Top civil rights lawyer speaks Friday at Redding Symposium

4:07 p.m., April 20, 2004--Jack Greenberg, professor at Columbia Law School and former director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, will deliver the keynote speech during a one-day symposium to mark the 50th anniversary of Brown vs. Board of Education, the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision that ended segregation in public schools, Friday, April 23, in Clayton Hall.

The Redding Symposium, titled "Celebrating the Past, Considering the Present and Contemplating the Future," was named after the late Louis L. Redding, a distinguished Delaware civil rights lawyer who represented the plaintiff in two of the six cases that were consolidated and later led to the historic decision.

The symposium, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 8:45 a.m. and end with a reception at 5:20 p.m. The event is fully subscribed, however, space may be available if there are cancellations.

Greenberg, who argued more than 40 cases before the U.S. Supreme Court, including Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 as Redding's co-counsel, received the Presidential Citizens Medal in January 2001 from President Bill Clinton, who praised Greenberg for helping "break down the legal underpinnings of segregation in America." The medal was established in 1969 by President Richard Nixon to honor citizens who have performed exemplary deeds of service for the nation.

Other symposium speakers will include Orlando Camp, one of 11 black 10th graders in the failed attempt to integrate the Milford Delaware School in September 1954, Annette Woolward-Provine, historian and author of "Integrating Delaware: The Reddings of Wilmington," and Leland Ware, Louis L. Redding Chair for the Study of Law and Public Policy at UD.

Panelists in two morning sessions will discuss the history of the decision, including the two Delaware cases, and commemorate Redding's work as a civil rights lawyer. Two afternoon sessions will examine current desegregation issues and consider the future of school desegregation.

The symposium will be featured in a special live broadcast of “Delaware Tonight” on WHYY TV titled, "Brown vs. Board of Education: The Delaware Story," from 5-6 p.m., Friday.

The symposium was organized by UD, the American Civil Liberties Union-Delaware, the Metropolitan Wilmington Urban League, Widener University School of Law, Delaware State University, the Delaware Heritage Commission and the Delaware State Bar Association.

For more information, visit [www.udel.edu/suapp/brown/index.htm].

Article by Martin Mbugua

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