Getting elected to a public political office is no small feat. It often entails many hours of hard work and requires getting the broader population to believe in you and your ideas. Politicians can affect citizens’ daily lives by passing memorandums, adjusting tax rates, and instilling social and economic policies. Join me as we shine a Historical Spotlight on one of the most well-known mayors of Washington, D.C., Marion Barry. 

Marion was born in Mississippi on March 6, 1936 to his parents Mattie and Marion Sr. Because he experienced racism and inequity from an early age, he had a strong passion to one day change the norm in society. 

At the tender age of 17, he boycotted his newspaper route after being denied a trip to New Orleans as a prize for successfully gaining 15 new customers. The newspaper company claimed it was too expensive renting multiple buses to satisfy the segregation requirement in New Orleans, so proposed a trip to unsegregated St. Louis, Missouri instead to appease Marion.

As time went on, and he experienced more and more racist incidents, he became increasingly involved in civil rights organizations like the NAACP chapter at his college, LeMoyne-Owen College, in Memphis. He was also nearly expelled from school after criticizing the only white member on LeMoyne-Owen’s board of trustees for comments he felt were demeaning to Black Americans. Marion wrote a letter to the school’s president and asked for the trustee to be removed from the board. His pushback ultimately made it to the front page of Memphis’ conservative morning newspaper. 

A few years later while attending graduate school at Fisk University, he was arrested multiple times for participating in the Nashville sit-ins to desegregate lunch counters. He was elected as the first chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and helped develop a voter registration project in McComb, Mississippi. His work with SNCC helped him step into the political arena to make the difference he desired in society. 

Marion directly lobbied with state legislatures in Mississippi on behalf of Black Americans who wanted the right to vote in elections. Fellow SNCC member, James Forman, encouraged him to head a new SNCC office in Washington, D.C. since, at the time, the district wasn’t recognized as a state and didn’t have voting representation in Congress. 

In 1965, Marion accepted the challenge, moved to Washington, D.C., and immediately became heavily involved in peaceful street demonstrations and bus boycotts. Similar to the Montgomery Bus Boycott, he helped organize rides for those who needed it, leading to thousands of dollars of lost revenue for the bus line. He served as the leader of the Free D.C. Movement to lobby for D.C.’s ability to govern their own local affairs. 

He was also active in organizing the 1968 Washington, D.C. riots following the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. He created a free food distribution program for poor black residents whose homes and neighborhoods had been destroyed during the riots. Taking it a step further, he also became a board member of the city’s Economic Development Committee to help send federal funding and venture capital to black-owned businesses that were struggling to recover.

In 1971, Marion announced that he’d be running for at-large member of the school board and insisted he wanted to guide the board back to “issues of education” and away from problems of personalities. He defeated the incumbent with 58 percent of the vote. After being seated in 1972, he was unanimously elected as president of the board and served for two years. He effectively reorganized the school system’s finances and advocated for a larger budget and raises for teachers. 

After establishing Washington’s home rule in 1974, Marion was elected an at-large member of Washington’s first elected city council where he served as chair of the Committee on Finance and Revenue. He was re-elected in 1976, but chose to give up his seat in 1978 to run for mayor.

His work as an activist and legislator, as well as an early endorsement from The Washington Post, prepared Marion to be a competitive mayoral candidate. He won the Democratic primary with the campaign slogan “Take a Stand” and the promise to improve the “bumbling and bungling” D.C. administration. Marion won the general election in a landslide and took office in January 1979. 

Marion served four total terms as mayor from 1979 to 1991 and 1995 to 1999. 

During his first term, he focused on increasing efficiency in city administration and government services like the sanitation department and began his signature summer jobs program to keep school-aged residents involved in something productive while out of school. To help the Black community, he insisted that any firm partnering with the city had minority partners and instituted legislation requiring 35% of all contracts to go to minority-owned firms. 

He also tried reigning in the city’s chaotic finances, but ultimately found that the city’s alleged $41 million surplus was actually a $285 million deficit. Unfortunately, unemployment and crime rates rose dramatically during this term and he was first reported to be using cocaine at downtown nightclubs.  

During his second term, Washington experienced a massive real estate boom that initially helped alleviate the city’s financial problems, but government spending skyrocketed. Marion tried combating unemployment by creating government jobs, but the payrolls grew so great that by 1986, no one in the administration knew exactly how many employees it had. 

Several government officials were indicted for financial misconduct while Marion began to be plagued by rumors and reports of womanizing and alcohol and drug abuse. Stories ran rampant about his cocaine use in the city’s nightclubs and red-light district. Even his one-time lover, Karen Johnson, was convicted of cocaine possession and contempt of court for refusing to testify to a grand jury about Marion’s drug use. 

His third term was punctuated by the effects of his longtime cocaine and alcohol addictions. He would later admit that he lost control of his drug habit soon after being sworn in. Unfortunately, the city declined drastically as he battled his addictions. 

A winter blizzard struck in January 1987, affecting many local businesses. D.C. had the highest murder rate in the nation after crack use exploded in the city, prompting almost 500 homicides each year. Deficits continued to grow even as city services suffered. 

By late 1989, federal officials were investigating Marion on suspicion of illegal drug possession and use. On January 18, 1990, Marion was arrested with a former girlfriend named Hazel Diane “Rasheeda” Moore in a sting operation by the FBI and D C. police for crack cocaine use and possession. 

Hazel was an FBI informant when she invited Marion to a hotel room and insisted that he smoke cocaine. Agents monitored on camera from another room until he accepted her offer. During his arrest, he coined one of his most iconic quotes when he said, “Bitch [She] set me up…I shouldn’t have come up here…”

He was originally charged with three felony counts of perjury, 10 counts of drug possession, and one misdemeanor count of conspiracy to possess cocaine, but was only convicted for one possession incident. The jury deadlocked on the remaining charges. Six or seven jurors believed the evidence against Marion was overwhelming while the other five were convinced the prosecution falsified evidence and testimony as part of a racist conspiracy against him. 

While Marion’s drug use was inappropriate and a misuse of public office, it’s important to note that he smoked the cocaine that originally belonged to the government informant. Throughout his arrest and trial, he continued as mayor until he was sentenced to six months in federal prison. He faced his first and only electoral loss of his career and surrendered himself at a correctional facility in October 1991. 

Marion was released in April 1992 and filed papers to run for city council just two months later. He ran under the slogan “He May Not Be Perfect, But He's Perfect for D.C.” and defeated the four-term incumbent by winning 70 percent of the vote. Two years later, he entered his name into the 1994 mayoral election. Despite the controversy of his drug use and conviction, he went on to win the Democratic primary and the general election. 

His fourth and final term was plagued by even worse financial woes, with the deficit ballooning between $700 million and $1 billion. City services continued being dysfunctional due to mismanagement and Congress created the District of Columbia Financial Control Board to take complete authority over the city’s day-to-day spending and finances. 

Marion spent the last two years of his term battling with the control board for power over D.C. The conflict was ultimately settled when the federal government agreed on legislation that rescued the city from its financial crisis, but stripped Marion of all authority over nine district agencies. He was left with control of only the Department of Parks and Recreation, the public libraries, and the Board of Tourism, a condition he was severely unhappy with. He declined to run for a fifth term in office, believing that Congress wouldn’t restore full home rule while he was mayor. 

After leaving office, Marion did some consulting work for an investment banking firm before deciding to run for the city council seat he held before becoming mayor. He held his seat until 2014. 

Marion unfortunately passed away from heart disease on November 23, 2014 at the young age of 78. He will forever be known as “Mayor for life” and one of the greatest mayors of Washington, D.C. He put his life and career on the line to help many people in the Black community who were suffering get better living conditions and advocated for policies that would directly benefit the Black Washington, D.C. population. 

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Signed, 

Jessica Marie