Rabbi Judah Cahn Elected to NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Board

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NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
107 WEST 43 STREET *+ NEW YORK 36, N. Y. © JUdson 6-8397 

ARTHUR B. SPINGARN THURGOOD MARSHALL 
President Director and Counsel 

WALTER WHITE ROBERT L. CARTER 
Secretary Assistont Counsel 

ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS, ARNOLD DE MILLE 
Treasurer Press Relations 

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 

RABBI JUDAH CAHN ELECTED TO NAACP 
LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND BOARD 

NEW YORK - Rabbi Judah Cahn, Temple Israel, Lawrence, New 

York, and five other religious, labor and lay leaders were elected to 

the Board ef Directors of the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, 

Ince, it was announced this week by Thurgood Marshall, Director- 

Ccunsel of Legal Defense, 

The new members were unanimously elected at a recent meeting 

of the Board held at Legal Defense headquarters, 107 West 3rd Street, 

New York, N. Yo 

The other new members are Willard W, Allen, Sovereign Grand 

Commander, The United Su emo Couneil, 33°, Prince Hall Masons and 

President of the Southern Life Insuranee Company; George K. Hunton, 

national secretary of the Catholic Interracial Council; Mrs, Daisy Eo 

Lampkin, Vice President, Pittsburgh Courier; Carl Murphy, president 

of the National Newspaper Publishers Association and president of the 

Afro-American newspapers and Charles S, Zimmerman, secretary-treasurer, 

Dressmakers Union, Local 22. 

NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., is the 

legal arm of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored 

People which has waged a long and uphill fight to establish the 

constitutional rights for Negroes to vote, to educate their children 

without regards to race, to travel without being discriminated and 

segregated against, and to work and live as other people. 

During the past 15 years Legal Defense has participated in 

hundreds of cases throughout the land, and its lawyers have appeared 

37 times before the United States Supreme Court in major cases in- 

volving the basic rights and principles denied Negro Americans. 

Among the most celebrated cases are the Smith v. Allwright 

which affirmed the right of Negro citizens to vote in primaries; the 

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Sweatt and McLaurin cases, which established the right of Negroes to 

attend state supported graduate and professional schools in states 

which had previously barred Negroes. 

The most recent and most comprehensive cases ever prepared 

by Legal Defense are the now famous school segregation cases which 

ask the United States Supreme Court to outlaw segregation in public 

and elementary schools, 

The election of the six new members brings the governing 

body of Legal Defense to a total of 3h. 

Rabbi Cahn was associated with Dr. Stephen S. Wise as Director 

of Boys' Work at the Free Synagogue. For three years he served as 

Chaplain in the Children's Court in New York City. He did his gradu- 

ate work in Political Science at Columbia University and received his 

Master of Arts Degree from that school, His work on the subject of 

Thomas Jefferson and his attitude towards the Church is an outstand- 

ing eontribution in the field, He received the degree of Doctor of 

Divinity from Springfield College, Springfield, Mass., in 1953. He 

served as Rabbi of Sinai Temple in Springfield, Mass., for six yearse 

While in Springfield, Rabbi Cahn served on the Planning Board of the 

City.e This was the first time in the history of the Commonwealth of 

Massachusetts that a minister was asked to serve in this capacity. He 

is a past President of the Zionist Organization in Springfield, He 

was an instructor in the Department of Government in the Massachusetts 

State College. He organized the Hillel Foundations at Smith College 

and Massachusetts State College. 

In 192 Rabbi Cahn became associated with the B'nai B'rith 

Hillel Foundations and served as the National Administrative Assistant 

to Dr. Sachar until 1945. In that year, Temple Israel of Lawrence, 

New York, one of the outstanding Reform Congregations in this country, 

invited Rabbi Cahn to become its spiritual leader. In addition to 

his work in this Congregation of a thousand families, Rabbi Cahn served 

on the National Board and the National Administrative Committee of the 

National Association for the Advancement of Colored Peoplee He is the 

only Rabbi in the United States to serve in such a capacity, and the seo 

oe a ef the N.A.A.C.P. - the first being Dr. Stephen S, Wise, who 

served as one of the founders of the organization, Rabbi Cahn is on 

the Board of Governors of the Hebrew Union College. 

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