Civil rights attorney Hill dies at 100

2007-08-06

RICHMOND, Va. Oliver W. Hill, a civil rights lawyer who was at the front of the legal effort that desegregated public schools, has died at age 100, a family friend said.

Hill died peacefully yesterday at his home during breakfast, said Joseph Morrissey, a friend of the Hill family.

In 1954, he was part of a series of lawsuits against racially segregated public schools that became the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision, which changed America’s society by setting the foundation for integrated education.

“He was among the vanguard in seeking equal opportunity for all individuals, and he was steadfast in his commitment to effect change. He will be missed,” said L. Douglas Wilder, who in 1989 became the nation’s first elected black governor and was a confidant of Hill’s. Wilder is now Richmond’s mayor.

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