Earl B. Dickerson: A Voice for Freedom and Equality (Chicago Lives) [Hardcover]

Robert J. Blakely (Author), Marcus Shepard (Author), John Hope Franklin (Foreword)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This biography sheds welcome light on the man who sat to the left of Martin Luther King at the 1963 March on Washington. The first black graduate of the University of Chicago Law School and the first black alderman elected to the Chicago City Council, Dickerson arrived in the Windy City at age 15, as a stowaway on the Illinois Central Railroad. Finding the racial situation in Chicago pretty similar to the one he'd left behind in Mississippi, Dickerson spent the rest of his long and active life working toward its improvement. A man of prodigious energy, he was known as the "Dean of Chicago's Black Lawyers" (most notably, arguing Hansberry v. Lee in 1940; a harbinger of the end of racially restrictive covenants) and also became president of one of the largest black-owned insurance companies in America. While Blakely details Dickerson's major political and business accomplishments, he adds dimension to the man's life and gives the reader a keen sense of the African-American social and cultural history through his attention to Dickerson's involvement in Chicago's South Side. Though pedestrian in its prose style, Blakely's straightforward biography makes a meaningful contribution to African-American and Chicago history. (Mar.)
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From Booklist

Dickerson's life as social activist, history-making lawyer, and successful businessman reflects the complex, if not paradoxical, role of this individual's struggle for social and racial equality during most of the twentieth century. Among his many "first Negro" achievements: graduation from the University of Chicago Law School, second lieutenant during World War I, founding member of the American Legion, and head of the National Lawyer's Guild. Yet, his primary focus remained a quest to achieve social and racial equality for all Americans. Paradoxically, he was affiliated with the Democrats and Republicans; he was a socialist and yet for 60 years was the general counsel, president, and chairman of the premier black life insurance company in America. But it is within Dickerson's commitment to principles associated with securing social and racial equality that these apparent conflicts reveal an exceptional man, pursuing ideals with action and not mere words. Vernon Ford
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Product Details

• Hardcover: 324 pages
• Publisher: Northwestern University Press; 1 edition (May 15, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0810123355
• ISBN-13: 978-0810123359
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 6.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,649,167 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars AN ACTIVIST BEFORE HIS TIME!, June 1, 2006

By 

Kenneth Kapel "Leftist American" (Chicago,Il, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Earl B. Dickerson: A Voice for Freedom and Equality (Chicago Lives) (Hardcover)

Earl Dickerson is a name unknown to most civil rights activists today,but without his contributions that started nearly eighty years ago the United States would still be "a third world country" in regards to race relations.As Chicago aldermen(the First black Democrat),activist member of FDRs FEPC,member and President(1951-'54) of the progressive National Lawyers Guild(labeled "subversive" by the U.S. Attorney General and the U.S. House Un-Americans)Why is it ALL organizations that want to extend freedom,in the U.S., are labeled "RED"?Mr Dickerson(deceased 1985) was a pioneer and visionary that ALL Americans should get to know and admire.
In this excellent biography you will learn that NOT ALL opponents of expanding Civil Rights to Black Americans were Southern Demcrats(Dixiecrats), and reactionary Republicans,but also so-called "liberals",who did not hesitate to use red-baiting against the wealthy businessman(insurance and the law).In the name of anti-communism many sins have been committed by the U.S. government at home and abroad.A worthy addition to any serious student of recent U.S. history,especially anyone wanting to know more regarding the Civil Rights and Civil Liberties battles of the twentieth-century.You will also learn a lot about the ins and outs of Chicago politics,by reading this book.Gideons Army(3vol.Marzani and Munsell)by the late NU professor of Journalism Curtis MacDougal is a invaluable contribution in getting a look at Illinois,and in general,U.S.leftwing politics in the late 1940s.This book came out in the middle 1960s,it MAY still be available.The role of the U.S. Communist Party,in the Henry Wallace campaign for President in 1948,of which Mr. Dickerson was a supporter, is fully discussed by Prof.MacDougall, who also was a Wallace backer.In the '48 elections Illinois Demcrats made sure that FDRs former Vice President WAS NOT On the ballot.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A thoroughly researched, engagingly told life story, December 9, 2006

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Earl B. Dickerson: A Voice for Freedom and Equality (Chicago Lives) (Hardcover)

Prominent journalist Robert J. Blakely and freelance writer Marcus Shepard present Earl B. Dickerson: A Voice for Freedom and Equality, the first ever biography of Earl B. Dickerson (1891-1986), an independent-minded African-American who spent his life struggling against racial injustice. The racial oppression in his native Mississippi forced him to flee to Chicago at age fifteen; yet Chicago was no utopia. Dickerson worked his way through preparatory schools and college, a segregated officers' training school, and law school at the University of Chicago. His distinguished career included membership in FDR's first Fair Employment Practices Committee; leadership in the movement that broke the color barrier to membership in the Illinois State Bar Association; and his driving role behind the Hansberry v. Lee U.S. Supreme Court case that brought about the beginning of the end of restrictive real estate covenants, used as a legal tool of segregation in the North. A thoroughly researched, engagingly told life story that brings to life the man behind the pitched legal battles for social progress.

5.0 out of 5 stars A life that helped to transform Chicago, February 23, 2010

By 

Gary T. Johnson - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Earl B. Dickerson: A Voice for Freedom and Equality (Chicago Lives) (Hardcover)

If you want to deepen your understanding of the forces that transformed Chicago during the twentieth century, begin with this excellent biography. Longevity is one reason: Dickerson's life spanned 1891 to 1986. He first arrived in Chicago from Mississippi in 1907 -- nine years before historians date the beginning of the Great Migration. His list of affiliations is another: board member of the national NAACP, President of the Chicago Urban League almost continuously from 1939-1955, and member of President Franklin Roosevelt's first Fair Employment Practices Commission, among many other posts. All of these are notable, but what makes Dickerson's life so illuminating is that he was a moving force in so many different sectors. Yes, lawyers are often aldermen, and lawyers sometimes are businessmen, but how many insurance company executives have been civil rights activists? Dickerson was all of these, and he also handled a landmark case before the U.S. Supreme Court: Hansberry v. Lee. This 1940 decision ended racially restrictive covenants on Chicago's South Side.