[Congressional Record Volume 163, Number 195 (Thursday, November 30, 2017)]
[Senate]
[Page S7559]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     REMEMBERING ANNA DIGGS TAYLOR

 Ms. STABENOW. Mr. President, today I wish to remember and pay 
tribute to Judge Anna Diggs Taylor, who turned her lifelong passion for 
justice into a highly successful legal career, breaking down barriers 
for women and people of color and inspiring me and so many others in 
our State.
  When Anna Katherine Johnston was born in 1932 in Washington, DC, 
women had very few options. African-American women had even fewer. 
However, Anna's parents, Hazel Bramlette Johnston--a business teacher--
and Virginius Douglass Johnston--a Howard University trustee--deeply 
believed in the power of education and in their smart, hard-working 
daughter. When she was in 10th grade, they pulled her from the 
segregated DC school system and enrolled her in the prestigious 
Northfield School for Girls in Massachusetts, from which she graduated 
in 1950.
  Her own early experiences with segregation and witnessing how the law 
could be used as a tool to further equality led her to the legal 
profession. It wasn't a common career path for women in those days. In 
fact, when she graduated from Yale Law School in 1957, there were only 
four other women in her class. About 5,500 women were practicing 
lawyers in the United States in 1960.
  Anna got her chance to join those ranks when J. Ernest Wilkins, the 
first African-American man appointed as an Assistant Secretary of 
Labor, hired her as a staff lawyer in the Office of the Solicitor. In 
1960, Anna married Congressman Charles Diggs, Jr., and moved to 
Detroit, where she had two children and a career, including as an 
assistant Wayne County prosecutor.
  In 1964, her passion for justice led her to Mississippi, where she 
represented civil rights workers who were jailed for helping register 
African-American voters. She arrived the same day civil rights 
activists James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner 
disappeared, and she became a target of hatred herself when an angry 
mob yelled racial slurs at her and three other activists as they were 
leaving the Neshoba County courthouse after trying to question the 
sheriff.
  Over the years, Anna worked both in private practice and in public 
service, as an assistant U.S. attorney and managing her husband's 
congressional office. When she and her husband later divorced, she 
helped to elect Coleman Young as Detroit's first Black mayor and worked 
to integrate city government during his administration.
  In 1976, Anna married S. Martin Taylor and worked on Jimmy Carter's 
Presidential campaign. Three years later, President Garter appointed 
her to the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan. 
She was the first Black woman Federal judge to serve in our State and 
the first Black Woman chief judge for that circuit. She retired in 
2011.
  She once said that ``black judges have an important role, especially 
in staying close to their communities,'' and Judge Taylor did just 
that. She was deeply involved in community organizations including the 
Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan. She was an adjunct labor 
law professor at Wayne State University, vice president of the Yale Law 
School Association, and served on the joint steering committee of the 
gender and racial ethnic fairness task forces for the Sixth Circuit, 
positions that allowed her to help open the same doors that others had 
opened for her.
  In a biography, Judge Taylor once wrote that her legal career was ``a 
thousand times more exciting, more intellectually challenging, and more 
enriching'' than she had ever imagined while at Yale Law. That didn't 
mean it was easy; breaking barriers never is. Yet she did it. Judge 
Taylor's life and career will long serve as an example of just how far 
you can go with hard work, persistence, and a passionate dedication to 
your ideals.
  I think that young girl in a segregated DC classroom would be really 
proud. I know that many people in Michigan certainly are.
  Thank you.

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