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Anita Hill
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Anita Hill
Anita Faye Hill (born July 30, 1956) is an American lawyer, educator and author. She is a professor of social policy, law, and women's studies at Brandeis University and a faculty member of the university's Heller School for Social Policy and Management. She became a national figure in 1991 when she accused then-U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, her supervisor at the United States Department of Education and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, of sexual harassment.
Anita Hill was born to a family of farmers in Lone Tree, Oklahoma, the youngest of Albert and Erma Hill's 13 children. Her family came from Arkansas, where her maternal grandfather Henry Eliot and all of her great-grandparents had been born into slavery. Hill was raised in the Baptist faith.
Hill graduated from Morris High School, Oklahoma, in 1973, where she was class valedictorian. Hill received her bachelor's degree in psychology in 1977 from Oklahoma State University, where she was a first-generation college student. In 1980, she earned her Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut.
Hill was admitted to the District of Columbia Bar in 1980 and began her law career as an associate with the Washington, D.C. firm of Wald, Harkrader & Ross. In 1981, she became an attorney-adviser to Clarence Thomas, who was then the Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights. When Thomas became chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in 1982, Hill served as his assistant, leaving the job in 1983.
Hill then became an assistant professor at the evangelical Christian O. W. Coburn School of Law at Oral Roberts University where she taught from 1983 to 1986. In 1986, she joined the faculty at the University of Oklahoma College of Law where she taught commercial law and contracts.
In 1989, she became the first tenured African American professor at OU. She left the university in 1996 due to ongoing calls for her resignation that began after her 1991 testimony. In 1998, she became a visiting scholar at Brandeis University and, in 2015, a university professor at the school.
In 1991, President George H. W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas, a federal circuit judge, to succeed retiring Associate Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. Senate hearings on his confirmation were initially completed with Thomas's good character being presented as a primary qualification for the high court because he had been a judge for just slightly more than one year. There had been little organized opposition to Thomas's nomination, and his confirmation seemed assured until a report of a private interview of Hill by the FBI was leaked to the press. The hearings were then reopened, and Hill was called to testify publicly.
Hill said on October 11, 1991, in televised hearings that Thomas had sexually harassed her while he was her supervisor at the Department of Education and the EEOC. When questioned on why she followed Thomas to the second job after he had already allegedly harassed her, she said working in a reputable position within the civil rights field had been her ambition. She also said in her testimony that she had no other job to go to. The position at the EEOC was appealing enough to keep her from going back into private practice with her previous firm. She said that she realized only later in her life that the choice had represented poor judgment on her part, but that "at that time, it appeared that the sexual overtures... had ended."
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Anita Hill
Anita Faye Hill (born July 30, 1956) is an American lawyer, educator and author. She is a professor of social policy, law, and women's studies at Brandeis University and a faculty member of the university's Heller School for Social Policy and Management. She became a national figure in 1991 when she accused then-U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas, her supervisor at the United States Department of Education and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, of sexual harassment.
Anita Hill was born to a family of farmers in Lone Tree, Oklahoma, the youngest of Albert and Erma Hill's 13 children. Her family came from Arkansas, where her maternal grandfather Henry Eliot and all of her great-grandparents had been born into slavery. Hill was raised in the Baptist faith.
Hill graduated from Morris High School, Oklahoma, in 1973, where she was class valedictorian. Hill received her bachelor's degree in psychology in 1977 from Oklahoma State University, where she was a first-generation college student. In 1980, she earned her Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in New Haven, Connecticut.
Hill was admitted to the District of Columbia Bar in 1980 and began her law career as an associate with the Washington, D.C. firm of Wald, Harkrader & Ross. In 1981, she became an attorney-adviser to Clarence Thomas, who was then the Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights. When Thomas became chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in 1982, Hill served as his assistant, leaving the job in 1983.
Hill then became an assistant professor at the evangelical Christian O. W. Coburn School of Law at Oral Roberts University where she taught from 1983 to 1986. In 1986, she joined the faculty at the University of Oklahoma College of Law where she taught commercial law and contracts.
In 1989, she became the first tenured African American professor at OU. She left the university in 1996 due to ongoing calls for her resignation that began after her 1991 testimony. In 1998, she became a visiting scholar at Brandeis University and, in 2015, a university professor at the school.
In 1991, President George H. W. Bush nominated Clarence Thomas, a federal circuit judge, to succeed retiring Associate Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall. Senate hearings on his confirmation were initially completed with Thomas's good character being presented as a primary qualification for the high court because he had been a judge for just slightly more than one year. There had been little organized opposition to Thomas's nomination, and his confirmation seemed assured until a report of a private interview of Hill by the FBI was leaked to the press. The hearings were then reopened, and Hill was called to testify publicly.
Hill said on October 11, 1991, in televised hearings that Thomas had sexually harassed her while he was her supervisor at the Department of Education and the EEOC. When questioned on why she followed Thomas to the second job after he had already allegedly harassed her, she said working in a reputable position within the civil rights field had been her ambition. She also said in her testimony that she had no other job to go to. The position at the EEOC was appealing enough to keep her from going back into private practice with her previous firm. She said that she realized only later in her life that the choice had represented poor judgment on her part, but that "at that time, it appeared that the sexual overtures... had ended."
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