NASW Social Work Pioneers®

CELEBRATING DR. JAMES DUMPSON’S 100 YEARS AND HIS IMPRESSIVE RECORD OF PUBLIC SERVICE

HON. CHARLES B. RANGEL
OF NEW YORK
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Mr. RANGEL. Madam Speaker, I rise today in honor of Dr. James Dumpson, a preeminent social activist of outstanding character and a transformative life’s work, who turns one hundred years of age on April 5, 2009. This public servant of notable and illustrious record—who in 1959 became the only African American Commissioner of Welfare in the country—is a quiet hero of our movement for Civil Rights and racial equality. He is a gentle man of forceful voice and conviction, agitating on behalf of children, the elderly, and the impoverished in New York for 60 years, his country for 80 years—and we are all the better for it. A modern-day Renaissance man, Dr. Dumpson’s long-distinguished activism touches the fields of health, education, social justice, and academia. He is a familiar, popular, and pioneering leader in New York and in the African American community; an icon who worked tirelessly on behalf of others.

He earned a teaching certificate in 1932 from the Chaney Normal School, a B.A. degree from Temple University in 1934, an M.A. degree from Fordham University, and his Ph.D.—when he was henceforth known as “Dr. D.”—from the University of Dacca in Ghana. Dumpson has throughout his life served as a teacher to others, teaching elementary school for two years as a young man, and later, beginning as a Visiting Associate Professor at Fordham University in 1957 and returning a decade later as Dean of the Graduate School of SocialWork, with the faculty rank of professor. He served as a United Nations Advisor and Chief of Training in Social Welfare to the government of Pakistan in 1953, returning to Pakistan in 1971 as a consultant and receiving a fellowship there in 1977 through the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare to Pakistan.

He cemented his trailblazing status by becoming Commissioner of Welfare for New York City in 1959, the only African American and social worker to serve in that post in the country. He wielded his talents and skill to assist Presidents Kennedy and Johnson as an advisor, serving on various advisory commissions, including the Parents Commission on Narcotics and Drug Abuse. He did not retire until the spritely age of 97, channeling his vigor and youthful spirit as New York City’s Health Service Administrator and Chairman of the Health and Hospitals Corporation beginning in 1990, and teaching at Fordham University up until 2006.

May this Congress today note, applaud, and send its gratitude for the contributions of Dr. Dumpson, and send him warm birthday wishes.