This article will be permanently flagged as inappropriate and made unaccessible to everyone. Are you certain this article is inappropriate? Excessive Violence Sexual Content Political / Social
Email Address:
Article Id: WHEBN0000950782 Reproduction Date:
Patricia Roberts Harris (May 31, 1924 – March 23, 1985) served in the American administration of President Jimmy Carter as United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and United States Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare (which was renamed the Secretary of Health and Human Services during her tenure). She was the first African American woman to serve in the United States Cabinet, and the first to enter the line of succession to the Presidency. She previously served as United States Ambassador to Luxembourg under President Lyndon B. Johnson, and was the first African-American woman to represent the United States as an ambassador.[2]
Roberts was born on May 31, 1924, in George Washington University National Law Center in 1960, ranking number one out of a class of 94 students.
Harris worked briefly for the U.S. Department of Justice before returning to Howard University in 1961 as an associate dean of students and law lecturer at Howard's law school. In 1963, she was elevated to a full professorship and, in 1969, she was named Dean of Howard University's School of Law.
Her first position with the U.S. government was as an attorney in the appeals and research section of the criminal division of the Department of Justice in 1960. There she met and struck up a friendship with Robert Kennedy, the new attorney general. In 1963, President John F. Kennedy appointed her co-chairman of the National Women's Committee for Civil Rights.
In 1964, Harris was elected a delegate to the Democratic National Convention from the District of Columbia. She worked in Lyndon Johnson's presidential campaign and seconded his nomination at the 1964 Democratic Convention. Soon after his victory, President Johnson appointed her Ambassador to Luxembourg from 1965 to 1967. Following her service as Dean of Howard's School of Law from 1969 to 1972, she joined Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson, one of Washington, D.C.'s most prestigious law firms.
In 1971, Harris was named a director of IBM.
She continued making an impact on the Democratic Party when, in 1972, she was appointed chairman of the credentials committee and a member-at-large of the Democratic National Committee in 1973. A testimony to her effectiveness and her commitment to excellence came when President Jimmy Carter appointed her to two cabinet-level posts during his administration.
Harris was appointed to the cabinet of President Jimmy Carter when he took office in 1977. She thus became the first African American woman to enter the Presidential line of succession, at number 13. Between 1977 and 1979 she served as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development (HUD),[4] and in 1979, she became Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare.
After the Department of Education. Harris remained as Secretary of the renamed Department of Health and Human Services until Carter left office in 1981. Because the department had merely changed names, as opposed to disbanding with new department being created, she did not face Senate confirmation again after the change.
Harris unsuccessfully ran for breast cancer, on March 23, 1985. She was interred at the Rock Creek Cemetery in Washington, D.C.
Barack Obama, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, Gerald Ford, United States
New York City, United States, American Civil War, Hawaii, Western United States
Puerto Rico, Philadelphia, Virginia, /e Washington, United States
Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Lyndon B. Johnson, Politics
Richard Nixon, Hubert Humphrey, John F. Kennedy, Democratic Party (United States), Robert F. Kennedy
Jimmy Carter, Louisiana, United States Army, New Orleans, Patricia Roberts Harris
President of the United States, California, United States Department of Health and Human Services, Ohio, Massachusetts
Democratic Party (United States), Republican Party (United States), Jimmy Carter, Presidency of Bill Clinton, United States Secretary of Labor
Democratic Party (United States), Republican Party (United States), Barack Obama, Presidency of Bill Clinton, Jimmy Carter
Ronald Reagan, Egypt, Pakistan, Rosalynn Carter, Jimmy Carter