Andrew Young

Andrew Jackson Young, Jr. ( born March 12, 1932 in New Orleans, Louisiana) is an American civil rights activist and politician ( Democratic Party). He was mayor of Atlanta and U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations under President Jimmy Carter.

Life

Andrew Young's father was a dentist and his mother, school teacher.

After a year at Dillard University in New Orleans in 1947 Young went to Howard University in Washington, where he graduated in 1951 made ​​in medicine. He originally wanted to follow his father's profession and become a dentist, but changed his mind on religious views and made 1955 the degree in theology at the University of Connecticut in Hartford.

Young was ordained by the United Church of Christ and served as a pastor of a church in Marion, Alabama, where he became familiar with the idea of nonviolent resistance by Mahatma Gandhi. In Marion he met his future wife, Jean Childs. He called on the African American population to stand up for the right to vote of African Americans in Alabama. He was a friend and an ally of Martin Luther King. In 1957 he moved to New York City and worked for the National Council of Churches.

During the civil rights movement, he decided to move to Atlanta, Georgia. There, too, he fought for the introduction of voting rights for African Americans. In 1964, he was Executive Director for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, with whom he organized many non-violent protests. Andrew Young was a close friend and collaborator of Martin Luther King and was with him in Memphis, Tennessee, when King was shot in 1968.

He tried unsuccessfully to be elected in 1970 as a Congressman from Georgia. In 1972 he tried again and was the first African-American lawmaker from Georgia in the House of Representatives since Reconstruction. He was reelected in 1974 and 1976. 1976 President Jimmy Carter appointed him to the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Due to a secret meeting with PLO representatives Zehdi Terzi but Young had to resign from that office in 1979.

1981 awarded him the Medal of Freedom Jimmy Carter. 1981 Young was elected mayor of Atlanta in 1985 and confirmed in office. In 1990, he ran unsuccessfully for governor of Georgia, and was beaten in the Democratic primary Zell Miller.

Young was a member of the Committee, the Olympic Summer Games in 1996 brought to Atlanta.

Andrew Young is a member of the Federation of the Freemasons, his lodge, St. James Lodge No.. 4 is constituted under the Prince Hall Grand Lodge.