Page 28 - November 2018 | Cleveland Metropolitan Bar Journal

BarJournal FEATURE

JULY/AUGUST 2015
EXTRA The Norman S. Minor

Bar Association

BY JUDGE RONALD B. ADRINE

he Norman S. Minor Bar Civil Rights Movement. Much
Association (NSMBA) was like the John Harlan Law Club,
founded in June of 1980. It the Cleveland Lawyers focused
grew out of the merger of four on professional advancement
T pre-existing African American but also tended to put much
legal professional groups in Cleveland and of its emphasis on the social
is the community’s first full-fledged African interactions of its membership.
American Bar Association. The Cleveland Chapter of
The predicate organizations were the John the National Conference of
M. Harlan Law Club, the Cleveland Lawyers Black Lawyers was formed
Association, the Cleveland Chapter of the in 1974. Its membership was
National Conference of Black Lawyers and the primarily composed of activists
Black Women Lawyers of Greater Cleveland. who experienced the turbulent,
The John Harlan Law Club’s founding militant years of the Civil Rights
dated back before 1940. Numbered amongst Movement. This group actively
its membership were such Cleveland African sought to eradicate racism and
American legal luminaries as Lawrence O. to vigorously defend African
Payne (who in 1924 became Cleveland’s first Americans whose civil and
black city prosecutor) and Perry B. Jackson human rights were denied. They
(who became Ohio’s first black judge in wanted to use the skills they
1942). John Harlan focused on professional learned in Law school as weapons
advancement but tended to put much of its to advance the economic, Norman S. Minor
emphasis on the social interactions of its educational, political and social
membership. institutions of African Americans.
The Cleveland Lawyers Association spun off They came together with the idea of instituting American female to serve in that capacity in
from John Harlan in the early 1960s. It was litigation to further those aims. a major metropolitan area anywhere in the
composed of many younger black lawyers of The Black Women Lawyers of Greater United States) and from there to succeed Louis
that time who came of age during the 1950s, Cleveland formed in the early 1970s because Stokes as member of Congress from the 11
th
after the Korean War and during the nascent of the perception of some black female lawyers Congressional District of Ohio.
that many of their interests were unique However, by the late 1970s, all of these
from those of their male counterparts. Not organizations were experiencing a period of
Certified Auto/Motorcycle Appraisals infrequently, they felt that those differences stagnation and decline. Talks of merger surfaced

Certified Appraisers for: were not recognized by the leadership of the several years before the advent of the NSMBA.
All Insurance Claims

Bankruptcy other three organizations. The group provided On June 24, 1976, African American attorneys,

Diminished Value a platform for African American female lawyers calling themselves the Young Lawyers Group,

Expert Witness to gain visibility in the legal community. One met and talked of “the desirability or need
Charitable Donations of its founders, and its first president, Almeta of our coming together as young lawyers to
A. Johnson, became the first woman to serve discuss and pursue matters of mutual concern
as Chief Prosecutor for the City of Cleveland. to us as well as to other Black lawyers in the

Another member, Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Cleveland Area.” Ultimately they decided
took the bench as an Associate Judge of the against forming a new formal organization and

General Division of Cuyahoga County’s Court instead decided to join the John Harlan Law
Auto Appraisal Group • John Golias of Common Pleas, later moving on to become Club and to exercise their best efforts to make
440-526-3445 • 800-848-2886 the first African American to serve as Cuyahoga it the strong organization that they perceived
www.autoappraisal.com County Prosecuting Attorney (the first African Cleveland’s African American legal community
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