Marian
Wright Edelman is an American author, activist and one of the nation's leading
advocates for the rights of children. She is founder and president of the Children's
Defense Fund, whose mission is to ensure that every child has a healthy and fair
start in life. Marian Wright Edelman's worldview was greatly influenced by her
father, Arthur Wright, a Baptist preacher who expected his children to work hard
at getting a good education and to serve others. She has dedicated her life to
serving those who cannot always advocate for themselves. After becoming the first
woman to get her law degree and be admitted to the Bar in Mississippi, she worked
for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and then moved to Washington DC in 1968 to serve
as legal counsel for the Poor People's March organized by Martin Luther King,
Jr. She worked on a number of other civil rights and public service causes before
founding the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) in 1973.
As
the nation's most powerful lobby for children, CDF has helped convince the government
to adopt many policies to protect and empower children, such as the 1990 Act for
Better Child Care which overhauled and improved childcare, as well as other legislation
to protect children who are abused, adopted, handicapped, homeless, neglected
or poor. CDF continues to advocate for the 14 million American children living
in poverty by advocating for health care, support for homeless children, expanding
Head Start programs, youth pregnancy-prevention, reducing violence in the media,
and other programs. Marian Wright Edelman has been honored with many awards for
her dedication to a better world including the Albert Schweitzer Prize for Humanitarianism,
the Robert F. Kennedy Lifetime Achievement Award and the Presidential Medal of
Freedom.
