With her appointment in 1966, Judge Constance Baker Motley became the first African American woman appointed to the federal judiciary. She became the chief judge in 1982, and assumed senior status in 1986. This was after nearly 20 years with the NAACP, when chose to serve on the New York State Senate. On her election to the New York State Senate in February of 1964, she became the first African-American woman to serve in that branch of the Legislature. She immediately began a campaign for the extension of civil rights legislation and for additional low and middle income housing. From 1945 to 1964, Judge Motley worked on all of the major school segregation cases supported by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. She wrote the legal brief for the landmark Brown vs. Board of Education case and helped strategize on other important legal precedents. Among the cases in which she played a prominent role were desegregation cases involving universities of Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, Oklahoma, and Georgia, and Clemson College in South Carolina. A real one in position. Historic. Shouts to her.
