[Congressional Record Volume 165, Number 82 (Thursday, May 16, 2019)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E615-E616]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                     HONORING UNITA ZELMA BLACKWELL

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. BENNIE G. THOMPSON

                             of mississippi

                    in the house of representatives

                         Thursday, May 16, 2019

  Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Madam Speaker, I rise today to honor Ms. 
Unita Zelma Blackwell on her great contributions to civil rights 
activism.
  Born in Lula in 1933 into a sharecropping family, Blackwell left 
Mississippi as a child to attend school in West Helena, Arkansas, 
because black children weren't allowed to consistently attend school at 
that time in the Mississippi Delta. Blackwell forfeited school at the 
eighth grade and began sharecropping with her family.
  During the early 70s, Blackwell became an important pillar in the 
civil rights movement in the South. She served as a project director 
and field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 
(SNCC), helping organize voter drives for African Americans across 
Mississippi. These efforts landed her in jail at least 70 times.
  In 1967, she co-founded Mississippi Action Community Education, a 
community development organization which helped districts to 
incorporate as towns. Incorporation enabled them to set their 
geographical boundaries so that they could have a legal identity-an 
important advantage when they wanted government help in installing 
streetlights or electricity.
  In 1976, Unita Blackwell became the first African American woman 
mayor in the state of Mississippi (Mayersville, MS) where she developed 
the city's infrastructure with an annual $30,000 budget. She also 
served as an adviser to Presidents Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, 
Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton.
  Blackwell's career path was very diverse: Key organizer, Mississippi 
Freedom Democratic Party, 1964; National President of the U.S.-China 
People's Friendship Association, 1977 through 1983; elected Mayor of 
Mayersville, 1976 through 2001; had the town incorporated, 1976; 
appointed by President Carter to the U.S. National Commission on the 
International Year of the Child, 1979; vice-chairman of the Mississippi 
Democratic Party, 1976 through 1980; established Mayors' Exchange 
Program between U.S. and China; 1984; national president of the 
National Conference of Black Mayors, 1990 through 1992.
  Notable awards achieved by Blackwell: Southern Christian Leadership 
Award, 1990; Institute of Politics Fellow, John F. Kennedy School of 
Government, Harvard University, 1991; MacArthur Foundation Genius 
Grant, 1992; APA leadership award for elected official, 1994; honored 
with a Mississippi Freedom Trail marker, 2016.
  Her son, Jeremiah Blackwell, Jr., informed Mississippi Today of his 
mother's death on Monday, May 13, 2019 at age 86.
  Madam Speaker, today I honor the life of Ms. Unita Blackwell for her 
many contributions to education, civil rights, and the great state of 
Mississippi. Blackwell made a career of serving others, and her work 
had a direct and positive influence on the lives of thousands.

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