Representative Denise Majette

Denise Lorraine Majette (born May 18, 1955) is an American politician and attorney from the state of Georgia. A member of the Democratic Party, she represented Georgia’s 4th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives from January 3, 2003, to January 3, 2005. During her single term in Congress, she participated in the legislative process at a time of significant national debate over security, foreign policy, and domestic priorities, and she represented the interests of a heavily Democratic, majority-Black district based in DeKalb County.

Majette was born in Brooklyn, New York, and grew up there before leaving for college. She attended Yale University, where she completed her undergraduate studies, and went on to earn a Juris Doctor degree from Duke University School of Law in 1979. Her legal training at Duke prepared her for a career that combined public service, teaching, and private practice, and laid the foundation for her later work as a judge and legislator.

After receiving her law degree, Majette began her legal career in North Carolina. She worked as a Legal Aid staff attorney, representing low-income clients, and served as a clinical adjunct law professor at Wake Forest University, where she helped train law students in practical legal skills. In 1983 she moved to Georgia and settled in Stone Mountain, an Atlanta suburb in DeKalb County. There she entered private law practice, building her experience in the state’s legal community over the course of the 1980s.

Majette’s judicial career began in the early 1990s. In 1992 she was named an administrative law judge at the Georgia State Board of Workers’ Compensation, adjudicating disputes involving workplace injuries and benefits. The following year, in 1993, Georgia Governor Zell Miller appointed her as a judge of the State Court of DeKalb County. Majette held that judgeship for nine years, presiding over a wide range of civil and criminal matters in one of the state’s most populous counties. Her tenure on the bench enhanced her public profile and established her reputation as a jurist before she entered electoral politics.

In 2002 Majette resigned from the DeKalb County State Court to run for the U.S. House of Representatives in Georgia’s 4th congressional district. Entering her first partisan race, she challenged ten-year incumbent Representative Cynthia McKinney in the Democratic primary. In a contest shaped in part by controversy over McKinney’s comments following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and by crossover voting from Republicans who were permitted to participate in the Democratic primary, Majette defeated McKinney by a margin of 58 percent to 42 percent. Given the district’s heavily Democratic and majority-Black electorate, her primary victory was effectively tantamount to election, and she entered Congress in January 2003.

As a member of the House of Representatives from 2003 to 2005, Majette took part in the democratic process during a period marked by the war in Iraq, debates over homeland security, and ongoing domestic policy disputes. Her voting record was regarded as somewhat more moderate than that of her predecessor, although by national Democratic standards she was considered fairly liberal. She supported affirmative action, abortion rights, and legal status for undocumented immigrants working in the United States, and she opposed school vouchers and the death penalty. Over the course of her term, she contributed to legislative deliberations on these and other issues while representing the interests of her DeKalb County–based constituency.

After serving one term in the House, Majette chose not to seek reelection in 2004 and instead ran for the United States Senate seat being vacated by Senator Zell Miller, who had been appointed in 2000 following the death of Republican Senator Paul Coverdell and later decided not to seek a full term. Her decision to enter the Senate race surprised many Georgia Democrats, as she had not been widely mentioned as a prospective candidate, and some party leaders questioned the viability of her candidacy, particularly after she stated that “God” had told her to run. Majette finished first in the Democratic primary but was forced into a runoff against businessman Cliff Oxford, which she won. She received endorsements from Democratic Senators Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan, among others, and campaigned under the slogan “I’ll be nobody’s Senator, but yours.” Her nomination made her both the first African American and the first woman ever nominated for the U.S. Senate by a major party in Georgia. In the general election, however, she was defeated by Republican Representative Johnny Isakson of Georgia’s 6th congressional district, losing by 18 percentage points. Analysts attributed her loss to several factors, including her late entry into the race, the financial and organizational costs of the primary runoff, Isakson’s strong showing in the Republican primary, limited time to build statewide name recognition, and a proposed amendment to the Georgia Constitution banning same-sex marriage—which Majette opposed—that significantly boosted Republican turnout and passed in every county, including DeKalb. She also received little assistance from the national Democratic ticket, as presidential nominee John Kerry did not seriously contest Georgia against President George W. Bush. In the same election cycle, Cynthia McKinney regained the 4th district House seat Majette had vacated.

Following her departure from Congress, Majette returned to private law practice in Atlanta. In March 2006 she announced her candidacy for Georgia State School Superintendent as a Democrat. She won the Democratic primary, defeating substitute teacher Carlotta Harrell with approximately 67 percent of the vote, but lost the general election by a wide margin to the Republican incumbent, Kathy Cox. Majette continued to practice law in Georgia after the campaign, but her legal career later encountered serious professional difficulties. On March 28, 2014, the Supreme Court of Georgia disbarred her, finding that she had overbilled clients and misled the court about the amount of fees she was owed.