Ernest Nathan Morial - Early Life and Career

Early Life and Career

Morial, a New Orleans native, grew up in the Seventh Ward. His father was Walter Etienne Morial, a cigarmaker, and his mother was Leonie V. (Moore) Morial, a seamstress. He attended Holy Redeemer Elementary School and McDonogh #35 Senior High School. He graduated from Xavier University of Louisiana in New Orleans, Louisiana in 1951. In 1954, he became the first African American to receive a law degree from Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. Morial attended summer school throughout his law school tenure in order to graduate as the first African American. Had he not done so, another classmate, Robert F. Collins, would have graduated at the same time, thus entering into the history books as, technically, the first African American graduate of LSU Law, by virtue of his last name: "C" comes before "M." Collins would later become the first black federal judge in the south.

Morial came to prominence as a lawyer fighting to dismantle segregation and as president of the local NAACP from 1962 to 1965. He followed in the cautious style of his mentor A.P. Tureaud in preferring to fight for civil rights in courtroom battles rather than through sit-ins and demonstrations. After unsuccessful electoral races in 1959 and 1963, he became the first black member of the Louisiana State Legislature since Reconstruction when he was elected in 1967 to represent a district in New Orleans' Uptown neighborhood. He ran for an at-large position on New Orleans' City Council in 1969–1970 and lost narrowly. He then became the first black Juvenile Court judge in Louisiana in 1970. When he was elected to the Louisiana Fourth Circuit Court of Appeal in 1974, he was the first black American to have attained this position as well.

In 1955, he married Sybil Haydel, later to become an accomplished professional in her own right and, ultimately, a dean of Xavier University College. The couple had two sons, Marc and Jacques, and three daughters, Julie, Cheri, and Monique.