While America owes a tremendous, invaluable amount of gratitude to Martin Luther King, Jr, Thurgood Marshall, Rosa Parks, and countless other iconic legends whose legacies are widely acknowledged, many lesser celebrated, perhaps unsung heroes, also contributed to the persistent demand for equal justice. One such activist, born to slave parents, over one hundred years before the Civil Rights Act of 1964, was Judge Isaac Franklin Bradley, Sr. In addition to serving in many capacities as an elected official, his list of accomplishments include the distinction of being the first African American to graduate from The University of Kansas School of Law, as well as, the honor of joining W.E.B. Dubois as a charter member of the Niagara Movement, which was the forerunner of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, the NAACP.
Judge Bradley fought diligently for social reform that uplifted the lives of African Americans, during a time when his voice was not always welcome. Readers will be encouraged to reflect on how the struggle for equal justice during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, compares to the current challenges that force modern freedom fighters to understand that there will always be REASONS TO PERSIST.