Howard W. Dixon (August 4, 1915 – July 30, 2007) was a civil rights

attorney Attorney may refer to: * Lawyer ** Attorney at law, in some jurisdictions * Attorney, one who has power of attorney * ''The Attorney'', a 2013 South Korean film See also * Attorney general, the principal legal officer of (or advisor to) a gove ...

Miami Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...

between 1955 and 1997. During that time, he was considered an activist for the rights of poor people and ethnic and racial minorities. He served as General Counsel for the

NAACP The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&nb ...

in the '50s, was a founding Board Member of the Florida Civil Liberties Union. He was the founding executive director of Legal Service of Greater Miami, a program that grew out of President

Lyndon Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), often referred to by his initials LBJ, was an American politician who served as the 36th president of the United States from 1963 to 1969. He had previously served as the 37th vice ...

's 1964 War on Poverty. He served as Executive Director from 1966 to 1977. After his retirement as a General Master for the Florida Court System in 1987, he served as a full-time volunteer for the Legal Aid Society of Greater Miami, earning him the John Minor Wisdom Public Service and Professionalism Award for Pro Bono Service by the American Bar Association in 1995. As Executive Director for Legal Services of Greater Miami, led several U.S. Supreme Court victories, including Agrersinger vs. Hamlin and Fuentes vs. Shevin in 1972. The cases allowed for people to have counsel and hearings in specific situations. In 1990, Dixon was awarded the Florida Supreme Court's highest honor, the Tobias Simon Pro Bono Award. In 1961, as an attorney for the Florida Civil Liberties Union, Dixon defended the

Freedom Riders Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated Southern United States in 1961 and subsequent years to challenge the non-enforcement of the United States Supreme Court decisions ''Morgan v. Virginia' ...

Tallahassee, Florida Tallahassee ( ) is the capital city of the U.S. state of Florida. It is the county seat and only incorporated municipality in Leon County, Florida, Leon County. Tallahassee became the capital of Florida, then the Florida Territory, in 1824. In ...

. He established legal precedence in the case regarding emergency appeals from the State to the Federal courts. The case became famous in legal circles at that time as a method to remove lawsuits from state to federal jurisdiction when all state remedies have not been exhausted. Dixon was named in the amicus brief with the

American Civil Liberties Union The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a nonprofit organization founded in 1920 "to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed to every person in this country by the Constitution and laws of the United States". T ...

to the Florida Supreme Court urging reversal for Gideon vs. Wainwright, the case that supported the sixth amendment of the constitution to provide counsel in criminal cases for defendants unable to afford their own attorneys.Gideon vs. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963), CERTIORARI TO THE SUPREME COURT OF FLORIDA. No. 155. Argued January 15, 1963. Decided March 18, 1963.

Footnotes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Dixon, Howard 1915 births 2007 deaths Florida lawyers 20th-century American lawyers American civil rights activists