John Mercer Langston Post Office Building

Floor Speech

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Ms. McCLELLAN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Maryland for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of my bill, H.R. 7385, to rename the Petersburg Post Office as the John Mercer Langston United States Postal Service Building.

John Mercer Langston broke barriers and redefined what was possible for Black Virginians in the late 19th century.

Born in 1829 in Louisa, Virginia, he was an abolitionist, attorney, diplomat, voting rights advocate, educational administrator, community leader, the founding dean of the law school of Howard University, founding president of Virginia State University, and my predecessor as the first African American elected to Congress from Virginia representing the Fourth District.

My connection to Mr. Langston is personal. My parents worked at Virginia State University where he was the first president. I grew up on that campus.

My father would often go to that post office to pay bills and to collect mail from the box. We used to joke he was the mayor of the post office because he knew everybody there. Now, as the first African- American woman elected to Congress from Virginia in the same district that Mr. Langston represented, it is my honor to put forth this bill and ask my colleagues to support renaming the post office, that I literally grew up in, after a legendary trailblazer in the Commonwealth of Virginia, John Mercer Langston.

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