Center a Tribute to Judge Damon J. Keith's Lifetime Pursuit of Civil Rights

May 18, 2010
Michael H. Hodges / The Detroit News

When Winnie and Nelson Mandela came to Detroit in 1990, Judge Damon J. Keith called Rosa Parks to see if she needed a ride to the airport for the welcome ceremony. Her caretaker, however, said the two of them hadn't been invited.

"You're kidding!" said an astonished Keith, telling them he'd be by shortly to pick them up. When the Mandelas got off the plane, they made a beeline for Parks, bypassing the governor, the mayor and the president of the United Auto Workers. "Rosa Parks!" they cried, throwing their arms around her.

"You see," said the 87-year-old Keith with a smile, "that was the face they knew."

On Monday, Wayne State University Law School will break ground on the Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights. The tribute recognizes the towering stature of the judge, whose landmark rulings over more than 42 years on the federal bench redefined civil rights and civil liberties law.

"The First Amendment is alive and well in no small part because of Judge Keith's efforts," said Robert M. Ackerman, dean of Wayne State's Law School.

Keith, who sits on the U.S. Court of Appeals, is the judge who rebuked President Richard Nixon on wiretaps and stopped secret deportation hearings under the Bush administration. He's the judge who desegregated Pontiac public schools, leading to one of the first mandatory busing programs outside the South.

Yet it is his many kindnesses to Detroit and its residents -- relocating Parks after she was mugged in her house, and saving the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History -- that may constitute his most enduring legacy locally.