S*0191 Resolution, By Patterson
 A SENATE RESOLUTION TO SALUTE AND THANK COMMITTED COMMUNITY LEADER, DEVOTED
 HUSBAND, AND LOVING FATHER, THE HONORABLE LEROY E. BROWNE, SR., OF ST. HELENA
 ISLAND FOR THE CONTRIBUTIONS MADE TO THE RESIDENTS OF ST. HELENA ISLAND AND
 BEAUFORT COUNTY DURING HIS DISTINGUISHED TWENTY-YEAR POLITICAL CAREER.

   01/12/05  Senate Introduced and adopted SJ-10

TO SALUTE AND THANK COMMITTED COMMUNITY LEADER, DEVOTED HUSBAND, AND LOVING FATHER, THE HONORABLE LEROY E. BROWNE, SR., OF ST. HELENA ISLAND FOR THE CONTRIBUTIONS MADE TO THE RESIDENTS OF ST. HELENA ISLAND AND BEAUFORT COUNTY DURING HIS DISTINGUISHED TWENTY-YEAR POLITICAL CAREER.

Whereas, the Honorable LeRoy E. Browne, Sr., was born in 1916 on St. Helena Island, the son of George and Redell Browne. He graduated from Penn Normal, Industrial and Agricultural School in 1934, and the Hampton Institute (now Hampton University) in Virginia in 1940; and

Whereas, Mr. Browne is a devoted family man married to Corinne Jefferson Browne and has one son, LeRoy, Jr., and three daughters Carol, Rosalyn, and Cynthia; and

Whereas, LeRoy E. Browne continued his lifelong association with Penn after graduation serving as maintenance superintendent at Penn Community Services, Inc., for twenty-five years during which time Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference attended a retreat at Penn Center prior to the 1963 march in Washington. Mr. Browne's meeting with Dr. King motivated him to become involved with the civil rights movement; and

Whereas, in 1960, at the age of forty-three, LeRoy E. Browne became the first African American to win elective office in South Carolina since reconstruction; his service saw the Beaufort County Board of Directors expand from a five-member board with only one black member to a county council of nine members with a black majority in the 1970s; and

Whereas, during his twenty-year tenure as a well-respected and much-admired member of the county board, Mr. Browne served on a variety of county committees including public service planning, public buildings, health, budget, capital equipment, and personnel, and he served as chairman of roads and bridges; and

Whereas, LeRoy E. Browne has been active in civic affairs holding membership in the NAACP, the Lowcountry Regional Council, the Board of Directors of the Sea Island Federal Credit Union, the Sea Island Farmers Co-op, and the Executive Committee of the Democratic Party; and

Whereas, LeRoy E. Browne has been an outstanding public servant and civil rights leader whose courage and drive brought him great success in the political arena during a divisive time, and whose efforts helped open the door for blacks to become involved in politics. Now, therefore,

Be it resolved by the Senate:

That the members of the Senate of the State of South Carolina, by this resolution, salute and thank committed community leader, devoted husband, and loving father, the Honorable LeRoy E. Browne, Sr., of St. Helena Island for the contributions made to the residents of St. Helena Island and Beaufort County during his distinguished twenty-year political career.

Be it further resolved that a copy of this resolution be presented to the Honorable LeRoy E. Browne.