tuesday, October 23, 2012

  Ms. LEE of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor the 
extraordinary career and tremendous accomplishments of Dr. Pearl Alice 
Marsh of California as she retires from a distinguished career in 
academia, public service and advocacy for both the United States and 
throughout Africa. Emerging from humble roots to become the first 
African-American woman to receive a doctorate degree in Political 
Science from the University of California, Berkeley, Dr. Marsh 
continues to be an inspiring trailblazer.
  Dr. Marsh's prolific career includes a decade of service as Senior 
Professional Staff for Africa on the House Committee on Foreign 
Affairs. Yet, Dr. Marsh's long record of activism is at the heart of 
her call to service. Playing a role in some of the defining civil and 
human rights movements of our time, Dr. Marsh spoke out for non-
discriminatory Fair Housing in California and helped drive the Civil 
Rights, Students, Health Rights, Women's and African Liberation 
movements throughout the 1960s and 1970s. This bold activism was part 
of an engine for enormous social and political change, and Dr. Marsh's 
passion for social justice went on to inform every aspect of her long 
career.
  Pearl Alice Marsh began her career as a social worker and advisor to 
the Oak Park Neighborhood Council Member in Sacramento, CA, in 1968. 
Throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, she held many key positions 
driving efforts to strengthen the response of California communities to 
mental health issues, including joining the University of California, 
Berkeley to coordinate health administration and planning seminars for 
the Neighborhood Health Seminars Project and becoming the Associate 
Director of Mental Health Planning at Northern Alameda County.
  Yet, in 1986, Dr. Marsh turned her attention back to academia and her 
studies of Africa, accepting a position as Program Director of 
Berkeley's Center for African Studies. In 1993, she moved to 
Washington, DC, to put her academic skills into policy practice as the 
Senior Research Associate for International Affairs at the Joint Center 
for Political and Economic Studies. In this critical role, Dr. Marsh 
developed and convened a series of multi-party forums in the run-up to 
the South African elections, which saw the election of Nelson Mandela 
as the first black president of the newly racially-integrated South 
Africa. She later became Executive Director at the Africa Policy 
Information Center, where she supervised the development of the 
Advocacy Network for Africa, a network of over 60 human rights, 
advocacy and humanitarian organizations working to raise the level of 
understanding and attention to current events in Africa through key 
policymakers.
  In the years that followed, Dr. Marsh employed her ample knowledge 
and expertise to help guide Congressional policy as Senior Policy 
Advisor for International Affairs and Domestic Policy for Congresswoman 
Juanita Millender-McDonald. And, for the next decade, from 2000 to 
2011, Dr. Marsh served as a Professional Staff Member on the House 
International Relations Committee and the Committee on Foreign Affairs 
where she reported to consecutive chairmen and helped to develop two 
key pieces of legislation--the U.S. Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, 
Tuberculosis and Malaria Authorization Act of 2003 that created PEPFAR 
and the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde Global Leadership Against HIV/
AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria Authorization Act of 2003, which has 
helped to provide AIDS treatment for more than 6.6 million people 
around the world.
  In the final chapter of her professional career, Dr. Marsh returned 
to her activist roots, assuming the position of Director of U.S. Policy 
and Global Health at the ONE Campaign, where she developed an advocacy 
plan to scale up African co-financing of their national health needs.
  On behalf of the residents of California's 9th Congressional 
District, Dr. Pearl Alice Marsh, I salute you. I am proud to call you a 
colleague, a former constituent, but most importantly my friend. Thank 
you for your countless contributions to the struggle for equal 
opportunity and for your manifold commitment to teaching, advocating 
and producing groundbreaking U.S. foreign policy in the fight against 
global poverty and disease. I congratulate you on your many 
achievements, and I wish you and your loved ones all the best in this 
next chapter of life.

                          ____________________