Long-serving US Congressman John Conyers Jr. who cofounded Congressional Black Caucus dies at age 90

Long-serving US Congressman John Conyers Jr., who co-founded the Congressional Black Caucus and helped create the Martin Luther King Jr. national holiday, before he resigned amid sexual allegations made against him, has died. 

Conyers died at his home in Detroit, according to police. 

The death ‘looks like natural causes,’ Detroit police spokesman Cpl. Dan Donakowski told the Associated Press.

John Conyers is applauded for his tenure with the Congressional Black Caucus during the swearing-in ceremony at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2015 in Washington, DC. He co-founded the caucus in 1971

Congressman John Conyers (left) with Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. are pictured in an undated photo. Conyers spent 15 year fighting to have a national holiday in honor of the slain civil rights leader

The Michigan Democrat had been the longest-serving black member of Congress until his death, and was known as the dean of the Congressional Black Caucus, which he helped found in 1971. 

He was one of only six black House members when he won his first election by just 108 votes in 1964. His life in public office spanned more than 50 years of elections which he would come to dominate with more than 80% of the vote, even after his wife went to prison for taking a bribe. 

Counting on that voter loyalty, Conyers often spoke his mind and was critical of politicians on both sides of the aisle. 

In 1979, he called then-President Jimmy Carter ‘a hopeless, demented, honest, well-intentioned nerd who will never get past his first administration.’ In 2004, he also had words for President George W. Bush, saying he had been ‘an absolute disaster for the African-American community. 

US President George W. Bush signs the Fannie Lou Hammer, Rosa Parks, and Coretta Scott King Voting Rights Act Reauthorization and Amendments Act of 2006 as Conyers (left) and other lawmakers watch on. Conyers was criticial of Bush’s work for the black community

Throughout his career, Conyers used his influence to push civil rights. He started off by co-sponsoring the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which prohibited discrimination at the ballot box. 

He later spent 15 year fighting to have a national holiday in honor of slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. It was first celebrated in 1986, after President Ronald Reagan signed legislation to create the holiday three years earlier.

Congressman John Conyers (left) and Jesse Jackson on Walt Disney Television. Jackson said Sunday that without Conyers there would be no King holiday — ‘no doubt about that.’ ‘He was one of the most consequential congressmen,’ Jackson said.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson said Sunday that without Conyers there would be no King holiday — ‘no doubt about that.’

‘He was one of the most consequential congressmen,’ Jackson said.

Conyers, a shrewed politician who was was big on imagery, had even employed civil rights leader Rosa Parks to work at his Detroit office for two decades. Both appear in an undated picture above

Conyers, a shrewed politician who was was big on imagery, had even employed civil rights leader Rosa Parks to work at his Detroit office for two decades.

However, the liberal Democrat’s career ended abruptly when female staffers came forward in 2017 alleging he asked them for sex and engaged in unwanted touching.

Conyers paid off one staffer $27,000 after she alleged he fired her for not accepting his sexual advances. The former aide claimed that the veteran lawmaker ‘violated’ her body and asked her to find other women to sexually satisfy him.

Former Conyers aide Marion Brown (above) in November 2017 said the then 88-year-old representative from Detroit, for whom she had worked for 11 years, had fired her for refusing a demand for sex. Brown at the time accepted a $27,000 settlement from the congressman

Marion Brown, a single mother of two grown daughters and a grandmother, appeared on the Today Show in November of that year with her attorney Lisa Bloom to detail her history with the then 88-year-old representative from Detroit, for whom she had worked for 11 years.

She claimed her boss made unwelcome sexual advances multiple times , but she stayed on the job because she needed to support her family and found the work rewarding.

‘It was sexual harassment, violating my body, propositioning me, inviting me to hotels with the guise of discussing business and propositioning for sex,’ Brown told Savannah Guthrie. ‘He just violated my body, he’s touched me in different ways. It was very uncomfortable and very unprofessional.’  

Parts of Brown’s narrative first emerged without her name attached to it when BuzzFeed News reported that Conyers paid the settlement from his taxpayer-funded congressional office allowance.

Conyers admitted at the time to paying the settlement but denied any misconduct, stating that his office ‘resolved the allegations…to save all involved from the rigors of protracted litigation.’

Despite his denials of inappropriate behavior, Conyers would step down as top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee and then all-together from Congress after 53 years in office, citing health reasons.

After admitting to the settlement, but denying wrongdoing, Conyers told a Detroit radio station that his ‘legacy can’t be compromised or diminished in any way by what we’re going through now.’ He resigned from Congress in  December 2017, citing health reasons

‘My legacy can’t be compromised or diminished in any way by what we’re going through now,’ Conyers told a Detroit radio station from a hospital where he’d been taken after complaining of light headedness in December 2017.

 ‘This, too, shall pass. My legacy will continue through my children.’

Conyers was born and grew up in Detroit, where his father, John Conyers Sr., was a union organizer in the automotive industry and an international representative with the United Auto Workers union. He insisted that his son, a jazz aficionado from an early age, not become a musician.

The younger Conyers heeded his father’s advice, but jazz remained, he said, one of his ‘great pleasures.’ He sponsored legislation to forgive the $1.6 million tax debt of band leader Woody Herman’s estate and once kept a standup bass in his Washington office.

Before heading to Washington, Conyers served in the National Guard and with the US Army Corps of Engineers during the Korean War supervising repairs of military aircraft. He earned his bachelor’s and law degrees from Wayne State University in the late 1950s.

His political aspirations were honed while working as a legislative assistant from 1958 to 1961 to US Rep. John Dingell, a fellow Michigan Democrat who, when he retired in 2014 at age 88, was Congress’ longest-serving member. That mantle then was passed onto Conyers.

Dingell died in February.

John Conyers Jr.(second from right) and other lawmakers prepare to attend the first meeting of the House Judiciary Committee in Washington DC, Febraury 1965.

Soon after being elected to Congress, Conyers’ leadership at home — in the segregated streets of Detroit — would be tested. Parts of the city were burned during riots in July 1967 that were sparked by hostilities between black residents and Detroit’s mostly white police force, and by the cramped living conditions in black neighborhoods.

Conyers climbed onto a flatbed truck and appealed to black residents to return to their homes, but he was shouted down. His district office was gutted by fire the next day. But the plight of the nation’s inner cities would remain his cause.

‘In Detroit you’ve got high unemployment, a poverty rate of at least 30 per cent, schools not in great shape, high illiteracy, poor families not safe from crime, without health insurance, problems with housing,’ he told The Associated Press in 2004. ‘You can’t fix one problem by itself — they’re all connected.’

He was fiercely opposed to Detroit’s finances being taken over by a state-appointed emergency manager as the city declared bankruptcy in 2013. 

Conyers, whose district included much of Detroit, sought a federal investigation and congressional hearings, arguing it was ‘difficult to identify a single instance’ where such an arrangement, where local officials are stripped of most of their power, succeeds.

Conyers was the only House Judiciary Committee member to have sat in on two impeachment hearings: 

US President Bill Clinton  hugs Congressman John Conyers at the ‘Conyers for Congress’ dinner at a Washington, DC, restaurant, in May 1999

He supported a 1972 resolution recommending President Richard Nixon’s impeachment for his conduct of the Vietnam War, but when the House clashed in 1998 over articles of impeachment against President Bill Clinton, Conyers said: ‘Impeachment was designed to rid this nation of traitors and tyrants, not attempts to cover up an extramarital affair.’

Conyers also had scandals of his own.

John Conyers and his wife Monica leave following the funeral service for the late singer Aretha Franklin on August 31, 2018

In 2009, his wife Monica Conyers, a Detroit city councilwoman largely elected on the strength of her husband’s last name, pleaded guilty to bribery. The case was related to a sludge hauling contract voted on by the City Council, and she spent nearly two years in prison.

Three years earlier, the House ethics committee closed a three-year investigation of allegations that Conyers’ staff worked on political campaigns and was ordered to baby-sit for his two children and run his personal errands. He admitted to a ‘lack of clarity’ with staffers and promised changes.

But he couldn’t survive the last scandal, involving the sex allegations. An ethics committee launched a review after his settlement with Brown.

Conyers initially said he looked forward to vindicating himself and his family, but he announced his immediate retirement in December 2017 after fellow Democrats called for his resignation. 

Conyers initially said he looked forward to vindicating himself and his family, but he announced his immediate retirement in December 2017 after fellow Democrats called for his resignation, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (right)

The chorus included Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, the House’s top Democrat.

Conyers became chairman of the House Judiciary Committee when Democrats regained the House majority in 2006. He oversaw 2007 hearings into the White House’s role in the firings of eight federal prosecutors and 2009 hearings on how the NFL dealt with head injuries to players.

Conyers frequently swam against the prevailing political currents during his time in Congress. He backed, for example, anti-terrorism legislation that was far less sweeping than a plan pushed by then-Attorney General John Ashcroft in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks.

Conyers had been an early supporter in 2007 of then-Sen. Barack Obama. The congressman is pictured greeting a President Obama as he arrives aboard Air Force One at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport in Detroit, Michigan January 20, 2016

He was also an early supporter in 2007 of then-Sen. Barack Obama, who was expected by some in the Congressional Black Caucus to push public health insurance, sharp funding increases for urban development and other initiatives long blocked by Republicans.

‘We want him to stand strong,’ Conyers said in 2009.

Conyers enjoyed his greatest support back home in Detroit — except when he tried to venture into local politics. 

However, he unsuccessfully took on 16-year incumbent Mayor Coleman A. Young in 1989, launching his bid with the statement: ‘Look out, Big Daddy, I’m home.’ 

Eventually, a poorly organized campaign helped him finish a mere third in the primary. He ran again for mayor when Young retired in 1993, and lost again.

Along with his wife, Conyers is survived by two sons, John III and Carl.