Leon+A+Higginbotham+Jr.



Aloyisus Leon Higginbotham Jr. was born on February 25, 1928 in Ewing, a small suburb of Trenton, New Jersey. Ewing was a large African American neighborhood, and Higginbotham attended segragated grammar schools. His mother, Emma Lee Higginbotham, was a maid, and his father, Aloyisus Leon Higginbotham, was a factory worker. While completing high school, Higginbothham wanted to work, so he took little odd jobs like mowing lawns and shoveling snow, to make money. He even manipulated his birth certificate, at the age of fifteen, so he could recieve working papers, one year before the law allowed, in order to work at pottery factory shoveling clay.

Interested in engineering, Higginbotham enrolled into Purdue University, in West Lafayette, Indiana, at the age of sixteen. He was one of the twelve black students who attended the college. Although happy about starting college, Higginbotham was very disturbed when he found out that black students were not allowed to live on campus. Him and the other black students were relocated to a building called the International House, which was the only place that black people were allowed to live in the city of West Lafayette. They had to sleep in an unheated attic, while the rest of the schools population slept in their comfortable dorm rooms. Unhappy about the living arrangements, Higginbotham took great initiative and arranged a meeting with the President of the University. In the meeting he asked if him and the other black students could live on campus in one of the several heated dormitories. Reluctantly, the president of the University denied Higginbothams request. As a result, Higginbotham decided to leave Purdue University and he finished his undergraduate education at Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio. At Antioch College he was the head of the college chapter of the [|NAACP] and he recieved his BA in Sociology in 1949. Inspired by his experience at Purdue and the examples set by Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, Higginbotham decided to pursue a legal career.

In 1949 Higginbotham enrolled into Yale Law School. There he gained great experience working as a research assistant for his professor and as a member of the [|moot court] team. He graduated an honors student with a [|LLB] in 1952. Following his graduation, Higginbotham was excited to start his career but was soon disappointed when he could not find a job with any law firm in Philedepia as a result of his race. He finally started his career as a law clerk for the Judge Curtis Bok of the Philadephia Court of Common Plea. With Higginbotham's hard work and dedication to his career, his success grew bigger and bigger. Later, in 1953, he was hired as an assistant district attorney by the District Attorney Richard Dilworth. In 1954 Higginbotham successfully went into private practice as a principal in the first African American law firm of Norris, Green, Harris, and Higginbotham, in Philadelphia. During the time he worked with the private practice, Higginbotham got active in the civil rights movement. He served as president of the local chapter of the NAACP, where he worked toward Affirmative Action, and he was also a member of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commision. Between the years of 1960 and 1962 Higginbotham served as a hearing officer for conscientious objectors for the U.S. Department of Justice. In 1962 President John F. Kennedy appointed Higginbotham as a commisioner on the [|Federal Trade Commision]. This made Higginbotham the first African American member of a federal adminisrative agency. Almost two years later, President Lydon B. Johnson appointed him as the U.S. District Court Judge for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. At the time of his appointment, he was at the young age of 36. In 1977 President Jimmy Carter assigned Higginbotham to the U.S. Federal Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit in Philadelphia. Later, in 1989, he became chief judge until his retirement in 1993.

Higginbotham died on December 14, 1998, after suffering from a stroke at the age of 70. Although he has passed on, all of his accomplishments will be forever remembered and marked in history. His work truly reflects his dedication for the civil rights and his legendary pursuit for equality and justice. Over the years Higginbotham has won many awards such as the Presidential Medal of Honor, given to him by president Bill Clinton in 1995. The NAACP also awarded him the Spingarn Medal in 1996. From Higginbotham's sucess, many people can learn that with hard work and dedication, despite any trials or tribulation, you can be or do anything you set your mind too.

__Works Cited__

Glaberson, William. "A. Leon Higginbotham Jr., Federal Judge, Is Dead At 70." __The New York Times__ 15 Dec. 1998.

__The Official Site of the Presidential Medal of Freedom__. 18 Feb. 2009 .

Diver, Colin S. __A. Leon Higginbotham__. 18 Feb. 2009 .

__A. Leon Higginbotham__. 18 Feb. 2009 .