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Sadie alexander economics

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Sadie T. M. Alexander (dec.), Distinguished Fellow 2022

 

Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. in economics in the United States, in 1921, from the University of Pennsylvania.  Because of her race and gender, she was denied a regular academic position after graduating, although later in her life she was offered positions at Black colleges that she was unable to accept.  She turned to law, and, in 1927, she became the first woman to earn a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School. At law school, the dean attempted to deny her participation in the law review, but her fellow students insisted that she be given the honor that she had earned.1 She was admitted to the bar in Pennsylvania, becoming the first Black woman to practice law in that state.  She wrote speeches and articles on the economic condition of African Americans2 and was an active and outspoken advocate of civil rights throughout her life.  Julianne Malveaux's powerful analysis of the implications of Sadie Alexander's omission

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The reckoning on race in the field of economics began around 100 years ago. To put that in perspective, white women had only recently been granted the right to vote, and, in 1921, white people had burned Black Wall Street, in Tulsa, to the ground.

Yet, in that same year, at the age of 23, Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander achieved the unthinkable when she became the first Black woman in the U.S. to earn a doctorate degree in economics. Throughout Alexander’s long and fruitful career, she championed civil rights for marginalized groups, especially Black women, creating a path for today’s Black economists, lawyers, and policy practitioners. She’s an example for all of us today on how to weather uncertain times at the nexus of political instability, racial injustice, and a global health crisis.

Ever since the death of Trayvon Martin, the senseless deaths of Black people have launched mass protests concerning police brutality and the systemic racism that permeates every aspect of our society. In 2020, industries and institutions that had long escaped close scrutiny found themselves fac

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Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander

Childhood

 “If I would tell you my medical history, you would agree with me that I was destined to live for some years”[1]

Sadie Tanner Mossell was born on January 2, 1889 in a house at 2908 Diamond Street, Philadelphia, which was owned by Sadie’s uncle, the artist Henry Osawa Tanner.[2]  Sadie’s mother, Mary Louisa Tanner, had an excruciating time with her pregnancy––she had suffered several previous miscarriages, and this time she was dragged half a block while trying to put her other children on the Ridge Avenue Trolley.[3] Happily, Sadie arrived at full term; her mother would later remark that her daughter was “destined to come into the world.”[4] Bishop Benjamin Tucker Tanner, Sadie’s grandfather on her mother’s side, baptized her with water from the River Jordan, and she was named Sadie Tanner Mossell, after her maternal grandmother.[5]

When Sadie Mossell was a year old, her parents separated.[6] Sadie would later recall that the separat

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