Mayor Karen Bass Sunday paid tribute to Billy G. Mills, the trailblazing former Los Angeles City Councilman and judge who died last month at the age of 96.
Mills died at his Los Angeles home on June 27, his son James Edward Mills said.
“Today, Los Angeles mourns the passing of Billy G. Mills, a trailblazing public servant, civil rights attorney, and jurist whose life helped shape the arc of justice and opportunity in our city,” Bass wrote. “As the first Black graduate of the UCLA School of Law and the first Black man elected to the Los Angeles City Council in 1963, alongside Tom Bradley, Mills broke barriers and helped open doors for generations of Angelenos.”
Mills and future mayor Tom Bradley were elected to the City Council in 1963, the first Black residents to be elected to the body (Gilbert Lindsay, who was appointed to fill Edward Roybal’s seat in January 1963, was the first Black person to serve on the City Council).
“Though you may have never heard of him, my father played a critical role in creating the world many of us today take for granted,” James Mills wrote in a social media tribute.
“… He dedicated his professional life to the law. As a civil rights attorney, he worked to defend the principles of due process and equal justice in a system that deprived many in our community of even the most basic of human rights. Elected as one of the first Black Americans to serve on the Los Angeles City Council, my dad served the best interests of his constituents even as redlining segregated our communities by race and deprived our neighborhoods of the financial capital required to thrive.
“… Like so many Black professionals who came of age during the Civil Rights Movement, he believed that progress demanded participation. The struggle for equality was not something happening somewhere else. It was reflected in the work he did each day, the offices he held, the communities he served, and the example he set for his children,” his son added.
Mills ran for Congress in 1972, losing in the primary to Yvonne Brathwaite Burke.
He was appointed to the Los Angeles Superior Court by then-Gov. Ronald Reagan in 1974, and served on the bench for over two decades.
“On the City Council, his dignified and thoughtful leadership guided Los Angeles through the aftermath of the 1965 Watts Uprising,” Bass said in her statement. “His legacy endures in South LA, where he pushed for paved alleys and essential infrastructure in neighborhoods that had long been neglected.”
“… Throughout his life in public service, Judge Mills shared his journey with his wife and life partner, Dr. Rubye Mills, herself a trailblazer, who preceded him in death. On behalf of the city of Los Angeles, I extend my deepest condolences to their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, and to all who carry forward their legacy of service, dignity, and justice,” the mayor added.