Remembering civil rights pioneers on the anniversary of their passing

Law From a Different Perspective

By Michele M. Jochner

Michele M. Jochner is a partner at Schiller, DuCanto & Fleck LLP after previously serving as a judicial law clerk to Illinois Supreme Court Justices Charles E. Freeman and the late Mary Ann G. McMorrow. She serves in leadership positions with a number of bar associations and community organizations, is a frequent lecturer and author on a variety of legal issues and has been an adjunct professor at DePaul University College of Law and The John Marshall Law School. She can be reached at mjochner@sdflaw.com.

Posted October 23, 2014 2:54 PM

Mohandas Gandhi encouraged us to “be the change that you want to see in the world.” Friday holds the distinction of marking the passing of two pioneers in the civil rights movement who lived these very words. On Oct. 24, 2005, Rosa Parks — who inspired the Montgomery, Ala., bus boycott after being arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man — died at the age of 92. On that same day in 1972, the first black person to play Major League Baseball, Jackie Robinson, died at the …

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