Lake County Attorneys

                                                          Virgil Hawkins was a Leesburg civil rights pioneer who challenged Florida's segregated  university system in the 1950s. 
                                                           In 1949, at age 41, he enrolled in the all-white University of Florida Law School.  When he was rejected, he sued. He did                                                                                                                         not attend UF, but the school later opened enrollment to blacks.  He earned a degree from the New England School of Law
                                                           in Boston in 1965.  When he returned to Florida, he couldn't practice law because of a rule that graduates must first pass
                                                           the Florida Bar Exam.  In 1976,  the courts allowed Hawkins into The Florida Bar without taking the exam. He died in
                                                           1988 at age 81.

LEESBURG -- Black activist Virgil Hawkins, who waged a 28-year civil rights battle to practice law in Florida and helped break the color barrier at the University of Florida Law School, died after a lengthy illness. He was 81.
    Mr. Hawkins had been in poor health for several months. He moved to Ocala to live with relatives when his wife, Ida, was unable to care for him at their Leesburg home.
    He died on Thursday at Munroe Regional Medical Center in Ocala after suffering acute kidney failure, his wife said on Saturday.
    Funeral services are scheduled for 11 a.m. on Feb. 20 at St. Stephens AME Church in Leesburg.
    He was hospitalized in June after suffering a stroke that left him unable to speak.
    Mr. Hawkins, who was born in Okahumpka, near Leesburg, taught school and was a principal in Lake County schools in the 1940s after graduating from Bethune- Cookman College in Daytona Beach.
    In 1949, at the age of 41, he applied for admission to the all-white law school at the University of Florida in Gainesville and was turned away because he was black.
    That incident began a 28-year civil rights odyssey that ended when he was allowed to practice law in 1977. Although Mr. Hawkins never attended the University of Florida Law School, his battle opened the door for other blacks.
    Mr. Hawkins challenged the state's segregated school system and won a court order prohibiting graduate schools from discriminating because of race when enrolling students. The order forced Florida to allow blacks into law schools at the University of Florida and Florida State University.
    In March 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that he should be admitted to the law school in Gainesville.
    The Florida Supreme Court invoked states' rights to deny Mr. Hawkins immediate admission in a 5-2 ruling. In June 1957 the U.S. Supreme Court refused to throw out the state court's decision. The Board of Control, similar to the current Board of Regents, then adopted rigid entrance requirements that made it impossible for Mr. Hawkins to enroll even if he won court approval.
    Nineteen years later, the Florida Bar told the state Supreme Court that it should give special consideration to Mr. Hawkins because of his ill treatment while trying to enter law school in 1949.
    The Bar said Mr. Hawkins should be allowed to take the state bar examination even though he graduated from an unaccredited Massachusetts law school about 20 years earlier. If he failed, the Bar said Mr. Hawkins should be given special assistance.
    In November 1976, the Florida Supreme Court ruled 7-0 that Mr. Hawkins should be allowed to practice law in Florida and waived a requirement he first take the state bar examination.

James Durden was an assistant public defender in Lake County for nine years until retiring in December 1990.  He was honored in June 1989 by the U.S. Supreme Court for his work as a defense lawyer for the needy and poor. He passed The Florida Bar exam in 1958 after graduating from Howard University in Washington, DC, then opened a private practice in Leesburg. Durden died at age 62 in 1990 after battling cancer for three years.


Brief by G. Fahs
James Warren Durden was born 28 Feb 1927 in Savannah, Georgia, died 21 Jan 1990 in Leesburg, and was buried Evergreen Cemetery, Lake County.  He was the son of James S. and Viola (Rushing) Durden, and the sibling of Thelma L., Anna M., and Janey D.  He was married to Ozie White.
James served in the 5th Armored Division during the Korean War, enlisting at Panama City, Bay County, Florida in 1950.

Obit
South Florida Sun-Sentinel (Fort Lauderdale, FL) - January 23, 1990
Deceased Name: JAMES DURDEN , ATTORNEY 1ST BLACK TO PRACTICE LAW IN LAKE COUNTY
    James Durden, Lake County's pioneer black attorney who was honored by the U.S. Supreme Court for his ''defense of the needy and the unfortunate,'' has died in Leesburg at the age of 62.
    Mr. Durden worked as an assistant public defender until mid-December, despite the cancer he had fought for the past three years. He died on Sunday at his home.
    In June, he was invited to Washington to meet with Supreme Court justices William Brennan, Anthony Kennedy and Sandra Day O'Connor. They told him that his refusal to give up his fight to represent the poor in the face of racial bigotry and hatred was an example for the nation.
    ''The principal interest of most lawyers is the almighty buck,'' Brennan told Mr. Durden. ''Then there are those who believe their first responsibility is the defense of the needy and the unfortunate.''
    Born in Savannah, Ga., Mr. Durden fought in World War II before working his way through Bethune-Cookman College in Daytona Beach to become a teacher. After serving in the Korean War, he returned to Leesburg to teach.
    He passed the Florida Bar exam in 1958 after graduating from Howard University in Washington. He opened a private practice in Leesburg.
    The work was not easy in the segregated South. Mr. Durden continued teaching at night because he did not earn enough money from his law practice to survive.
    For decades, he was Lake County's only black attorney. He said he felt plenty of racial bias, but refused to discuss it, saying he preferred to dwell on the positive things in his life.   .....GFahs