Lawrence Otis Graham is the New York Times bestselling author of 14 books and a nationally-known attorney and commentator on race, politics and class in America. Best known as the Harvard-trained lawyer who left his New York law firm to go undercover as a busboy and expose racism, sexism and anti-Semitism at an all-white country club in Connecticut, he is the author of the new book,The Senator and The Socialite: the true story of America’s First Black Dynasty, which tells the story of U.S. Senator Blanche Bruce, the first black man (and a former slave) to serve a full term in the Senate. The book is being excerpted by Reader’s Digest and U.S. News & World Report and featured in Essence Magazine, Ebony and Vanity Fair Magazine.

This new book follows 3 generations of the Bruce family, as Blanche moves from Mississippi slave, to rich landowner, to Senator, to a job under President Garfield where he becomes the first black to have his name printed on U.S. currency. He and his wealthy black wife send their son and grandkids to Exeter and Harvard, beginning in 1896, and use their ornate Washington townhouses to entertain the black and white political elite of the 1880s.  The book follows the family from the Deep South, to Washington, and to New York in the 1940s where the Bruces work with the Rockefellers and reach their shocking end after their Harvard-educated grandson goes to prison and their granddaughter marries a black Hollywood actor who passes for white.

Graham’s prior book, Our Kind of People: Inside America’s Black Upper Class, exposed the world of high-society black families who first became focused on summer homes, debutante cotillions, skin color, the right families, Jack & Jill, and schools like Howard, Spelman and Morehouse beginning in the 1880s. Graham’s Our Kind of People and Member of the Club redefined the black American experience. He remains a popular speaker, and he is leading a campaign to get the U.S. Post Office to create a stamp honoring Senator Bruce since the nation has never placed a black elected official on a stamp during the 159 years that the country has issued postage stamps.  

Click here to learn how Graham left his law firm to work undercover as a busboy at a Connecticut Country Club and exposed racism and anti-Semitism.

Click here to help us create a postage stamp honoring Senator Blanche Bruce the first black to serve a full term in the U.S. Senate.