Rep. Tyrone L. Brooks Sr. to speak at 32nd Annual Black History Banquet on Feb. 6
The Appling County Branch N.A.A.C.P. is proud to announce that the honorable State Representative Tyrone L. Brooks, Sr. will be the keynote speaker at the 32nd Annual Black History Banquet on Feb. 16 at 7:00 p.m. Tickets are on sale now. Contact any member of the local N.A.A.C.P. Branch for further information, or call (912-278-3892 or 912-278-5057.
Rep. Tyrone L. Brooks Sr. a dynamic public speaker, lifelong civil rights worker, and servant of the people. He is also known around the world as the man who changed the Georgia flag. He is a lifelong member of Pleasant Grove Baptist Church in Warrenton and his Atlanta church home is the West Hunter Street Baptist church in the West End. He currently represents House District 63 (Fulton and Douglas counties) in the Georgia General Assembly.
Representative Tyrone L. Brooks was born to Ruby and Mose Brooks in Washington, Wilkes County, GA. He was reared in Warrenton where he was educated in the public school system. He received further education at Boggs Academy, Keysville; Lassalle Institute, Philadelphia, PA; Howard University, Washington, D.C., Atlanta University and the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government, Cambridge, MA. In May of 2001, the John Marshall School of Law bestowed on him his first honorary degree of Doctor of Jurisprudence.
Brooks began his career in public service as an activist for civil and human rights at the age of 15 as a volunteer with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). He became a full-time staffer at the organization in 1967. Under Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Under Dr. King, the Rev. Ralph David Abernathy, the Rev. Hosea Williams and Dr. Joseph E. Lowery, he served in many positions, nationally and locally. He has been at the forefront and involved in the struggle for freedom, justice and equality since 1960 and has been jailed 66 times for civil rights work.
Elected in 1980 as a member of the Georgia House of Representatives, Brooks serves on the following committees: Economic Development and Tourism, Governmental Affairs and Retirement. A former member and officer of the powerful House Appropriations Committee and Special Rules (Policy), during his tenure as state representative he has consistently created and supported legislation to help the poor and oppressed people in our society. He led the successful movement to reactivate the town of Keysville in spite of the many threats against his life. He also led the campaign against Apartheid in South Africa by championing legislation to divest all public funds controlled by the state of Georgia from the former brutal, inhumane government. He sponsored legislation calling for the unconditional release of Nelson Mandela. Along with Dr. Ralph David Abernathy, Dick Gregory and many others. Brooks was arrested at the South African Embassy in Washington, D.C. on Thanksgiving Day November 1976 and jailed for protesting the massacre in Soweto while calling for the end of the Apartheid government. Tyrone Brooks has worked to eradicate racism, sexism, illiteracy and injustice. Some of the laws he has helped pass include the Antiterrorism law, the establishment of the Positive Employment and Community Help (PEACH) Program, and the Reapportionment Max Black Plan. His House Bill 16 resulted in winning an almost twenty-year battle in the General Assembly to change the Georgia state flag. It became law Jan. 31, 2001. In 2005, he sponsored a package of legislation to repeal and purge Jim Crow era segregation laws from the Georgia Constitution and legal code. In 2006, his House Bill 101 allowed law enforcement officers the opportunity to buy back service prior to 1976, which was denied to them because of race.
Brooks has received numerous awards and honors for outstanding leadership and service from many civic, religious, government, media, educational and civil rights organizations including NAACP, SCLC, SCLC/W.O.M.E.N., Inc., History Makers, Georgia Coalition of Black Women, Inc., National Baptist Convention, the International Ministers and Lay Association of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, Georgia Legislative Black Caucus, Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, City of Atlanta, The Atlanta Voice Newspaper, the John Marshall School of Law, WVEE V-103, The Auburn Avenue Research Library on African-American Culture and History, American Association of Affirmative Action, as well as several fraternities and sororities. He was selected Man of the Year in 2007 by The Georgia Informer Newspaper. He is a 2008 inductee in the International Civil Rights Walk of Fame.
Representative Brooks is an active member of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus (GLBC). He is President of the Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials (GABEO), co-founder of the Coalition for the People?s Agenda, and serves in many other organizations. He works every day in the movement towards full political empowerment of African-Americans in the American Body Politic trying to register and educate 600,000 unregistered African Americans in Georgia and 7 million throughout the United States of America.
Rep. Tyrone Brooks Legislative Highlights
1981 - The Charitable Solicitation Act.
1981-2001 - Cosponsored legislation to increase Homestead Exemptions and reduce taxes for the elderly and the poor.
1982 - Divestment from South Africa. Free Nelson Mandela. Reapportionment to Create the Majority Black 5th Congressional District in Atlanta.
1983 - Anti-Terrorism (Anti KKK) Law.
1986-87 - Positive Employment and Community Help (PEACH) Program (Welfare Reform Program).
1986 - Began movement to reactivate the town of Keysville, GA.
1987 - Keysville won the legal fight with assistance from ACLU, the Crystic Institute and Georgia Attorney General Mike Bowers.
1988 - Keysville elected African-Americans to all municipal offices. They are still serving today. Keysville has been in the state and federal budgets since 1990. This financial assistance has contributed to revival and rebuilding of the city's infrastructure, and the reopening of Boggs Academy (now known as Boggs Rural Life Center).
The Brooks litigation. Initiated a federal class action lawsuit against the state and introduced legislation to force the state to appoint more African-American judges and prosecutors and reform the Judicial Nominating Committee. Today, Georgia has the most racially diverse judiciary of any state in the nation.
1992 - Signed an out-of-court settlement consent decree to settle, ‘The Brooks Litigation’ with Governor Zell Miller. Because of the ongoing implementation and aggressive activism Georgia now has more African-American judges than any other state in the U.S.A.
Cosponsored and helped pass the Max Black Reapportionment Plan, which elected three African-Americans to the United States Congress from Georgia and several African-American state legislators. Because of this activism, Georgia now leads the nation with more African-American elected officials than any other state (800) and the largest legislative black caucus (50).
1999 - Sponsored resolution urging federal and state authorities to reopen investigation of the murders of five African-Americans at the Moore?s Ford Bridge in Walton County. This massacre on July 25, 1946, was the last open public lynching of black people recorded in the nation. Governor Roy Barnes has ordered the GBI to reopen this case and work to bring justice to bear and closure for relatives of the victims, our state and the nation.
Nov. 22, 2000 and January 9, 2001 - Sponsored House Bill 16, the legislation to change the Georgia State Flag. Brooks participated in the final design of the new flag and wrote those famous words, Georgia?s History above the flags from our past.
February 2001 - Sponsored legislation that deals with consumer product disclosure (defective vehicle tires). The unfortunate, untimely death of Earl Shin holster, NAACP civil rights activists, June 2000 near Tuskegee, Alabama prompted Brooks to sponsor this legislation.
January 2003, Sponsored the following legislation:
House Bill 28 - To require registration by political parties so that we won?t have anymore victims of Republican crossover voting, i.e. Cynthia McKinney.
House Bill 29 - To repeal the Runoff election Law adopted in 1964 to prevent Negroes and Liberals from winning public offices. The Voting Rights Act was being debated in Congress. This was the response from 9 states (all in the South) to our quest to become participants in the body politic (Will be reintroduced).
House Bill 1027 - To bring African-American law enforcement officers into the Peace Officers Benefit Annuity Retirement Fund, who were denied membership because of their race prior to 1976. House Bill 1327 - To ban racial profiling in traffic stops.
Cosponsored House Resolution 1343 with Rep. Mike Coan: The legislation repeals a 1955 law urging Congress to call for Constitutions and code.
2005 - Sponsored a package of legislation to repeal and purge racist segregation laws (from the Jim Crow era) from the Georgia Code.
House Bill 25 - Repeal a statute that gave the governor of Georgia executive powers to close public schools to avoid desegregation.
House Bill 26 - Repeals the statute that gave the governor powers to suspend compulsory attendance laws.
This was a maneuver to allow white parents to keep their children out of desegregated schools and away from black children and not be charged with violating the mandatory compulsory school attendance law.
House Bill 27 - Repeals a statute that allow the General Assembly to grant state funds to private segregationist academies that were organized for the purpose of accommodating white parents who refused to send their children to desegregated schools.
House Bill 372 - Repeals a statute that allowed the Georgia Education Authority (GA Department of Education) to lease public facilities and properties to private schools (segregationist academies and schools).
Note: all these bills were signed into law May 2005 after passing the House and Senate unanimously.
2006 - House Bill 101 - Benefits African American law enforcement officers currently employed and certified. Allows law enforcement officers the opportunity to buy back service prior to 1976, which was denied to them because of race. The Peace Officers Annuity and Benefit Retirement fund was segregated and reserved for whites only from 1951 to 1976. The state will subsidize half of the cost of the buy back. House Bill 101 passed the House and Senate unanimously and was signed into law, May 2006.
House Bill 1019 - Co-Sponsored with Rep. Burke Day to require mandatory, certified training for law enforcement offices are authorized to use tasers, stun guns, or electric shock devises. Passed the House and Senate and was signed into law 2006.
2007 - sponsored resolution urging Congress, the United Nations, and the African Union to help end the genocide in the Sudan Darfur Region.
2008 - Will reintroduce the following legislation:
-To allow for immediate restoration of voting rights for felons upon their release from prison or jail.
-To create a civil rights museum in the capital rotunda.
-To ban racial profiling.
-To reintroduce House Resolution 30 (Companions to House Bill 101). This legislation will allow for a vote on a constitutional amendment, which will allow the General Assembly to grant a benefit to those retired officers who were denied membership in the Peace Officers Annuity and Benefit Retirement Fund.
Will Co-sponsor resolution urging the state of Georgia to apologize for its role in the slave trade industry.
2009 - House Bill 493, a 150 million dollar jobs bill passed during the 2010 Session: Signed into law May 2010.
Note: Throughout his civil rights and political careers, Brooks has consistently opposed Georgia?s death penalty law. He now supports proposals calling for a moratorium on executions until a comprehensive study is conducted to evaluate its disproportionate disparity impacting African-Americans, minorities and the poor. He opposes mandatory minimum sentences; two strikes, three strikes and out laws; and laws that mandate trials for children in adult courts.
Representative Tyrone L. Brooks was born to Ruby and Mose Brooks in Washington, Wilkes County, GA. He was reared in Warrenton where he was educated in the public school system. He received further education at Boggs Academy, Keysville; Lassalle Institute, Philadelphia, PA; Howard University, Washington, D.C., Atlanta University and the Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government, Cambridge, MA. In May of 2001, the John Marshall School of Law bestowed on him his first honorary degree of Doctor of Jurisprudence.
Brooks began his career in public service as an activist for civil and human rights at the age of 15 as a volunteer with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). He became a full-time staffer at the organization in 1967. Under Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Under Dr. King, the Rev. Ralph David Abernathy, the Rev. Hosea Williams and Dr. Joseph E. Lowery, he served in many positions, nationally and locally. He has been at the forefront and involved in the struggle for freedom, justice and equality since 1960 and has been jailed 66 times for civil rights work.
Elected in 1980 as a member of the Georgia House of Representatives, Brooks serves on the following committees: Economic Development and Tourism, Governmental Affairs and Retirement. A former member and officer of the powerful House Appropriations Committee and Special Rules (Policy), during his tenure as state representative he has consistently created and supported legislation to help the poor and oppressed people in our society. He led the successful movement to reactivate the town of Keysville in spite of the many threats against his life. He also led the campaign against Apartheid in South Africa by championing legislation to divest all public funds controlled by the state of Georgia from the former brutal, inhumane government. He sponsored legislation calling for the unconditional release of Nelson Mandela. Along with Dr. Ralph David Abernathy, Dick Gregory and many others. Brooks was arrested at the South African Embassy in Washington, D.C. on Thanksgiving Day November 1976 and jailed for protesting the massacre in Soweto while calling for the end of the Apartheid government. Tyrone Brooks has worked to eradicate racism, sexism, illiteracy and injustice. Some of the laws he has helped pass include the Antiterrorism law, the establishment of the Positive Employment and Community Help (PEACH) Program, and the Reapportionment Max Black Plan. His House Bill 16 resulted in winning an almost twenty-year battle in the General Assembly to change the Georgia state flag. It became law Jan. 31, 2001. In 2005, he sponsored a package of legislation to repeal and purge Jim Crow era segregation laws from the Georgia Constitution and legal code. In 2006, his House Bill 101 allowed law enforcement officers the opportunity to buy back service prior to 1976, which was denied to them because of race.
Brooks has received numerous awards and honors for outstanding leadership and service from many civic, religious, government, media, educational and civil rights organizations including NAACP, SCLC, SCLC/W.O.M.E.N., Inc., History Makers, Georgia Coalition of Black Women, Inc., National Baptist Convention, the International Ministers and Lay Association of the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church, Georgia Legislative Black Caucus, Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, City of Atlanta, The Atlanta Voice Newspaper, the John Marshall School of Law, WVEE V-103, The Auburn Avenue Research Library on African-American Culture and History, American Association of Affirmative Action, as well as several fraternities and sororities. He was selected Man of the Year in 2007 by The Georgia Informer Newspaper. He is a 2008 inductee in the International Civil Rights Walk of Fame.
Representative Brooks is an active member of the Georgia Legislative Black Caucus (GLBC). He is President of the Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials (GABEO), co-founder of the Coalition for the People?s Agenda, and serves in many other organizations. He works every day in the movement towards full political empowerment of African-Americans in the American Body Politic trying to register and educate 600,000 unregistered African Americans in Georgia and 7 million throughout the United States of America.
Rep. Tyrone Brooks Legislative Highlights
1981 - The Charitable Solicitation Act.
1981-2001 - Cosponsored legislation to increase Homestead Exemptions and reduce taxes for the elderly and the poor.
1982 - Divestment from South Africa. Free Nelson Mandela. Reapportionment to Create the Majority Black 5th Congressional District in Atlanta.
1983 - Anti-Terrorism (Anti KKK) Law.
1986-87 - Positive Employment and Community Help (PEACH) Program (Welfare Reform Program).
1986 - Began movement to reactivate the town of Keysville, GA.
1987 - Keysville won the legal fight with assistance from ACLU, the Crystic Institute and Georgia Attorney General Mike Bowers.
1988 - Keysville elected African-Americans to all municipal offices. They are still serving today. Keysville has been in the state and federal budgets since 1990. This financial assistance has contributed to revival and rebuilding of the city's infrastructure, and the reopening of Boggs Academy (now known as Boggs Rural Life Center).
The Brooks litigation. Initiated a federal class action lawsuit against the state and introduced legislation to force the state to appoint more African-American judges and prosecutors and reform the Judicial Nominating Committee. Today, Georgia has the most racially diverse judiciary of any state in the nation.
1992 - Signed an out-of-court settlement consent decree to settle, ‘The Brooks Litigation’ with Governor Zell Miller. Because of the ongoing implementation and aggressive activism Georgia now has more African-American judges than any other state in the U.S.A.
Cosponsored and helped pass the Max Black Reapportionment Plan, which elected three African-Americans to the United States Congress from Georgia and several African-American state legislators. Because of this activism, Georgia now leads the nation with more African-American elected officials than any other state (800) and the largest legislative black caucus (50).
1999 - Sponsored resolution urging federal and state authorities to reopen investigation of the murders of five African-Americans at the Moore?s Ford Bridge in Walton County. This massacre on July 25, 1946, was the last open public lynching of black people recorded in the nation. Governor Roy Barnes has ordered the GBI to reopen this case and work to bring justice to bear and closure for relatives of the victims, our state and the nation.
Nov. 22, 2000 and January 9, 2001 - Sponsored House Bill 16, the legislation to change the Georgia State Flag. Brooks participated in the final design of the new flag and wrote those famous words, Georgia?s History above the flags from our past.
February 2001 - Sponsored legislation that deals with consumer product disclosure (defective vehicle tires). The unfortunate, untimely death of Earl Shin holster, NAACP civil rights activists, June 2000 near Tuskegee, Alabama prompted Brooks to sponsor this legislation.
January 2003, Sponsored the following legislation:
House Bill 28 - To require registration by political parties so that we won?t have anymore victims of Republican crossover voting, i.e. Cynthia McKinney.
House Bill 29 - To repeal the Runoff election Law adopted in 1964 to prevent Negroes and Liberals from winning public offices. The Voting Rights Act was being debated in Congress. This was the response from 9 states (all in the South) to our quest to become participants in the body politic (Will be reintroduced).
House Bill 1027 - To bring African-American law enforcement officers into the Peace Officers Benefit Annuity Retirement Fund, who were denied membership because of their race prior to 1976. House Bill 1327 - To ban racial profiling in traffic stops.
Cosponsored House Resolution 1343 with Rep. Mike Coan: The legislation repeals a 1955 law urging Congress to call for Constitutions and code.
2005 - Sponsored a package of legislation to repeal and purge racist segregation laws (from the Jim Crow era) from the Georgia Code.
House Bill 25 - Repeal a statute that gave the governor of Georgia executive powers to close public schools to avoid desegregation.
House Bill 26 - Repeals the statute that gave the governor powers to suspend compulsory attendance laws.
This was a maneuver to allow white parents to keep their children out of desegregated schools and away from black children and not be charged with violating the mandatory compulsory school attendance law.
House Bill 27 - Repeals a statute that allow the General Assembly to grant state funds to private segregationist academies that were organized for the purpose of accommodating white parents who refused to send their children to desegregated schools.
House Bill 372 - Repeals a statute that allowed the Georgia Education Authority (GA Department of Education) to lease public facilities and properties to private schools (segregationist academies and schools).
Note: all these bills were signed into law May 2005 after passing the House and Senate unanimously.
2006 - House Bill 101 - Benefits African American law enforcement officers currently employed and certified. Allows law enforcement officers the opportunity to buy back service prior to 1976, which was denied to them because of race. The Peace Officers Annuity and Benefit Retirement fund was segregated and reserved for whites only from 1951 to 1976. The state will subsidize half of the cost of the buy back. House Bill 101 passed the House and Senate unanimously and was signed into law, May 2006.
House Bill 1019 - Co-Sponsored with Rep. Burke Day to require mandatory, certified training for law enforcement offices are authorized to use tasers, stun guns, or electric shock devises. Passed the House and Senate and was signed into law 2006.
2007 - sponsored resolution urging Congress, the United Nations, and the African Union to help end the genocide in the Sudan Darfur Region.
2008 - Will reintroduce the following legislation:
-To allow for immediate restoration of voting rights for felons upon their release from prison or jail.
-To create a civil rights museum in the capital rotunda.
-To ban racial profiling.
-To reintroduce House Resolution 30 (Companions to House Bill 101). This legislation will allow for a vote on a constitutional amendment, which will allow the General Assembly to grant a benefit to those retired officers who were denied membership in the Peace Officers Annuity and Benefit Retirement Fund.
Will Co-sponsor resolution urging the state of Georgia to apologize for its role in the slave trade industry.
2009 - House Bill 493, a 150 million dollar jobs bill passed during the 2010 Session: Signed into law May 2010.
Note: Throughout his civil rights and political careers, Brooks has consistently opposed Georgia?s death penalty law. He now supports proposals calling for a moratorium on executions until a comprehensive study is conducted to evaluate its disproportionate disparity impacting African-Americans, minorities and the poor. He opposes mandatory minimum sentences; two strikes, three strikes and out laws; and laws that mandate trials for children in adult courts.
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