Fall 1999
Articles
Reviews
1998 Award Recipients
In Memoriam
Handouts
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Dale Richmond Award Winner:
Marian Wright Edelman
Marian Wright Edelman, founder and president of the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF), has been an
advocate for disadvantaged Americans for her entire professional career. Under her
leadership, the Washington-based CDF has become a strong national voice for children and
families. CDF’s mission is to Leave No Child Behind and to ensure every child a
Healthy Start, a Head Start, a Fair Start, a Safe Start, and a Moral Start in life with
the support of caring families and communities.
Mrs. Edelman, a graduate of Spelman College and Yale Law School, began her career in
the mid-60s when, as the first black woman admitted to the Mississippi Bar, she directed
the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund office in Jackson, Mississippi. In 1968, she
moved to Washington D.C., as counsel for the Poor People’s March that Dr. Martin
Luther King, Jr. began organizing before his death. She founded the Washington Research
Project, which was the parent body of the CDF. For two years she served as the Director of
the Center for Law and Education at Harvard University, and in 1973 began CDF.
Mrs. Edelman has received many honorary degrees and awards including the Albert
Schweitzer Humanitarian Prize, the Heinz Award, and was a MacArthur Foundation Prize
Fellow. She served on the Board of Trustees of Spelman College which she chaired from 1976
to 1987. She is the author of several books, including Families in
Peril: An Agenda for Social Change, The Measure
of Our Success: A Letter to My Children and Yours, Guide My Feet:
Meditations and Prayers on Loving and Working for Children, a children’s
book, Stand
For Children, and a memoir of mentors that will be published by Beacon Press in
1999.
Marian Wright Edelman is married to Peter Edelman, a Professor at Georgetown Law
School. They have three sons: Joshua, Jonah, and Ezra.  |
