Title
Proclamation honoring the lifetime achievements of Judge Justin M. Johnson and congratulating him for receiving the 2006 Drum Major for Justice Award.
Body
WHEREAS, the Homer S. Brown Law Association held their Seventh Annual Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Prayer Breakfast on January 16, 2006 at Mt. Ararat Baptist Church, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and The Honorable Justin M. Johnson was the recipient of the Drum Major for Justice Award; and
WHEREAS, Judge Johnson graduated from the University of Chicago Law School in 1962, joining his father and brother at the law firm of Johnson, Johnson & Johnson, becoming the first African-American to head a major municipal law department in Western Pennsylvania in 1970, after being appointed Solicitor and Assistant Secretary for both the School District of Pittsburgh and the Pittsburgh-Mt. Oliver Intermediate Unit; and
WHEREAS, he served on the Board of Neighborhood Legal Services Association as a founding director in 1965, holding various offices, and in 1969, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court appointed him as the first African-American member of the Pennsylvania Board of Law Examiners, where he served for 20 years; and
WHEREAS, he was appointed to the Pennsylvania Crime Commission in 1973, and in 1978 joined the firm of Berkman Ruslander Pohl Lieber & Engel, where he practiced until his appointment to the Bench in 1980, where he was installed as the second African-American to serve on the Superior Court of Pennsylvania. In 1985, he was elected to his first ten-year term and in 1995, the voters retained Judge Johnson for a second ten-year term; and
WHEREAS, he is a lifetime member of the NAACP, Urban League, Sigma Pi Phi, Rho Boule, Alpha Delta Phi, serving as a trustee of Pittsburgh Theological Seminary from 1985 to 1994, a trustee of Princeton Theological Seminary, a Life Trustee of CMU and also serves as Director of the Mt. Ararat Community Activity Center, and as moderator of the Presbytery...
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