Pauli Murray (1910 - 1985)

​American advocate, legal scholar, theorist, author and Episcopal priest, Pauli Murray has long stood out for a life of service. A multiracial person with Black, Irish and Native American roots, Murray has influenced racial and women’s issues and legislation in America and inspired many Supreme Court decisions through the years. In addition to being California’s first Black attorney general and the Episcopal Church’s first Black priest, her writings about civil rights legislation were ahead of their time. Like so many, she struggled with gender and sexuality, identifying as a gender non-conforming person at a time when her in-betweenness seemed contrary to social constructs.