Jack Greenberg (lawyer)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jack Greenberg (born December 22, 1924) is an American attorney and legal scholar. He was among the NAACP's legal counsel for a quarter century, notably including his involvement in cases included under the crucial Brown v. Board of Education decision. In all, he argued 40 civil rights cases before the U.S. Supreme Court.
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[edit] Life and career
[edit] Education
Born in New York City, Greenberg graduated from Columbia College in 1945 and Columbia Law School in 1948.
[edit] Civil and human rights lawyer
Greenberg became a legal counselor for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund ("LDF") in 1949, and, in 1961, succeeded Thurgood Marshall as the LDF's Director-Counsel. Including his work on Brown v. Board of Education, other cases Greenberg argued include Alexander v. Holmes, which ordered the end of segregated school systems "at once," and Griggs v. Duke Power Company[1], which outlawed basing employment and promotion decisions on the results of tests with a discriminatory impact. He was also involved in Furman v. Georgia (1972), in which the Court held that the death penalty as it was then applied was a violation of the "cruel and unusual punishment" clause of the 8th Amendment.
Since the early 1970s, Greenberg has traveled to numerous countries in order to try to improve the human rights situation, including the former Soviet Union, South Africa (while it was still under apartheid), Cameroon, the Sudan, Hungary, Bulgaria, and others.
[edit] Educator
Greenberg left the LDF in 1984 to become a professor and vice dean at Columbia Law School. He served as dean of Columbia College from 1989 to 1993. As of Fall 2007, Greenberg still teaches at Columbia Law School and serves as a senior director of the LDF.
[edit] Author
Greenberg has varied intellectual interests: aside from several books on law and civil rights, he has written a cookbook (Dean Cuisine, with Harvard Law School Dean James Vorenberg, 1990), has appeared as a panelist for a New York Times tasting of Oregon pinot noir, and is currently (as of spring, 2008) writing a book on Franz Kafka with two other scholars.
[edit] Family
In 1950, Greenberg married Sema Ann Tanzer. They had four children: Josiah, David (now a well-known author of humorous poetry for children), and the twins Ezra and Sarah. In 1970, Greenberg divorced his first wife and married Deborah Mann Cole (née Deborah Lou Mann), widow of Wall Street lawyer and art collector Richard Cole. Soon afterwards he adopted her two children, Suzanne Cole Greenberg and William Cole (now an eminent rare book and art dealer, proprietor of Cole & Contreras Books / Sylvan Cole Gallery in Sitges, Spain). Greenberg's brother, Daniel S. Greenberg (1931), is a noted journalist and author now living in Washington, D.C.
[edit] Awards
In 2001, Greenberg was presented with a Presidential Citizens Medal. President Bill Clinton commented "In the courtroom and the classroom, Jack Greenberg has been a crusader for freedom and equality for more than half a century."
[edit] In film
A feature film based upon Greenberg's book, Crusaders in the Courts, is currently in production. The film, entitled The Crusaders, will star Tobey Maguire as Greenberg and Terrence Howard as Thurgood Marshall.
[edit] Sources
| Preceded by Robert Pollack |
Dean of Columbia College 1989 – 1993 |
Succeeded by Steven Marcus |
