Charles Hamilton Houston

• Born: September 3, 1895
• Birthplace: Washington, D.C.
• Died: April 22, 1950
• Place of death: Washington, D.C.

Lawyer and activist

Houston was a major figure in early civil rights activism who challenged racism and segregation in the military during World War I and later became a lawyer to continue the struggle for equality. His work as counsel for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) helped lay the groundwork for Brown v. Board of Education.

Areas of achievement: Civil rights; Law

Early Life

Charles Hamilton Houston was the only child of William and Mary (Hamilton) Houston and was raised with pride in his heritage. His maternal grandfather and paternal grandparents were runaway slaves and his paternal grandfather had been a conductor on the Underground Railroad until after the Civil War. Houston’s parents made sure that he had the best of everything available to a young African American man in the early twentieth century, particularly when it came to education. Houston entered M Street High School, a prominent college preparatory high school for African American students, at the age of thirteen. He graduated from Amherst College as the only African American in his class at the age of twenty.

Houston taught English and started a class on black literature at Howard University before America entered World War I. At that time, he chose to pursue being an officer rather than being drafted into an infantry unit. It was unheard of for an African American to be given the rank of officer, but he persisted. Through the efforts of Houston and some of his colleagues and fellow students, an officers’ training camp for African Americans was set up in Des Moines, Iowa. After Houston became an officer, however, he watched the Army assign his peers to specialties in which they had not been trained, only to then report that African Americans were not equipped to be officers. Houston was further offended by the fact that the African American officers were housed not with white officers but with the conscientious objectors. Additionally, while serving as a judge advocate, he witnessed the Army’s treatment of African American soldiers, who typically were punished more harshly than their white counterparts. Seeing these injustices prompted Houston to learn about his rights and study law so that he could fight the discrimination that African Americans faced.

Life’s Work

In 1919, Houston began attending Harvard Law School. In his third year, he became the first African American on the editorial board of the Harvard Law Review. After spending the final year of his doctoral program studying abroad, Houston became an attorney in 1924 and began practicing at his father’s firm. In the fall of that year, he began teaching at Howard University’s law school, and during his tenure there as a professor and later as vice dean, he was largely responsible for reshaping the program to gain national accreditation for the university.

While still at Howard, Houston began consulting on various cases for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and in 1933, the organization named him chief counsel in Commonwealth of Virginia v. George Crawford. Although he lost the case, a system began in which Houston argued for appeals or to overturn verdicts based on the exclusion of African Americans from jury selections. In 1934, the NAACP selected Houston to act as special counsel to direct the legal campaign to end school segregation. While school segregation was not the sole focus of Houston’s mission with the NAACP (he also handled cases involving transportation, false criminal charges, and other issues), he felt that is was of utmost importance. From 1935 to 1950, Houston researched, advised, and argued a series of cases that gradually set precedents on which future cases could be won. Traveling the country fighting institutionalized racism on several fronts eventually took its toll on his health. In 1949, Houston suffered a heart attack and was put on bed rest. Although he recovered enough to occasionally get out of bed, he often worked on briefs and advised colleagues in his hospital room.

On April 20, 1950, Houston died of a heart attack. Four years later, his work helped bring about school desegregation with the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling in Brown v. Board of Education.

Significance

Houston’s efforts laid the groundwork for civil rights advancements that continued for decades after his death. He taught and influenced a generation of lawyers that includes Thurgood Marshall, the legendary attorney and later Supreme Court justice who argued for the plaintiffs in Brown v. Board of Education.

Bibliography

James, Rawn, Jr. Root and Branch: Charles Hamilton Houston, Thurgood Marshall, and the Struggle to End Segregation. New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2010. Traces the relationship between teacher and student and contends that they were ideally suited to the long campaign to desegregate schools.

Kluger, Richard. Simple Justice: The History of Brown v. Board of Education and Black America’s Struggle for Equality. 1977. Rev. ed. New York: Knopf, 2004. A detailed account of Brown v. Board of Education that showcases Houston’s role in all the cases that led to the desegregation decision. This edition includes a chapter marking the fiftieth anniversary of the case and examining its legacy.

McNeil, Genna Rae. Groundwork: Charles Hamilton Houston and the Struggle for Civil Rights. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983. An excellent in-depth biography of Houston, providing a lot of detail about his personal life as well as a detailed account of his life’s work.