Background
Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. was born on November 29, 1908, in New Haven, Connecticut, moving with his parents at the age of six to Harlem, New York City. His father was a successful clergyman and a dabbler in real-estate.
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(Keep the Faith Baby, My Dear Colleagues, Handwriting on t...)
Keep the Faith Baby, My Dear Colleagues, Handwriting on the Wall, Burn Baby Burn, Death of Any Man, One Day
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(Book by Powell, Adam Clayton)
Book by Powell, Adam Clayton
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Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. was born on November 29, 1908, in New Haven, Connecticut, moving with his parents at the age of six to Harlem, New York City. His father was a successful clergyman and a dabbler in real-estate.
Adam was sent to Hamilton, New York, to Colgate University (1930, A. B. ) and afterwards to Columbia University (Teachers College, 1932, M. A. ) and studied for the ministry at Shaw University (1935, D. D. ).
He was heir-apparent to his father at the Abyssinian Baptist Church in Harlem and succeeded him as pastor in 1937. Upon his return to Harlem from Colgate in 1930 he had launched a career of agitation for civil rights, jobs, and housing for African Americans. It was the era of the Depression. He led demonstrations against department stores, Bell Telephone, Consolidated Edison, and Harlem Hospital, among others, to hire African Americans.
Elected to the city council in 1941, he continued to press for civil rights and for jobs for African Americans in public transportation and the city colleges. As editor of the militant People's Voice from 1942, and with a reputation gained from his church for doing something about the destitute (he directed a soup kitchen and a relief operation that fed and clothed thousands of Harlem indigents), he was a force to be reckoned with in the Depression. The Emperor Haile Selassie of Ethiopia had awarded him a gold medallion for his work of relief in Harlem: he wore it everywhere. Powell's picket lines at the headquarters of the World's Fair in the Empire State Building resulted in hundreds of jobs for African Americans in 1939 and 1940.
But it was after his election to Congress that he really made his stand. He took his seat in 1945 for central Harlem. He was the first African American from an Eastern ghetto and the second African American in Congress—the first was William Dawson of Chicago. Dawson was more moderate than Powell.
As a freshman congressman Powell was appalled at being barred from public facilities in the House of Representatives: dining rooms, steam baths, showers, and barber-shop. He instantly used those facilities; with political instinct, he got his staff to use them also. He engaged Southern segregationists in debate. He tried to bring about an end to segregation in the military, to get African American newsmen admitted to the Senate and House press galleries, to introduce legislation to outlaw Jim Crow in transport, and to inform Congress that the Daughters of the American Revolution were practicing discrimination.
The Southern segregationists were mainly in his own party, the Democratic Party. In 1956 Powell supported Dwight Eisenhower, a Republican seeking a second term, and did not go with Adlai E. Stevenson, the Democratic nominee. He advised Stevenson to reject Southern bigots like Long of Louisiana, Eastland of Mississippi, and Tallmadge of Georgia—all of whom were in the Democratic Party. Eisenhower won, and some Democrats were prepared to punish Powell for his defection. Some critics accused him of currying favor with the federal government over alleged tax irregularities by voting for Eisenhower. Many Democrats had switched to the Republican Party for the presidential choice, as he did, but they were not African American congressmen. Powell was his own man.
Nevertheless, Powell was a Democrat; he welcomed the advent of a new president, Democrat John F. Kennedy in 1960, and became the new chairman of the House Committee on Education and Labor. Despite a high absentee record in the House, his accomplishments as chairman were extraordinary. The committee authorized more important legislation than any other: 48 major pieces of social legislation, embodying more than $14 billion. Kennedy's "New Frontier" and Lyndon Johnson's "Great Society" programs were intimately involved with this committee: education, manpower training, minimum wages, juvenile delinquency, and the war on poverty were all at stake. Presidents Kennedy and Johnson both sent Powell letters of thanks.
All the same, Powell claimed something for his African American constituents with each bill that was laid before him: this was the "Powell Amendment. " It called for a stop of federal funds to any organization which practiced racial discrimination. As chairman he had great power to block Great Society legislation; he occasionally held his ground until the Powell Amendment was included in the bill.
In March 1960 he was interviewed on a television show. He happened to call Esther James a "bag woman" during a debate on police corruption. She sued. Powell refused to make a settlement. He ignored all seven subpoenas and eight years of legal battles. He was wanted for criminal contempt of court by New York State. Finally he escaped to Bimini (Bahamas) in 1966, taking his congressional receptionist, Corinne Huff (former Miss Ohio), with him. She had been with him on a trip on the Queen Mary to Europe in 1962 when she was 21, together with Tamara Hall (an associate labor counsel for Education and Labor). A select committee of the House recommended public censure for Powell, a loss of seniority (his chairmanship), and the dismissal of Huff. The House voted to exclude him altogether (March 1967).
At a special election two months later Powell received a stunning victory—and he did not even campaign in Harlem. Contributions from his supporters and profits from a phonograph record ("Keep the Faith, Baby") were used to pay the damages in the James suit. In March 1968 Powell returned to Harlem triumphantly, and in January 1969 he was seated in Congress yet again, although without seniority. The Supreme Court ruled that the House acted unconstitutionally when he was unseated. Powell quipped: "From now on, America will know the Supreme Court is the place where you can get justice. "
In 1970 he was defeated in the Democratic primary.
He died on April 4, 1972, of prostate cancer; his ashes were scattered over Bimini.
The political leader and Harlem Baptist minister Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. was a pioneer in civil rights for black Americans.
He was the first person of African-American descent to be elected from New York to Congress.
Re-elected for nearly three decades, Powell became a powerful national politician of the Democratic Party, and served as a national spokesman on civil rights and social issues. He also urged United States presidents to support emerging nations in Africa and Asia as they gained independence after colonialism.
Seventh Avenue north of Central Park through Harlem has been renamed as Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Boulevard. One of the landmarks along this street is the Adam Clayton Powell Jr. State Office Building, named for Powell in 1983.
In addition, two New York schools were named after him, PS 153, at 1750 Amsterdam Ave. , and a middle school, IS 172 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. School of Social Justice, at 509 W. 129th St. It closed in 2009. In 2011, the new Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Paideia Academy opened in Chicago's South Shore neighborhood.
(Keep the Faith Baby, My Dear Colleagues, Handwriting on t...)
(Book by Powell, Adam Clayton)
Powell succeeded his father as pastor of the Abyssinian Baptist Church. After ordination, Powell began assisting his father with charitable services at the church and as a preacher. He greatly increased the volume of meals and clothing provided to the needy, and began to learn more about the lives of the working class and poor in Harlem.
With the church as his power base, Powell was able to build a formidable public following in Harlem through his crusades for jobs and housing for the poor.
At the age of 15 he had joined Marcus Garvey's African Nationalist Pioneer Movement, so he understood African American nationalism.
He agitated for civil rights, jobs, and housing for African Americans.
Leader of the largest African American church in the nation (13, 000 members—a sizeable basis of support), he was ready to use his ample skill in political demagoguery and his charisma in defense of African American nationalism.
Quotations: Powell himself said: "You don't have to be there if you know which calls to make, which buttons to push, which favors to call in. "
As an African American politician and minister he was controversial; as a personality he was extravagant and irreverent. He liked the playboy image, the good life.
Quotes from others about the person
As the historian Charles V. Hamilton wrote in his 1992 political biography of Powell,
"Here was a person who would at least 'speak out. '. .. That would be different . .. Many Negroes were angry that no Northern liberals would get up on the floor of Congress and challenge the segregationists. . .. Powell certainly promised to do that. . .. "
" the 1940s and 1950s, he was, indeed, virtually alone. .. . And precisely because of that, he was exceptionally crucial. In many instances during those earlier times, if he did not speak out, the issue would not have been raised. . .. For example, only he could (or would dare to) challenge Congressman Rankin of Mississippi on the House floor in the 1940s for using the word 'nigger. ' He certainly did not change Rankin's mind or behavior, but he gave solace to millions who longed for a little retaliatory defiance. "
In 1933, Powell married Isabel Washington, an African-American singer and nightclub entertainer. Like Powell, she was of mixed race. She was the sister of actress Fredi Washington. Powell adopted her son Preston, from her first marriage.
After their divorce, in 1945 Powell married the singer Hazel Scott. They had a son named Adam Clayton Powell III. In the early 21st century, he became a university administrator, Vice Provost for Globalization at the University of Southern California.
Powell divorced again, and in 1960 married Yvette Flores Diago from Puerto Rico. They had a son, whom they named Adam Clayton Powell Diago, using the mother's surname according to Latino tradition. In 1980, this son changed his name to Adam Clayton Powell IV, dropping Diago, when he moved to the mainland of the United States from Puerto Rico to attend Howard University. (His half-nephew, 8 years younger, was also named Adam Clayton Powell IV. )
This youngest son of Powell, known as A. C. Powell IV, later was elected to the New York City Council in 1991 in a special election; he served for two terms. He also was elected as a New York state Assemblyman (D-East Harlem) for three terms. After he and his wife had a son, they named him Adam Clayton Powell V. In the 2010 Democratic primary election, A. C. Powell IV unsuccessfully challenged the incumbent Charles B. Rangel for the Democratic candidacy in his father's former Congressional District.
In 1967, a U. S. Congressional committee subpoenaed Yvette Diago, the former third wife of Powell Jr. and the mother of Adam Clayton Powell IV. They were investigating potential "theft of state funds" related to her having been on Powell Jr. 's payroll but doing no work. Yvette Diago admitted to the committee that she had been on the Congressional payroll of her former husband, Adam Clayton Powell Jr. , from 1961 until 1967, although she had moved back to Puerto Rico in 1961. As reported by Time Magazine, Yvette Diago had continued living in Puerto Rico and "performed no work at all, " yet was kept on the payroll. Her salary was increased to $20, 578 and she was paid until January 1967, when she was exposed and fired
(May 5, 1865– June 12, 1953)
She was an African-American singer and nightclub entertaine.
(June 11, 1920 – October 2, 1981)
(born Adam Clayton Powell Diago in 1962)
(born 1946)
