Mary Francis Berry resigned from the U.S. Commission On Civil Rights after nearly 25 years of service. Recently, Berry and the Commission issued a scathing report on President Bush’s Civil Rights Record. Although the report was rejected by its conservative majority, Berry sent the report to the White House anyway with a plea to the President that he “embrace the core freedoms and values enshrined in our civil rights laws.”
Berry has issued both favorable and unfavorable reports to every administration since she was placed on the commission. Reagan actually had her fired saying that “she serves at my pleasure, and she’s not giving me any pleasure.” The NAACP Legal Defense Fund sued on her behalf and the other fired commissioners arguing that the president couldn’t fire the watch dog for doing her job. She won and was reinstated. Bush, like Reagan, also cannot take criticism.
Berry has done well in her two and a half decades on the Commission and the state of America is better for it.
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