Anita Hill
Encyclopedia
Anita Faye Hill is an American attorney and academic—presently a professor of social policy, law and women's studies at Brandeis University
's Heller School for Social Policy and Management
. She became a national figure in 1991 when she alleged that U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas
had made harassing sexual statements
when he was her supervisor at the U.S. Department of Education
and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
. Though Thomas was confirmed and took a seat on the Court, Hill's testimony focused national attention on the issue of workplace sexual harassment.
, Oklahoma
, the youngest of the thirteen children of Albert and Irma Hill, who were farmers. Her family hailed from Arkansas, where her great-grandparents and her maternal grandfather, Henry Eliot, were born into slavery. Hill was raised in the Baptist faith.
After graduating as valedictorian
from Morris High School, Hill enrolled at Oklahoma State University, receiving a bachelor's degree
with honors, in psychology 1977. She went on to Yale Law School
, obtaining her Juris Doctor
degree with honors in 1980.
She was admitted to the District of Columbia Bar
in 1980 and began her law career as an associate with the Washington, D.C.
firm of Wald, Harkrader & Ross. In 1981, she became an attorney-adviser to Clarence Thomas who was then the Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education
's Office for Civil Rights
. When Thomas became Chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
(EEOC) in 1982, Hill went along to serve as his assistant, leaving the job in 1983.
Hill then became an assistant professor at the Evangelical Christian
O. W. Coburn School of Law
at Oral Roberts University
where she taught from 1983 to 1986. In 1986, she joined the faculty at the University of Oklahoma College of Law
where she taught commercial law and contracts.
, a position that required Senate hearings and confirmation. The hearings were initially completed, with Thomas's good character being presented as a primary qualification for the high court because he had only been a judge for slightly more than one year. There had been little organized opposition to Thomas's nomination and his confirmation seemed assured until a report of a private interview of Hill by the FBI
leaked out to the press. The hearings were then reopened, and Hill was called to publicly testify. Hill claimed in the October 1991 televised hearings that Thomas had sexually harassed her while he was her supervisor at the Department of Education and the EEOC. When questioned on why she followed Thomas to the second job after he had already allegedly harassed her, she said she had wanted to work in the civil rights field, she had no alternative job, "and at that time, it appeared that the sexual overtures ... had ended."
According to Hill, during her two years of employment as Thomas's assistant, Thomas had asked her out socially many times, and after she refused, he used work situations to discuss sexual subjects. "He spoke about ... such matters as women having sex with animals and films showing group sex or rape scenes" she said, adding that on several occasions Thomas graphically described "his own sexual prowess" and the details of his anatomy. Hill also recounted an instance in which Thomas examined a can of Coke on his desk and asked, "Who has put pubic hair on my Coke?"
Four female witnesses waited in the wings to reportedly support Hill's credibility, but they were not called, due to what the Los Angeles Times described as private, compromise deal between "aggressive, gloves-off" Republicans and the Senate Judiciary Committee Chair, Democrat Joe Biden
. According to Time magazine, one of the witnesses, Angela Wright, may not have been considered credible on the issue of sexual harassment because she had been fired from the EEOC by Thomas.
Hill agreed to take a polygraph test which found that her statements were true; Thomas declined the test. He made a vehement and complete denial, adding that he was being subjected to a "high-tech lynching for uppity blacks" by white liberals who were seeking to block a black conservative from taking a seat on the Supreme Court. After extensive debate, the U.S. Senate
confirmed Thomas to the Supreme Court by a vote of 52–48; the narrowest margin since the 19th century.
Thomas's supporters questioned Hill's credibility claiming she was delusional or was a spurned woman, seeking revenge. They cited the time delay of ten years between the alleged behavior by Thomas and Hill's accusations, and noted that Hill had followed Thomas to a second job and had later had personal contacts with Thomas, including giving him a ride to an airport—behavior which they said would be inexplicable if Hill's allegations were true. Hill countered that she came forward because she felt an obligation to share information on the character and actions of a person who was being considered for the Supreme Court. She testified that after leaving the EEOC, she had had two "inconsequential" phone conversations with Thomas, and had seen him personally on two occasions; once to get a job reference and the second time when he made a public appearance in Oklahoma where she was teaching.
Doubts about the veracity of Hill's 1991 testimony persisted long after Thomas took his seat on the Court. They were furthered by American Spectator writer David Brock
in his 1993 book The Real Anita Hill
, though he later recanted the claims he had made, described his book as "character assassination", and apologized to Hill. After interviewing a number of women who alleged that Thomas had frequently subjected them to sexually explicit remarks, Wall Street Journal reporters Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson wrote a book which concluded that Thomas had lied during his confirmation process. Time magazine however, remarked in 1994 that "Their book doesn't quite nail that conclusion." In 2007, Kevin Merida, a coauthor of another book on Thomas, remarked that what happened between Thomas and Hill was "ultimately unknowable" by others, but that it was clear that "one of them lied, period." Writing in 2007, Neil Lewis of The New York Times remarked that, "To this day, each side in the epic he-said, she-said dispute has its unmovable believers".
In 2007, Clarence Thomas published his autobiography, My Grandfather's Son, in which he revisited the controversy, calling Hill his "most traitorous adversary" and a tool of pro-abortion liberals who feared that he would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade
if he were seated on the Supreme Court. He described Hill as touchy and apt to overreact, and her work at the EEOC as mediocre. He acknowledged that three other former EEOC employees had backed Hill's story, but said they had all left the agency on bad terms. He also wrote that Hill "was a left-winger who'd never expressed any religious sentiments whatsoever ... and the only reason why she'd held a job in the Reagan administration was because I'd given it to her." Hill denied the accusations in an op-ed
in the New York Times saying she would not "stand by silently and allow [Justice Thomas], in his anger, to reinvent me."
In October 2010, Thomas's wife Virginia
, a conservative activist, left a voicemail at Hill's office asking that Hill apologize for her 1991 testimony. Hill initially believed the call was a hoax and referred the matter to the Brandeis University campus police who alerted the FBI. After being informed that the call was indeed from Virginia Thomas, Hill told the media that she did not believe the message was meant to be conciliatory and said, "I testified truthfully about my experience and I stand by that testimony." Virginia Thomas responded that the call had been intended as an "olive branch".
in the United States
with the ultimate result that the behavior is less tolerated today. Shortly after the Thomas confirmation hearings, President George H. W. Bush dropped his opposition to a bill giving harassment victims the right to seek federal damage awards, back pay and reinstatement, and the law was passed by Congress. One year later, harassment complaints filed with the EEOC were up 50 percent and public opinion had shifted in Hill's favor. Private companies also started training programs to deter sexual harassment.
The manner in which the all male Senate Judiciary Committee
challenged and dismissed Hill's accusations of sexual harassment angered women politicians and lawyers. According to D.C. Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, Hill's treatment by the panel also contributed to the large number of women elected to Congress in 1992, "women clearly went to the polls with the notion in mind that you had to have more women in Congress", she said. In their anthology, All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, but Some of Us Are Brave, editors Gloria T. Hull, Patricia Bell Scott and Barbara Smith
described black feminists mobilizing "a remarkable national response to the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas controversy.
In 1992 a woman's group began a nationwide fundraising campaign and then obtained matching state funds to endow a professorship at the University of Oklahoma Law School in honor of Hill. Conservative Oklahoma state legislators reacted by demanding Hill's resignation from the university, then introducing a bill to prohibit the university from accepting donations from out-of-state residents, and finally attempting to pass legislation to close down the law school. E. Z. Million, a local conservative activist and business consultant, organized protests and compared Hill to the assassin of President Kennedy. Certain officials at the university attempted to revoke Hill's tenure. After five years of pressure, Hill resigned.
in January 1997, but soon joined the faculty of Brandeis University—first at the Women's Studies Program, later moving to the Heller School for Social Policy and Management
. In 2011, she also took an of counsel position with the Civil Rights & Employment Practice group of the plaintiffs' law firm Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll.
Over the years, Hill has provided commentary on gender and race issues on national television programs, including 60 Minutes
, Face the Nation
and Meet the Press
She has been a speaker on the topic commercial law of law as well as race and women's rights. She is also the author of articles that have been published in The New York Times
and Newsweek
. and has contributed to many scholarly and legal publications in the areas of international commercial law
, bankruptcy
, and civil rights
.
In 1995, Hill co-edited Race, Gender and Power in America: The Legacy of the Hill-Thomas Hearings with Emma Coleman Jordan. In 1997, Hill published her autobiography, Speaking Truth To Power, in which she chronicled her role in the Clarence Thomas confirmation controversy and wrote that creating a better society had been a motivating force in her life. In 2011, Hill’s second book, Reimagining Equality: Stories of Gender, Race, and Finding Home was published.
In it, she focuses on the sub-prime lending crisis that resulted in the foreclosure of many homes owned by African-Americans and she calls for a new understanding about the importance of home and its place in the American Dream.
Fellow. In 2008, she was awarded the Louis P. and Evelyn Smith First Amendment Award by the Ford Hall Forum
. She also serves on the Board of Trustees for Southern Vermont College which is located in Bennington, Vermont.
Brandeis University
Brandeis University is an American private research university with a liberal arts focus. It is located in the southwestern corner of Waltham, Massachusetts, nine miles west of Boston. The University has an enrollment of approximately 3,200 undergraduate and 2,100 graduate students. In 2011, it...
's Heller School for Social Policy and Management
Heller School for Social Policy and Management
The Heller School for Social Policy and Management is one of the four graduate schools of Brandeis University.Founded in 1959 as the University's first professional school, Heller is located on the Brandeis University main campus along with the Brandeis University Graduate School of Arts and...
. She became a national figure in 1991 when she alleged that U.S. Supreme Court nominee Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas
Clarence Thomas is an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. Succeeding Thurgood Marshall, Thomas is the second African American to serve on the Court....
had made harassing sexual statements
Sexual harassment
Sexual harassment, is intimidation, bullying or coercion of a sexual nature, or the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. In some contexts or circumstances, sexual harassment is illegal. It includes a range of behavior from seemingly mild transgressions and...
when he was her supervisor at the U.S. Department of Education
United States Department of Education
The United States Department of Education, also referred to as ED or the ED for Education Department, is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government...
and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an independent federal law enforcement agency that enforces laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, perceived intelligence,...
. Though Thomas was confirmed and took a seat on the Court, Hill's testimony focused national attention on the issue of workplace sexual harassment.
Early life, education and early career
Hill was born in MorrisMorris, Oklahoma
Morris is a city in Okmulgee County, Oklahoma, United States. The townsite was platted in 1904 by L. R. Kershaw, who was an attorney and was also an Immigration Agent for the Frisco Railroad. He named the town after H. E. Morris, a Frisco Railroad executive...
, Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
, the youngest of the thirteen children of Albert and Irma Hill, who were farmers. Her family hailed from Arkansas, where her great-grandparents and her maternal grandfather, Henry Eliot, were born into slavery. Hill was raised in the Baptist faith.
After graduating as valedictorian
Valedictorian
Valedictorian is an academic title conferred upon the student who delivers the closing or farewell statement at a graduation ceremony. Usually, the valedictorian is the highest ranked student among those graduating from an educational institution...
from Morris High School, Hill enrolled at Oklahoma State University, receiving a bachelor's degree
Bachelor's degree
A bachelor's degree is usually an academic degree awarded for an undergraduate course or major that generally lasts for three or four years, but can range anywhere from two to six years depending on the region of the world...
with honors, in psychology 1977. She went on to Yale Law School
Yale Law School
Yale Law School, or YLS, is the law school of Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Established in 1824, it offers the J.D., LL.M., J.S.D. and M.S.L. degrees in law. It also hosts visiting scholars, visiting researchers and a number of legal research centers...
, obtaining her Juris Doctor
Juris Doctor
Juris Doctor is a professional doctorate and first professional graduate degree in law.The degree was first awarded by Harvard University in the United States in the late 19th century and was created as a modern version of the old European doctor of law degree Juris Doctor (see etymology and...
degree with honors in 1980.
She was admitted to the District of Columbia Bar
Bar association
A bar association is a professional body of lawyers. Some bar associations are responsible for the regulation of the legal profession in their jurisdiction; others are professional organizations dedicated to serving their members; in many cases, they are both...
in 1980 and began her law career as an associate with the Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
firm of Wald, Harkrader & Ross. In 1981, she became an attorney-adviser to Clarence Thomas who was then the Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education
United States Department of Education
The United States Department of Education, also referred to as ED or the ED for Education Department, is a Cabinet-level department of the United States government...
's Office for Civil Rights
Office for Civil Rights
The Office for Civil Rights is a sub-agency of the U.S. Department of Education that is primarily focused on protecting civil rights in Federally assisted education programs and prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, handicap, age, or membership in patriotic...
. When Thomas became Chairman of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is an independent federal law enforcement agency that enforces laws against workplace discrimination. The EEOC investigates discrimination complaints based on an individual's race, color, national origin, religion, sex, age, perceived intelligence,...
(EEOC) in 1982, Hill went along to serve as his assistant, leaving the job in 1983.
Hill then became an assistant professor at the Evangelical Christian
Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism is a Protestant Christian movement which began in Great Britain in the 1730s and gained popularity in the United States during the series of Great Awakenings of the 18th and 19th century.Its key commitments are:...
O. W. Coburn School of Law
O. W. Coburn School of Law
The O. W. Coburn School of Law was the law school of Oral Roberts University. The school was named after donor Orin Wesley Coburn, the founder of Coburn Optical Industries and the father of future US politician Tom Coburn....
at Oral Roberts University
Oral Roberts University
Oral Roberts University , based in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in the United States, is an interdenominational, Charismatic Christian, comprehensive university with an enrollment of about 3,790 students from 49 U.S. states along with a significant number of international students from 70 countries...
where she taught from 1983 to 1986. In 1986, she joined the faculty at the University of Oklahoma College of Law
University of Oklahoma College of Law
The University of Oklahoma College of Law is an ABA-certified law school located on the University of Oklahoma campus in Norman, Oklahoma. Currently, the College of Law has an enrollment of 527 law students....
where she taught commercial law and contracts.
Clarence Thomas controversy
Thomas was nominated to the U.S. Supreme Court by then-President George H. W. BushGeorge H. W. Bush
George Herbert Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 41st President of the United States . He had previously served as the 43rd Vice President of the United States , a congressman, an ambassador, and Director of Central Intelligence.Bush was born in Milton, Massachusetts, to...
, a position that required Senate hearings and confirmation. The hearings were initially completed, with Thomas's good character being presented as a primary qualification for the high court because he had only been a judge for slightly more than one year. There had been little organized opposition to Thomas's nomination and his confirmation seemed assured until a report of a private interview of Hill by the FBI
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
leaked out to the press. The hearings were then reopened, and Hill was called to publicly testify. Hill claimed in the October 1991 televised hearings that Thomas had sexually harassed her while he was her supervisor at the Department of Education and the EEOC. When questioned on why she followed Thomas to the second job after he had already allegedly harassed her, she said she had wanted to work in the civil rights field, she had no alternative job, "and at that time, it appeared that the sexual overtures ... had ended."
According to Hill, during her two years of employment as Thomas's assistant, Thomas had asked her out socially many times, and after she refused, he used work situations to discuss sexual subjects. "He spoke about ... such matters as women having sex with animals and films showing group sex or rape scenes" she said, adding that on several occasions Thomas graphically described "his own sexual prowess" and the details of his anatomy. Hill also recounted an instance in which Thomas examined a can of Coke on his desk and asked, "Who has put pubic hair on my Coke?"
Four female witnesses waited in the wings to reportedly support Hill's credibility, but they were not called, due to what the Los Angeles Times described as private, compromise deal between "aggressive, gloves-off" Republicans and the Senate Judiciary Committee Chair, Democrat Joe Biden
Joe Biden
Joseph Robinette "Joe" Biden, Jr. is the 47th and current Vice President of the United States, serving under President Barack Obama...
. According to Time magazine, one of the witnesses, Angela Wright, may not have been considered credible on the issue of sexual harassment because she had been fired from the EEOC by Thomas.
Hill agreed to take a polygraph test which found that her statements were true; Thomas declined the test. He made a vehement and complete denial, adding that he was being subjected to a "high-tech lynching for uppity blacks" by white liberals who were seeking to block a black conservative from taking a seat on the Supreme Court. After extensive debate, the U.S. Senate
United States Senate
The United States Senate is the upper house of the bicameral legislature of the United States, and together with the United States House of Representatives comprises the United States Congress. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Article One of the U.S. Constitution. Each...
confirmed Thomas to the Supreme Court by a vote of 52–48; the narrowest margin since the 19th century.
Thomas's supporters questioned Hill's credibility claiming she was delusional or was a spurned woman, seeking revenge. They cited the time delay of ten years between the alleged behavior by Thomas and Hill's accusations, and noted that Hill had followed Thomas to a second job and had later had personal contacts with Thomas, including giving him a ride to an airport—behavior which they said would be inexplicable if Hill's allegations were true. Hill countered that she came forward because she felt an obligation to share information on the character and actions of a person who was being considered for the Supreme Court. She testified that after leaving the EEOC, she had had two "inconsequential" phone conversations with Thomas, and had seen him personally on two occasions; once to get a job reference and the second time when he made a public appearance in Oklahoma where she was teaching.
Doubts about the veracity of Hill's 1991 testimony persisted long after Thomas took his seat on the Court. They were furthered by American Spectator writer David Brock
David Brock
David Brock is an American journalist and author, the founder of the media watchdog group, Media Matters for America, and a Democratic political operative...
in his 1993 book The Real Anita Hill
The Real Anita Hill
The Real Anita Hill is a controversial 1993 book written by David Brock that claims to reveal the "true motives" of Anita Hill, who had accused Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas of sexual harassment during his 1991 confirmation hearings....
, though he later recanted the claims he had made, described his book as "character assassination", and apologized to Hill. After interviewing a number of women who alleged that Thomas had frequently subjected them to sexually explicit remarks, Wall Street Journal reporters Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson wrote a book which concluded that Thomas had lied during his confirmation process. Time magazine however, remarked in 1994 that "Their book doesn't quite nail that conclusion." In 2007, Kevin Merida, a coauthor of another book on Thomas, remarked that what happened between Thomas and Hill was "ultimately unknowable" by others, but that it was clear that "one of them lied, period." Writing in 2007, Neil Lewis of The New York Times remarked that, "To this day, each side in the epic he-said, she-said dispute has its unmovable believers".
In 2007, Clarence Thomas published his autobiography, My Grandfather's Son, in which he revisited the controversy, calling Hill his "most traitorous adversary" and a tool of pro-abortion liberals who feared that he would vote to overturn Roe v. Wade
Roe v. Wade
Roe v. Wade, , was a controversial landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court on the issue of abortion. The Court decided that a right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution extends to a woman's decision to have an abortion,...
if he were seated on the Supreme Court. He described Hill as touchy and apt to overreact, and her work at the EEOC as mediocre. He acknowledged that three other former EEOC employees had backed Hill's story, but said they had all left the agency on bad terms. He also wrote that Hill "was a left-winger who'd never expressed any religious sentiments whatsoever ... and the only reason why she'd held a job in the Reagan administration was because I'd given it to her." Hill denied the accusations in an op-ed
Op-ed
An op-ed, abbreviated from opposite the editorial page , is a newspaper article that expresses the opinions of a named writer who is usually unaffiliated with the newspaper's editorial board...
in the New York Times saying she would not "stand by silently and allow [Justice Thomas], in his anger, to reinvent me."
In October 2010, Thomas's wife Virginia
Virginia Lamp Thomas
Virginia "Ginni" Lamp Thomas is an American attorney who is the founder and president of the conservative advocacy group Liberty Central; and the head of Liberty Consulting, Inc. Thomas previously worked at The Heritage Foundation. She is the wife of U.S...
, a conservative activist, left a voicemail at Hill's office asking that Hill apologize for her 1991 testimony. Hill initially believed the call was a hoax and referred the matter to the Brandeis University campus police who alerted the FBI. After being informed that the call was indeed from Virginia Thomas, Hill told the media that she did not believe the message was meant to be conciliatory and said, "I testified truthfully about my experience and I stand by that testimony." Virginia Thomas responded that the call had been intended as an "olive branch".
Effects
Public interest in, and debate over, Hill's testimony is said to have launched modern-day public awareness and open discussion of the issue of workplace sexual harassmentSexual harassment
Sexual harassment, is intimidation, bullying or coercion of a sexual nature, or the unwelcome or inappropriate promise of rewards in exchange for sexual favors. In some contexts or circumstances, sexual harassment is illegal. It includes a range of behavior from seemingly mild transgressions and...
in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
with the ultimate result that the behavior is less tolerated today. Shortly after the Thomas confirmation hearings, President George H. W. Bush dropped his opposition to a bill giving harassment victims the right to seek federal damage awards, back pay and reinstatement, and the law was passed by Congress. One year later, harassment complaints filed with the EEOC were up 50 percent and public opinion had shifted in Hill's favor. Private companies also started training programs to deter sexual harassment.
The manner in which the all male Senate Judiciary Committee
United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary
The United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary is a standing committee of the United States Senate, of the United States Congress. The Judiciary Committee, with 18 members, is charged with conducting hearings prior to the Senate votes on confirmation of federal judges nominated by the...
challenged and dismissed Hill's accusations of sexual harassment angered women politicians and lawyers. According to D.C. Congressional Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, Hill's treatment by the panel also contributed to the large number of women elected to Congress in 1992, "women clearly went to the polls with the notion in mind that you had to have more women in Congress", she said. In their anthology, All the Women Are White, All the Blacks Are Men, but Some of Us Are Brave, editors Gloria T. Hull, Patricia Bell Scott and Barbara Smith
Barbara Smith
Barbara Smith in Cleveland is an American, lesbian feminist who has played a significant role in building and sustaining Black Feminism in the United States. Since the early 1970s she has been active as an innovative critic, teacher, lecturer, author, independent scholar, and publisher of Black...
described black feminists mobilizing "a remarkable national response to the Anita Hill-Clarence Thomas controversy.
In 1992 a woman's group began a nationwide fundraising campaign and then obtained matching state funds to endow a professorship at the University of Oklahoma Law School in honor of Hill. Conservative Oklahoma state legislators reacted by demanding Hill's resignation from the university, then introducing a bill to prohibit the university from accepting donations from out-of-state residents, and finally attempting to pass legislation to close down the law school. E. Z. Million, a local conservative activist and business consultant, organized protests and compared Hill to the assassin of President Kennedy. Certain officials at the university attempted to revoke Hill's tenure. After five years of pressure, Hill resigned.
Later career
Hill accepted a position as a visiting scholar at the Institute for the Study of Social Change at University of California, BerkeleyUniversity of California, Berkeley
The University of California, Berkeley , is a teaching and research university established in 1868 and located in Berkeley, California, USA...
in January 1997, but soon joined the faculty of Brandeis University—first at the Women's Studies Program, later moving to the Heller School for Social Policy and Management
Heller School for Social Policy and Management
The Heller School for Social Policy and Management is one of the four graduate schools of Brandeis University.Founded in 1959 as the University's first professional school, Heller is located on the Brandeis University main campus along with the Brandeis University Graduate School of Arts and...
. In 2011, she also took an of counsel position with the Civil Rights & Employment Practice group of the plaintiffs' law firm Cohen Milstein Sellers & Toll.
Over the years, Hill has provided commentary on gender and race issues on national television programs, including 60 Minutes
60 Minutes
60 Minutes is an American television news magazine, which has run on CBS since 1968. The program was created by producer Don Hewitt who set it apart by using a unique style of reporter-centered investigation....
, Face the Nation
Face the Nation
Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer is an American Sunday-morning political interview show which premiered on the CBS television network on November 7, 1954. It is one of the longest-running news programs in the history of television...
and Meet the Press
Meet the Press
Meet the Press is a weekly American television news/interview program produced by NBC. It is the longest-running television series in American broadcasting history, despite bearing little resemblance to the original format of the program seen in its television debut on November 6, 1947. It has been...
She has been a speaker on the topic commercial law of law as well as race and women's rights. She is also the author of articles that have been published in The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
and Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
. and has contributed to many scholarly and legal publications in the areas of international commercial law
Commercial law
Commercial law is the body of law that governs business and commercial transactions...
, bankruptcy
Bankruptcy
Bankruptcy is a legal status of an insolvent person or an organisation, that is, one that cannot repay the debts owed to creditors. In most jurisdictions bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the debtor....
, and civil rights
Civil rights
Civil and political rights are a class of rights that protect individuals' freedom from unwarranted infringement by governments and private organizations, and ensure one's ability to participate in the civil and political life of the state without discrimination or repression.Civil rights include...
.
In 1995, Hill co-edited Race, Gender and Power in America: The Legacy of the Hill-Thomas Hearings with Emma Coleman Jordan. In 1997, Hill published her autobiography, Speaking Truth To Power, in which she chronicled her role in the Clarence Thomas confirmation controversy and wrote that creating a better society had been a motivating force in her life. In 2011, Hill’s second book, Reimagining Equality: Stories of Gender, Race, and Finding Home was published.
In it, she focuses on the sub-prime lending crisis that resulted in the foreclosure of many homes owned by African-Americans and she calls for a new understanding about the importance of home and its place in the American Dream.
Awards and honors
In 2005, Hill was selected as a Fletcher FoundationFletcher Foundation
The Fletcher Foundation is a nonprofit foundation that supports civil rights and environmental education. It was created with a $50 million endowment in 2004 by New York financier and philanthropist Alphonse Fletcher, Jr....
Fellow. In 2008, she was awarded the Louis P. and Evelyn Smith First Amendment Award by the Ford Hall Forum
Ford Hall Forum
The Ford Hall Forum is the oldest free public lecture series in the United States. Founded in 1908, it continues to host open lectures and discussions in the Greater Boston area. Some of the more well-known past speakers include Maya Angelou, Isaac Asimov, Noam Chomsky, Alan Dershowitz, W. E. B...
. She also serves on the Board of Trustees for Southern Vermont College which is located in Bennington, Vermont.