PROGRAM SUMMARY

March Program:
Marion Wright Edelman
(Founder and President of Children’s Defense Fund)

Marion Wright Edelman, founder of the Children’s Defense Fund was the March 19 CREW luncheon keynote speaker at the Washington Hilton. The audience of 200 was captivated by Marion, who rattled off staggering facts and figures about the level of poverty in her mile-a-minute speech that left audience members floored – and invigorated to make a change.

As the daughter of a Baptist minister, a sense of giving back to the community was instilled in Marion at a young age. She said that as a child, service was as much a part of her life as going to school. After graduating from Spelman College and Yale Law, Marion became the first black woman to practice law in Mississippi.

In 1973 she started CDF, which now, in its 35th year, has raised billions in corporate grants and individual donations. Marion talked about the “cradle to prison pipeline” and CDF’s mission to end the funneling of young Americans, mostly minorities, into wrong life choices that lead to incarceration. Marion said she’s not surprised so many children are in jail because state governments in America spend an average of three times more on state prison systems that on public schools.

Marion’s moving speech had a profound effect on audience members. CREW President, Helen Haerle said, “Personally I find it overwhelming that one person could spend 35 years of one’s life to pursuing a goal that seems to move farther away from one’s reach every day. That level of passion and commitment is most extraordinary.” President-elect Jeanne LaBelle said Marion’s speech reminded her of the feeling she had as a teenager and young woman in the late 60s and early 70s; that “anything was possible and that individuals really could, and should, make a difference.”

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