Ernest Nathan Morial
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| Ernest N. Morial | |
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| In office May 1, 1978 – May 5, 1986 |
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| Preceded by | Moon Landrieu |
| Succeeded by | Sidney Barthelemy |
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Member of the Louisiana State Legislature
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| In office 1967 – 1970 |
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| Born | October 9, 1929 New Orleans, Louisiana |
| Died | December 24, 1989 (aged 60) New Orleans, Louisiana |
| Political party | Democratic |
| Spouse | Sybil Haydel |
Ernest Nathan Morial (known as Dutch) (October 9, 1929 - December 24, 1989) was a U.S. political figure and a leading civil rights advocate. He was the first black mayor of New Orleans, having served from 1978 to 1986. He was the father of former New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial.
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[edit] Early life and career
Morial was born in New Orleans of Creole ancestry and grew up in the Seventh Ward of New Orleans. His father was Walter Etienne Morial, a cigarmaker, and his mother was Leonie V. (Moore) Morial, a seamstress. He attended Holy Redeemer Elementary School and McDonough #35 High School. He graduated from Xavier University in 1951. In 1954, he became the first African American to receive a law degree from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. He and Israel Augustine, another African American, were admitted to law school together. Morial attended summer school throughout his law school tenure in order to graduate as the first African American. Had he not done so, Augustine by virtue of his name starting with the letter "A" would have entered into the history books as the first African American graduate.
Morial came to prominence as a lawyer fighting to dismantle segregation laws and as president of the local NAACP from 1962 to 1965. He followed in the cautious style of his mentor A.P. Tureaud in preferring to fight for civil rights in courtroom battles rather than through sit-ins and demonstrations. After unsuccessful electoral races in 1959 and 1963, he became the first black member of the Louisiana State Legislature since Reconstruction after being elected in 1967 to represent an Uptown district. He ran for an at-large position on New Orleans City Council in 1969-1970, and lost only narrowly. He then became the first black Juvenile Court judge in Louisiana in 1970. When he was elected to the Louisiana Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal in 1974, he was the first black American to have attained this position as well.
In 1955, he married Sybil Haydel, an accomplished professional in her own right and former Dean of Xavier University College. The couple had two sons, Marc Morial and Jacques Morial, as well as three daughters, Julie, Cheri, and Monique.
[edit] Morial as Mayor
In the election of 1977 he became the first African American Mayor of New Orleans by defeating City Councilman Joseph V. DiRosa by a vote of 90,500 to 84,300. Morial won with 95 percent of the black vote and 20 percent of the white vote, which came mainly from middle and upper class Uptown precincts. He won this election without the support of the major black political organizations like SOUL and COUP. During most of the election campaign, Morial was seen by most commentators to have been a spoiler candidate with little chance of victory. The two established 'serious candidates' - Nat Kiefer and deLesseps Story "Toni" Morrison, Jr. (liberal son of former mayor deLesseps Story "Chep" Morrison, Sr.) - came in third and fourth respectively.
Morial was a polarizing figure as mayor of New Orleans. Possessing a confrontational and abrasive personality, Morial was often accused by critics of being pompous, arrogant, and vindictive and ruthless towards his political opponents. Morial and his supporters countered that he was a confident and decisive leader and that he was being held to a different and harsher standard than previous white mayors with a similar style.
Morial waged long-standing political battles with the City Council, led by his archrival Sidney Barthelemy, and with COUP, Barthelemy’s political organization. He spent much of his time as mayor trying to increase the strength and influence of the mayor's office over state-appointed boards such as the Sewerage and Water Board and Dock Board, an effort he described as a democratization of city governance. He built a powerful patronage machine using unclassified city employees and used it to defeat opponents in the State Legislature - including Hank Braden, Louis Charbonnet, and Nick Connor - by personally sponsoring little-known challengers.
In his first term, Morial faced a sanitation workers’ strike and a police strike which led him to cancel the 1979 Mardi Gras parade season. The police union wagered, among its membership, that a strike coinciding with Mardi Gras would force the city's hand in securing many of their demands; but Morial refused to give in, and was supported by leaders of many of the city's Carnival Krewes. The New Orleans krewes either canceled their parades that year or moved them to suburbs in other Parishes. Morial’s hard-line stance towards the police strikers was epitomized by his Napoleonic stand where he placed his arm inside his coat and stood in a characteristic Napoleon pose at the announcement that he was cancelling Mardi Gras.
Most of Morial's achievements occurred in his first term as mayor. Morial committed the city to affirmative action in hiring city workers and introduced hiring quotas involving private city contractors. The proportion of black employees on the city's workforce increased from 40% in 1977 to 53% in 1985 under Morial’s tenure. Under Morial’s administration the number of black officers in the NOPD was increased to make up one third of the force, but continued incidents of police brutality – most notably the police killing of four blacks in Algiers in 1980 – damaged Morial’s reputation in the black community. Morial was also responsible for getting federal UDAG and Model Cities funding for several major developments, including Canal Place and the Jax Brewery development in the French Quarter. He continued to support previous mayor Moon Landrieu’s emphasis on tourism, but also tried to diversify the economy by developing the Almonaster-Michoud Industrial District in New Orleans East. However, the Louisiana World's Fair, held in 1984, was widely regarded as a financial failure.
By Morial's second term, economic decline and increased conflict with the City Council led to a decrease in the ability of the Morial administration to govern effectively. After serving two terms as mayor, he was prevented by the City Charter from seeking a third term. He twice tried to convince voters to change the Charter to allow him to run again but both proposals were soundly defeated. In his last months as mayor, he surprised political observers by seeking a City Council seat for District D. His unexpectedly poor showing in the Council primary led to his withdrawal from the runoff.
Morial’s political strength did not end after he left City Hall in 1986. He considered running for mayor again in the election of 1990, and his sudden death in 1989 during the election campaign influenced Mayor Barthelemy’s re-election, since he died before he could endorse an opponent.
[edit] Morial’s legacy
The City of New Orleans renamed its convention center, which spans over 10 blocks, the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in 1992 for the late New Orleans mayor. The convention center has been a major economic engine for the city's large tourist industry and in 2005 became a highly publicized national symbol when it served as a makeshift evacuation center in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.
In 1997, the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center posthumously honored Morial with the dedication of The Ernest N. Morial Asthma, Allergy and Respiratory Disease Center. The facility is Louisiana's first comprehensive center for the education, prevention, treatment and research of asthma and other respiratory diseases. "Dutch" suffered and eventually died from complications associated with asthma.
Morial was the 23rd General President of Alpha Phi Alpha, the first intercollegiate Greek-letter organization established for African Americans.
[edit] Sources
| This article is a part of a series on Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity |
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Members
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Programs
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Associations
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Topics of interest
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| See also: Fraternities and Sororities Wikiproject |
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- Biographical Dictionary of American Mayors, 1820-1980. Greenwood Press, 1981.
- DuBos, Clancy. “As an opponent, he had no equal.” Gambit Weekly, January 1, 1991.
- Hirsch, Arnold and Joseph Logsdon. Creole New Orleans: Race and Americanization. LSU Press, 1992.
- Hirsch, Arnold. "Harold and Dutch Revisited: A Comparative Look at the First Black Mayors of Chicago and New Orleans." in African-American Mayors: Race, Politics, and the American City. Edited by David Colburn and Jeffrey Adler. University of Illinois Press, 2001.
- Johnson, Allen, Jr. “The Morial Years: Highs and Lows.” New Orleans Tribune, May 1986.
- Whelan, Robert K., Alma Young, and Mickey Lauria. Urban Regimes and Racial Politics: New Orleans during the Barthelemy Years. UNO, 1991.
- Mason, Herman "Skip" [1997] (1999). "Walter Washington", The Talented Tenth: The Founders and Presidents of Alpha. Four-G Publishers, Inc. ISBN 1-885066-63-5.
| Preceded by Moon Landrieu |
Mayor of New Orleans 1978–1986 |
Succeeded by Sidney Barthelemy |
| Preceded by Lionel H. Newsom |
General President of Alpha Phi Alpha 1968-1972 |
Succeeded by Walter Washington |
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