Black History Month

Eric H. Holder, Jr.

Also known as: Eric H. Holder, Eric Holder, Eric Himpton Holder, Jr.

Birth: 1951
Nationality: American
Ethnicity: African American
Occupation: Judge, deputy attorney general, U.S. attorney (D.C.), U.S. attorney general nominee

Eric H. Holder became the highest–ranking black American law enforcement official in U.S. history in 1997 when he earned unanimous confirmation by the Senate as deputy attorney general. When President Bill Clinton appointed him U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia in 1993, he was also the first black American to hold that post. In each of these positions Holder has demonstrated a desire to bridge the communication gap between racial communities while, at the same time, he proved his intolerance for violent crime by cracking down on criminal activity. In 2008, Holder was nominated by Barack Obama to be the attorney general of the United States. If confirmed, he would be the first African American to hold this post – the highest position in the Justice Department.

BIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY

Holder was born and raised in a working-class section of Queens, New York. His parents had both emigrated from Barbados. By virtue of his scholarship, he was accepted into the academically elite Stuyvesant High School in Manhattan, and after graduation he enrolled at Columbia University. There he majored in American history, earning top grades, and he spent his spare time absorbing black culture at such notable Harlem landmarks as the Apollo Theater and the Abyssinian Baptist Church. Feeling a responsibility toward fellow black Americans who were less fortunate than himself, Holder began spending his Saturday mornings at a Harlem youth center and taking selected young people on trips around the city. He joined the Concerned Black Men, a national organization dedicated to helping minority youngsters.

Holder graduated from Columbia in 1973 with a bachelor's degree. He then studied law at Columbia and graduated in 1976, passing the New York State Bar in 1977.

Immediately after receiving his law degree, Holder joined the Department of Justice's Public Integrity Section in Washington, D.C., as a trial lawyer. He helped prosecute high-level cases involving noted public figures who had been accused of corruption. During his tenure from 1977 to 1988, Holder prosecuted FBI agents, organized crime figures, politicians, and others. In 1988 President Ronald Reagan appointed Holder associate justice of the Superior Court of the District of Columbia, a position he held until 1993.

Holder's success and favored position among politicians led to his selection in late 1993 by President Clinton as U.S. attorney for Washington, D.C., making him the first black to hold the position. The office, a division of the Justice Department, prosecutes both local and federal crimes—including high-level Congressional corruption cases and other violations of the law involving federal workers. The D.C.'s U.S. attorney's office employs more than 500 people, 300 of them lawyers who investigate crimes, bring indictments against individuals or groups, and take cases to trial.

While there, he faced a major case involving Dan Rostenkowski, an influential Democratic congressman from Illinois and chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, who was indicted on charges of misuse of official House accounts. Citing Holder's indictment of Rostenkowski, the Philadelphia Tribune reported that, in the matter of public policy, Rostenkowski had tremendous power over some major legislation. The Tribune also said that Rostenkowski was "very effective at making the intricate machinery of the White House work for him." Holder said in the New York Voice that the congressman had "about fourteen do-nothing employees on the House payroll ... mainly handling such chores as mowing his lawn."

As U.S. attorney, Holder fought discrimination in lending at an area bank. In 1994 he was involved in the Clinton Administration's settlement of an unprecedented case against a bank in Chevy Chase, Maryland, that refused to market its services in minority neighborhoods, particularly by declaring black areas off-limits—a practice known as "redlining." Holder said in the New York Voice that the bank neglected "whole segments of a neighborhood" and that the practice devastated the lives of individual citizens as well as the entire community. The bank violated the federal Fair Housing Act, declared the Justice Department.

In 1996 Holder increased the pressure on violence in the District of Columbia, where bias-related crimes had become a serious problem. He told the Washington Informer that there is no place in society "for cowardly attacks on residents simply because they are Black, Latino, Jews or Asians." He declared that Asian business owners were targeted because of their nationalities, not simply because they were merchants.

Holder also worked to facilitate dialogue between Asian and African American communities. Asian Week quoted excerpts from his little-noticed speech given in 1995 when one of Holder's deputies was sworn in as president of the Asian American Bar Association. Holder said, "At a time when many other business owners ignobly fled from the city to the suburbs, Asian business owners stepped in and filled a void." He praised the owners for their goods and services and their pursuit of the "American dream." He then urged Asian Americans to extend their reach to the entire community to show that they have a full stake in the community.

Holder remained highly visible as U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. He often spoke at local schools and organizations.

In April of 1997 President Clinton nominated Holder as deputy attorney general, the post immediately under Attorney General Janet Reno. At Senate hearings on June 13, Holder clearly stated his opposition to the death penalty. Quoted in The New York Times on June 14, 1997, he said, "I am not a proponent of the death penalty, but I will enforce the law as this Congress gives it to us." Of his impending confirmation which would make him the first black official in the second-highest post at the Justice Department, he said that the position would give him an opportunity "to help foster a dialogue between our diverse peoples about the issue of race in the hope that we can work to heal the racial divisions that have bedeviled this nation since its inception." After Holder was confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Reno, quoted in Jet on August 11, 1997, called him "one of the nation's most respected and qualified enforcement officials." She noted his wealth of experience and determination to safeguard streets and neighborhoods against violence. He was sworn in office in 1997 during a ceremony at the Justice Department, becoming the highest-ranking black law enforcement official in American history.

After seven years in the private sector, handling high-profile cases for Covington & Burling law firm, he is poised to make history again after being nominated by then President-elect Barack Obama to the attorney general position in November of 2008. If confirmed, he will be the first African-American attorney general. Holder is quoted in an article in The New York Times as saying, "I didn't have any idea what I would be when I grew up," but that the position of attorney general was "not on the radar." Describing a shared world view with President Obama in The American Lawyer, Holder says, "[Obama] is not defined by his race. He's proud of it, cognizant of the pernicious effect that race has had in our history but not defined by it."

D.C. Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton spoke on Holder's behalf in the Senate confirmation hearing on January 15, 2009. " If experience at every level of the department and the record of excelling in everything you have ever done matters to this committee," she said, "Eric Holder is unusually well qualified to become our attorney general."

FURTHER READINGS

• "Another Blow to the U.S. Congress: A Death." Philadelphia Tribune, August 2, 1994.
• "City Officials Warn of Increase in Hate Crimes." Washington Informer, October 30, 1996.
• "Clinton Administration Obtains Unprecedented Settlement in Lending Discrimination Case." New York Voice Inc./Harlem USA, September 21, 1994.
• Contemporary Black Biography. Vol. 9. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.
• "Holder's Swearing-In." Jet 92 (22 September 1997): 6.
• "Holder, High Achiever Poised to Scale New Heights." The New York Times, Dec. 1, 2008.
• "Justice Department Nominee Faces Little Opposition." The New York Times, June 14, 1997.
• "Making History." The American Lawyer, June 2008.
• "U.S. Senate Confirms Eric Holder Jr. as Deputy Attorney General; No. 2 Post at Justice Department." Jet 92 (11 August 1997): 32.Who's Who in America. 50th ed. New Providence, NJ: Marquis Who's Who, 1996.
• Wu, Frank H. "Letter from Washington: Getting Along." Asian Week 17 (6 October 1995): 9.

SOURCES

Eric H. Holder, Jr." Contemporary Black Biography, Volume 9, Gale Research, 1995.
Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2009.

"Eric H. Holder, Jr." Notable Black American Men. Gale Research, 1998.
Reproduced in Biography Resource Center. Farmington Hills, Mich.: Gale, 2009.