Oklahoma's first elected black judge Amos T. Hall led battle for desegregation | Only in Oklahoma (2024)

Amos T. Hall, a quiet, peace-loving, humble Tulsan who was a leader in the fight for desegregation and who became Oklahoma's first elected black judge, would have been impressed by the list of people who attended his funeral.

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, NAACP National Director Roy Wilkins, Oklahoma Gov. David Hall and Mayor Robert LaFortune were among more than 1,500 who crowded into the First Baptist Church to mourn his death, extol his memory and to hear the 75-year-old jurist eulogized.

"I can't think of anything more he could have done," Justice Marshall said in perhaps the most eloquent eulogy during the two-hour service. "He led the fight (for desegregation) here and around the country in the days when it was a little rough -- and to say a little rough is putting it mildly.

"It takes strength to stand up quietly, lawfully, peacefully and say 'I will not be moved. I am going down that road and nobody's going to stop me.' Amos Hall did just that and he carried so many with him," Marshall added.

It was an accurate description of Hall, who was found dead of a heart attack Aug. 27, 1971, in his car in the 4300 block of North Frankfort Place about 20 hours after he left his courtroom in the Tulsa County Courthouse after telling his clerk he would return shortly.

Hall failed to return for a trial scheduled for 3 p.m., and police began searching for the missing jurist about 5 p.m. when he missed another appointment. They even checked his car after someone reported it to police, but officers didn't see his body because it was slumped down.

The car's quiet-running engine was still running when the body was found the next day. A testimonial dinner for Hall, with Wilkins as the speaker, had been scheduled for Dec. 10 to honor the attorney for his long years of service to his community and to the Prince Hall Masonic Lodge. The dinner was canceled although organizers at first considered holding it as a memorial service.

He had served 31 years as the grand master of Oklahoma Prince Hall Masons. Hall was working as a church janitor when he acquired an old set of law books, which he began reading, and developed an interest in the law. He became a justice of the peace (a former judicial position that did not require a law degree) and continued studying his law books at night.

He was admitted to the Oklahoma bar in 1925. A native of Louisiana, Hall had graduated from Gilbert Industrial College in Baldwin, La., before coming to Tulsa in 1921. He served as the attorney for the Oklahoma NAACP for many years and was president of the Tulsa NAACP. He had been on the board of St. John's Hospital, the YMCA executive committee, the Tulsa NCCJ board and the Tulsa Economic Opportunity Task Force, among others.

Hall became the first black elected to a judicial position in Oklahoma in August 1970 when he polled more than 50 per cent of the vote in a four-candidate race for the Democratic nomination for associate district judge, thus avoiding the general election.

He had been serving as an appointed special district judge. Charles Owens, a former Tulsa police officer, who was the first black to serve as a judge when he was appointed in 1969, became the second black elected to a judicial post by winning a seat in the general election in Oklahoma County three months later.

Hall had remained firm in his belief that the battle for equal rights should be fought in the courts and the hearts of men, although he felt that black extremists considered him an "Uncle Tom."

"Even one person is not powerless against those who fight change in this life," Hall said. "Even one person can help to right the wrongs of life and even change the course of history.

"This change, if our nation is to survive and our democracy to continue, will not be effected through violence. It will come only through education and changes in the attitudes and the hearts of men."

Wilkins told those attending Hall's funeral "we should be proud of having known Amos Hall, having shared for a little while in his concern for his fellow man -- not white men, not black men, not yellow men, but all men."

Only in Oklahoma is a series from the Tulsa World Archive that was written by former Tulsa World Managing Editor Gene Curtis during the Oklahoma Centennial in 2007. The columns told interesting stories from the history of the country’s 46th state. The Tulsa World Archive is home to more than 2.3 million stories, 1.5 million photographs and 55,000 videos. Tulsa World subscribers have full access to all the content in the archive. Not a subscriber? We have a digital subscription special offer of $1 for three months for a limited time at tulsaworld.com/subscribe.