CUNY Podcasts

Anita Hill, whose riveting allegations of sexual harassment almost derailed the confirmation of Clarence Thomas as a U.S. Supreme court justice 20 years ago, told a crowd at Brooklyn College: “I assure you: Nowhere on my bucket list was the ambition of testifying before a Senate Judiciary Committee about my own personal experience. Nevertheless, as the nomination proceeded, I realized what was at stake. At the heart of my testimony was the integrity of the court … [which] is only as good as the integrity of the people who are sitting on the court,” she said at the Shirley Chisholm Day celebration. Chisholm (Brooklyn College, 1946) was the first black woman elected to Congress, in 1968, and the first woman to make a serious run for the Democratic presidential nomination, in 1972. Hill, a professor at Brandeis University, also discussed the role that gender and race continue to play, particularly in the current foreclosure crisis.