Research Catalog

Details

Additional authors

1. Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (Ill.)
2. NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

Description

1. 7.83 linear feet (16 boxes)

Summary

1. Clyde Murphy, a lawyer, pursued social justice throughout his career. Born on June 26, 1948, in Topeka, Kansas, Clyde moved to Miami, Florida, along with his father and stepmother, when he was four years old. He attended high school at North Dade Junior-Senior High School, where he excelled academically, wrote and took photographs for the school paper, and played the trumpet. He also attended the Yale University Summer High School for two summers, 1965-1966. Murphy graduated from Yale University in 1970, and Columbia University School of Law in 1975. Prior to law school, he worked as a community organizer and Assistant Director for Program Administration at Kings County Addictive Diseases Hospital in New York. After receiving his law degree and passing the New York State Bar in 1976, he worked for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) from 1975-1990; as assistant counsel, he focused on cases involving employment discrimination, police misconduct, and voting rights. One case of note was Westinghouse Electric Corp v. Vaughn, which he successfully argued in front of the United States Supreme Court. At LDF, Murphy also served as deputy director-counsel and director of the Voting Rights Project. In 1995, Murphy became the executive director of the Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (CLCCRUL). His areas of concern continued to be employment discrimination and voting rights, along with fair housing, predatory lending, and affirmative action. One of Murphy's achievements, Lewis v. City of Chicago, alleged that the 1995 firefighter entrance exam's cutoff score favored white applicants; Murphy and the CLCCRUL filed the lawsuit in 1998 and the Supreme Court ruled in the African American applicants' favor in 2010. Throughout the years, Murphy also lectured and taught at New York University (NYU) School of Law and Vassar College. Murphy's additional accomplishments include admission to the United States Supreme Court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Eight and Eleventh Circuits, and the United States District Court for the Southern and Eastern Districs of New York. Murphy died in 2010.
2. The Clyde Murphy papers primarily consist of professional materials related to his positions at NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund (LDF) and the Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (CLCCRUL). There is a limited amount of personal material, such as high school and college documents and some correspondence. Additionally, there are some writing samples, including excerpts from journals and drafts of essays related to civil rights and Barack Obama. The series on Murphy's work at LDF contains case materials, which is composed of reading material (briefs from previous cases, academic papers, and articles), briefs, and correspondence. Also, this series consists of administrative material, such as staff memos and grant information; other writing by Murphy (speeches and articles); statements by LDF on various topics (for example, whether or not to represent Angela Davis); and publications by LDF. The series on Murphy's work at CLCCRUL is structured in a similar manner; there is administrative material, such as memos, address lists, and monthly calendars, followed by case materials (briefs, correspondence, and reading material), other writing by Murphy, and CLCCRUL publications. In addition, this series contains outreach material, or material on task forces and committees on which Murphy served, under the auspices of CLCCRUL, for other organizations. The series on teaching is the smallest; it consists of one folder, a reading packet for a course that Murphy taught at NYU. The last series, printed or reading material, contains writing by others, some published and some unpublished; the majority of this material is related to legal issues pursued by Murphy, such as police misconduct, civil rights, and voting rights. This material includes published articles, chapters from books, newspaper clippings, and books; it also includes unpublished dissertations, papers delivered at conferences, speeches, and manuscripts.

Subject

1. Political rights, Loss of
2. Police misconduct
3. Discrimination in housing
4. Discrimination in employment
5. Authors, Black
6. African Americans > Civil rights
7. African American lawyers
8. Affirmative action programs > United States

Call number

1. Sc MG 876

Access (note)

1. Personnel file closed until 2027.

Source (note)

1. Gift of Monica Murphy, 2013.

Author

1. Murphy, Clyde, creator.

Title

1. Clyde Murphy papers.

Production

1. 1963-2011.

Type of content

1. text
2. still image

Type of medium

1. unmediated

Type of carrier

1. sheet

Restricted access

1. Personnel file closed until 2027.

Location of other archival materials

1. Materials Separated from the Resource: Transferred to the Photographs and Prints Division: photographs.

Source

1. Gift of Monica Murphy, 2013.

Connect to:

1. Finding aid

Added author

1. Chicago Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (Ill.)
2. NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund.

Research call number

1. Sc MG 876