HILL, ANITA FAYE
A little-known law professor testifying before a U.S. Senate committee in 1991 became a cause celebre when she accused a respected U.S. Supreme Court nominee of SEXUAL HARASSMENT.
Anita Faye Hill became a household name during the televised confirmation hearings of U.S. Supreme Court candidate CLARENCE THOMAS, the second African American in U.S. history to be tapped for the High Court. Hill, who is also African American, was
calm and articulate as she withstood an intense
grilling by the all-male, all-white SENATE JUDI-
CIARY COMMITTEE. Despite skepticism and
open hostility from some of the senators, Hill
stood firm on her account of sexually explicit
remarks and behavior by Thomas, her former
boss. Conservatives reviled Hill, feminists
revered her—and by the end of the hearings,
U.S. citizens of all political persuasions had a
keener awareness of the problem of sexual
harassment in the workplace.
Nothing in Hill’s background prepared her
for the unremitting media attention she received
during and after the Thomas confirmation hear-
ings. The youngest of Albert Hill and Erma Hill’s
13 children, she was an extremely private per-
son. Hill was born July 30, 1956, and raised on a
struggling family farm near Morris, Oklahoma.
Her religious parents emphasized the impor-
tance of hard work, strong moral values, and
education. Intelligent and disciplined, Hill was
valedictorian of her high school class and an
honor student at Oklahoma State University, in
Stillwater, where she graduated in 1977 with a
degree in psychology.After college,Hill attended
Yale University Law School on a scholarship
from the National Association for the Advance-
ment of Colored People (NAACP).
Hill graduated from law school with honors
in 1980, and worked briefly for the Washington,
D.C., law firm of Wald, Harkrader, & Ross. In
1981, she left private practice to become special
counsel to the assistant secretary in the U.S.
Department of Education’s Office of Civil
Rights. The assistant secretary was Thomas. It
was during this time that Thomas asked her out
and, according to Hill, sexually harassed her. In
