First Department Commemorates Judge Constance Baker Motley

On Monday, September 30, 2024, the Appellate Division, First Department held a historic event commemorating Hon. Constance Baker Motley, a civil rights icon who became the first Black woman appointed to the federal bench in 1966. The Court’s Representation of Justice Initiative Dome Revival celebrated the installation of Judge Motley’s nameplate in the landmarked courtroom’s stained-glass dome, and included remarks by Presiding Justice Dianne T. Renwick, Chief Judge Rowan D. Wilson, Associate Justice Peter H. Moulton, Chief Southern District Judge Laura Taylor Swain, Judge Motley’s niece, Constance L. Royster, and Judge Motley’s son, Joel Wilson Motley III.

In her opening remarks, Presiding Justice Renwick said, “For the first time in this court’s history, a new panel has been installed in the upper tier of our resplendent stained-glass dome, naming Judge Constance Baker Motley,” noting that this posthumous honor occurred “76 years after her 1948 admission to the New York State Bar . . . in the First Department.”

Justice Renwick continued, “At a time when there were few women lawyers and judges, much less women of color, Judge Motley stood out as an inspirational and powerful role model. She literally and figuratively opened doors for women, people of color, and individuals marginalized by traditional societal mores. . . . By installing [Judge Motley’s] name in our historic stained-glass dome, we pay tribute to her legacy and her vision to achieve equality throughout society. I am especially proud that this significant addition . . . celebrates her stature as an architect of the civil rights movement.”

Constance Baker Motley (1921-2005) was the ninth of 12 children born into a family whose parents emigrated from the Caribbean Island of Nevis and settled in New Haven, Connecticut. She was a graduate of New York University and Columbia Law School. During law school, Motley joined the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund (then known as the Legal Defense and Educational Fund) forging her path as a leader of the civil rights movement and chief legal strategist on the landmark cases that upended segregation as a matter of law and policy in the United States.

A singular force and a trailblazer, Judge Motley was the first Black woman to argue before the United States Supreme Court and multiple courts of appeal, the first Black woman to serve in the New York State Senate, the first woman to serve as Manhattan Borough President, and the first Black woman to be appointed to the federal bench.

Judge Motley’s nameplate replaces that of Roger B. Taney, the fifth Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court and author of the infamous decision in Dred Scott v. Sandford (60 U.S. 393 [1857]). Taney’s name has been moved to the Court’s law library and will be accompanied by explanatory signage.

Chief Judge Wilson, after reading an “uncomfortable” passage from the Dred Scott decision, said, “Taney’s writing in Dred Scott drew immediate outrage. The New York State Senate Judiciary Committee issued a report, saying that the decision had destroyed the confidence of the people in the Court, and described Taney’s statement that [African Americans] ‘had no rights which the white man was bound to respect’ as inhuman, unchristian, atrocious, disgraceful to the judge who uttered it and to the tribunal which sanctioned it.’”

Noting that research has not uncovered why Taney’s name was added to the dome when the First Department courthouse was constructed in the late 1890s, Chief Judge Wilson said, “[F]or whatever reason it was included, today we gather to celebrate the removal of his name from the dome. . . . For me, replacing Justice Taney’s name with Judge Motley’s is a reminder of how far we’ve come, not just in substantive law, but in how we recognize and honor talent and . . . how we repair the wounds of our nation’s past.”

Following the remarks,The Trials of Constance Baker Motley, an award-winning biographical film co-produced by her son, Joel Motley, was screened for the courtroom audience.

To view a video recording of the program, please visit the Court’s YouTube channel.