70 years later, UA offers law degree
He refused segregated education in ’40s
“I applied 71 years ago to earn a degree. Now they’re going to give me one.” — L. CLIFFORD DAVIS
FAYETTEVILLE — You won’t find L. Clifford Davis’ name on a building at the University of Arkansas.
He set foot on campus for the first time Thursday.
But Davis, 92, originally of Wilton, made an impact on the university 70 years ago and on civil rights in Arkansas.
Davis will be recognized for that when he is awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree at the All University Commencement ceremony today.
William T. Dillard II, chief executive of Dillard’s Inc., the Little Rock department store chain, will receive an honorary doctorate in business today from the University of
Arkansas, Fayetteville.
The commencement, which begins at 8:30 a.m., will be streamed live online at livestream.com/uark/ events/7134458.
In 1946, Davis began laying the groundwork for Silas Hunt, the first black person to enroll at the university two years later.
Davis graduated from Philander Smith College in Little Rock in 1945 and began law school at Howard University in Washington, D.C.
The next year, Davis applied to transfer to the law school in Fayetteville, but he was turned down because his application was incomplete, according to an article by Judith Kilpatrick, a former UA law professor and associate dean, in the summer 2009 issue of the Arkansas Historical Quarterly.
In 1947, Davis applied again and was accepted, but he would have been segregated within the law school, so he declined.
Davis would have had a separate classroom, study room, bathroom and possibly his own professor, wrote Kilpatrick. Instead of being allowed to go to the law library, someone would have gathered Davis’ library books for him.
“They were going to give me a different type of education,” Davis said Friday. “I would not have had the benefit of classroom discussion if I was going to be separated as a student. Training has a listening element to it, and you have to share information. You can’t have all of the good ideas. Somebody else has to have some.”
Unlike other students, Davis also would have been required to pay the $70 tuition in advance, and it would have been unrefundable.
Davis said he had been corresponding with Robert A. Leflar, who was then dean of the law school. Leflar was trying to find a way to quietly integrate the UA School of Law without a lawsuit being filed against the university, wrote Kilpatrick.
Because Missouri had no state-supported law school for black students, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1938 that the University of Missouri law school must admit Lloyd Gaines, a black man who had applied. Similar suits were in progress against law schools at the University of Oklahoma and the University of Texas, wrote Kilpatrick.
“Sometime in the fall of ’47, [Leflar] wrote me a letter and wanted me to pay tuition in advance because they were making plans for my admission and they didn’t want to go through all the trouble if I wasn’t coming,” Davis said.
Davis wrote Leflar saying advance payment wasn’t required of other students, so he wouldn’t pay in advance.
Davis said he heard nothing else from Fayetteville until January of 1948, when UA held a news conference and announced that Davis had applied and would be admitted if he showed up for the spring semester.
Davis didn’t show up, but Hunt did.
Hunt, a World War II veteran from Texarkana, Ark., “agreed to enroll under the conditions of segregation that Davis had rejected,” wrote Kilpatrick.
Hunt became the first black student to be admitted to any graduate or professional program at an all-white Southern university, according to The Encyclopedia of Arkansas History & Culture. There’s a building on the Fayetteville campus that bears his name. Hunt was unable to finish his degree, though. He died on April 22, 1949, of tuberculosis.
Davis decided to stay at Howard law school. Living expenses were higher in Washington, but Davis could find part-time work in Washington while he was attending school. He worked as a clerk for the Securities and Exchange Commission in the summer of 1948. Davis didn’t know whether he could find a job in Fayetteville.
Because Arkansas didn’t have a law school that admitted black students, Davis took advantage of a 1943 state law that provided tuition grants for black students to attend school out of state.
“By paying out-of-state tuition for African Americans, Arkansas hoped to evade litigation,” wrote Kilpatrick
Davis graduated from Howard University in 1949 and, after working for a few years in Pine Bluff, went on to be a lawyer and judge in Fort Worth.
Davis worked with Thurgood Marshall on the the case that ultimately became Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kan., a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that held that racial segregation in public schools violated the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
Davis filed lawsuits that led to the desegregation of the Mansfield and Fort Worth public schools in Texas, according to a UA news release.
In his March 30 letter to Davis offering the honorary degree, Joseph Steinmetz, chancellor of the Fayetteville campus, wrote “Your nomination stems from recognition of your tremendous career in the legal profession and as a civil rights leader pioneer.”
Davis said he was surprised to hear he would receive such an honor from the University of Arkansas.
“It never crossed my mind that this would happen,” he said. “I applied 71 years ago to earn a degree. Now they’re going to give me one.”
Davis said he planned to be in Fayetteville this weekend anyway to watch his great-nephew, Lionel Davis II receive his degree in mechanical engineering.
On Thursday, Davis toured the Fayetteville campus for the first time. A student ambassador drove Davis around in a golf cart, accompanied by Davis’ great-nephew.
After a stop at the law school building, Tamla Lewis, associate dean of the law school, rushed out to get a picture with Davis before he departed.
“This may sound sentimental, but just knowing his story and hearing his story and knowing myself as an African-American female having attended law school here and now as part of the administration, it reminds me not to take things for granted,” said Lewis, who grew up in Arkadelphia. “Just to be able to share that experience, it’s a bit overwhelming really.”
Stacy Leeds, who is dean of the law school, said it was a pleasant surprise to get to meet Davis on Thursday.
Leeds said other black people may have applied for admission to the law school before Davis.
“We don’t know all of their stories,” she said, “but we presume there were others who are unidentified even prior to Judge Davis.”
State Rep. John Walker, D-Little Rock, said it’s a shame Arkansas lost Davis to Howard University and then Texas.
“He’s an able lawyer and a wonderful human being who left the state to the detriment to the state,” said Walker, who is also a civil-rights lawyer. “He was a credit to our state.”
Of the honorary degree, Walker said, “It’s sort of reparation that’s inadequate for the harm he suffered.”
Davis didn’t seem to hold any grudges this week, saying he was excited to finally be on campus and that he was “very impressed.”
“It appears this university is open to students of all populations,” he said. “I could see walking on the campus a good variety of students, and they all seemed to be relaxed as such. It’s important that everyone learn and visit with a cross section of the population, regardless of race, ethnicity, education level, gender, political affiliation or any other socioeconomic factor.
“Every human being should respect every other human being and deal with respect and integrity with every other human being. I call that civil responsibility.”