Constance Baker Motley

"The story of Motley's life and legal victories is an example of the vital, often overlooked role that women—and trial attorneys—have played in changing American society for the better."
—Trial magazine

"Ford's book is more than a general biography of the woman who would become the first African-American female United States district judge; it presents in vivid detail how her work altered the legal landscape of the United States systematically, case after case, dismantling the Jim Crow laws in the Southern United States."
—US District Judge Marcia Cooke, Law360

"Part history, part law, and part homage, this work provides the background to the extraordinary life of Constance Baker Motley. Ford (Lehman College) aims to couch Motley’s incredible accomplishments within social and political times. Contextualizing Motley’s work at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund helps the reader see how her legal mind shaped the Civil Rights Movement. Ford’s book consists of seven chapters, all of which seek to provide a context for Motley and her fight for justice. Providing a historical foundation to race relations in the US and subsequently to Motley’s work, Ford details how the Civil Rights Movement was shaped by Motley’s litigation. Moving through the integral cases, Ford leads the reader to better understand how and why desegregation was the best option from both a legal and cultural perspective. The book provides insight into Motley's life and highlights her work as an activist lawyer. Constance Baker Motley is an important book in the field, best suited for anyone generally interested in issues related to desegregation in the US in the 20th century. Highly recommended."
—CHOICE

“Gary L. Ford Jr.’s well-researched book is more than a biography of Motley’s extraordinary life. It is an argument for recognizing the tenacious, courageous role African American women like her played in advancing the cause of civil rights and equal justice for all. To witness Judge Motley in action was to be fortified and astounded. Now, thanks to Ford, a new generation can bear witness to her immense talents.”
—Henry Louis Gates Jr., Alphonse Fletcher University Professor, Harvard University

“I had no idea how critical Constance Baker Motley’s role was until I read this book. Its insights about the way in which she, more than the males at the Legal Defense Fund, would get on a plane and head south time and again, into dangerous situations, defying racial and gender conventions, defying governors, legislatures, judges, and white mobs, persisting through every obfuscation, to make the Brown edict real, were a revelation!”
—Sheryll Cashin, professor of law at Georgetown University and author of Loving: Interracial Intimacy in America and the Threat to White Supremacy