Inductee Category: <span>Government and Law</span>
Honorable Calvin Smyre
Calvin Smyre, a Fort Valley State University graduate, served more than four decades in the Georgia House of Representatives and became a senior Democratic…
Honorable Willie Earl Lockette
Willie Earl Lockette, a Fort Valley State University alumnus, served as a Georgia superior court judge. He was among the HBCU-trained lawyers who moved…
Honorable Barbara Jordan
Barbara Jordan was a Texas Southern University graduate who became the first Southern Black woman elected to the U.S. House. Her speech during the…
Honorable Clarence Cooper
Clarence Cooper, a Clark Atlanta University graduate, is a senior U.S. district judge in the Northern District of Georgia. He earlier served as a…
Honorable Earnest Finney, Jr.
Ernest A. Finney Jr., a Claflin University graduate, was the first African American chief justice of the South Carolina Supreme Court. He earlier defended…
Jacquelyn Barrett
Jacquelyn Barrett, a Clark Atlanta University graduate, was the first African American woman elected sheriff in the United States when Fulton County, Georgia, chose…
Honorable Maynard Jackson
Maynard Jackson, a Morehouse College graduate, was Atlanta’s first Black mayor. He expanded Hartsfield Airport and required minority participation in city contracts, helping turn…
Honorable Jesse White
Jesse White, an Alabama State University alumnus, was Illinois secretary of state from 1999 to 2023, the longest-serving person in that office. A former…
Honorable Thurgood Marshall
Thurgood Marshall, a Howard University School of Law graduate, argued Brown v. Board of Education and later became the first African American justice of…
Gena Hudgins Ashe
Gena Hudgins Ashe is a Spelman College valedictorian (mathematics) who became an engineer, then a senior corporate lawyer and board director. She has held…