Draft:Frank D. Reeves

Frank D. Reeves
Born23 March 1916 Edit this on Wikidata
Montreal Edit this on Wikidata
Died8 April 1973 Edit this on Wikidata (aged 57)
Howard University Hospital Edit this on Wikidata
Spouse(s)Elizabeth Walker Stone Edit this on Wikidata


Frank Daniel Reeves (March 23, 1916 - April 8, 1973) was an African American lawyer, civil rights activist, and politician. He studied at Shaw Junior High School and Dunbar High School in Washington, D.C., and earned undergraduate and law degrees (1939) from Howard University, where he later held a full professorship and taught full-time or part-time for most of his life.[1]

Reeves worked at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People with Thurgood Marshall on the Brown v. Board of Education case that ended racial segregation in the United States (1954 and 1955), and later was a litigant on Griffin v. County School Board of Prince Edward County (1964). He also participated in Burns v. Wilson (1953) and acted as counsel to Congressman Adam Clayton Powell Jr. in Powell v. McCormack before the US Supreme Court (1968-69).[1]

Reeves served then-Candidate John F. Kennedy as a minority affairs adviser during his 1960 campaign, and ran for and was elected as the first African American member of the Democratic National Committee in 1960, where he seconded Kennedy's nomination as the Democratic Party's Presidential Candidate. After Kennedy became President of the United States in January 1961, Reeves became the first African American to serve as a Presidential administrative assistant.

The Frank D. Reeves Municipal Center in Washington, D.C., is named after Frank D. Reeves.

He served on Howard University's Board of Trustees from 1961 to 1966, and was a founding member of the National Conference of Black Lawyers in 1969.[1]

He died six weeks after suffering a stroke on Sunday, April 8, 1973 in Freedmen's Hospital (now Howard University Hospital) in Washington DC.

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References

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  1. ^ a b c Smith, J. Clay Jr. (1973). "In Memorium: Professor Frank D. Reeves -- Towards a Houstonian School of Jurisprudence and the Study of Pure Legal Existence". Howard Law Journal. 18: 1–11. Retrieved 2024-10-02.