The last state to admit a black student to the college level was South Carolina.
The fact is that racism, despite all the doomsayers, has diminished.
The Constitution, as originally drawn, made no reference to the fact that all Americans wre considered equal members of society.
The black population now consists of two distinct classes-the middle class and the poor.
Sexism, like racism, goes with us into the next century. I see class warfare as overshadowing both.
New Orleans may well have been the most liberal Deep South city in 1954 because of its large Creole population, the influence of the French, and its cosmopolitan atmosphere.
My parents never told us that our great-grandmothers had been slaves.
My father kept his distance from working-class American blacks.
King consciously steered away from legal claims and instead relied on civil disobedience.
In my view, I did not get to the federal bench because I was a woman.
In high school, I won a prize for an essay on tuberculosis. When I got through writing the essay, I was sure I had the disease.
In high school, I discovered myself. I was interested in race relations and the legal profession. I read about Lincoln and that he believed the law to be the most difficult of professions.
I soon found law school an unmitigated bore.
I remember being infuriated from the top of my head to the tip of my toes the first time a screen was put around Bob Carter and me on a train leaving Washington in the 1940s.
I rejected the notion that my race or sex would bar my success in life.
I never thought I would live long enough to see the legal profession change to the extent it has.
I got the chance to argue my first case in Supreme Court, a criminal case arising in Alabama that involved the right of a defendant to counsel at a critical stage in a capital case before a trial.
How long must the American community afford special treatment to blacks?
Had it not been for James Meredith, who was willing to risk his life, the University of Mississippi would still be all white.
Columbia Law School men were being drafted, and suddenly women who had done well in college were considered acceptable candidates for the vacant seats.
