PERSON: Marc Morial

CEO & President

Marc Haydel Morial /ˌmɔːriˈæl/ is an American political and civic leader and the current president of the National Urban League. Morial served as Mayor of New Orleans from 1994 to 2002 as the city’s youngest Mayor, President of the United States Conference of Mayors in 2001, and as a Louisiana State Senator from 1992 to 1994.

Morial was born in New Orleans, Louisiana. After completing his undergraduate degree at the University of Pennsylvania in 1980 and receiving his Juris Doctor from Georgetown University Law Center in 1983, he began his career as a lawyer in New Orleans and in 1985 he established a private law practice there.

In 2021, Harvard University published a case study, profiling Morial, called “Embracing the Uphill Struggle: Marc Morial’s Quest for Corporate Diversity”.

Marc Morial was born to Ernest N. “Dutch” Morial and Sybil (Haydel) Morial, an elementary school teacher, Xavier University of New Orleans Dean and civic activist. He is the second of five children. He was raised in Pontchartrain Park, a subdivision of New Orleans.

Morial went on to graduate Jesuit High School in New Orleans as a member of the National Honor Society. He was one of only 14 Black students of 1,000 at Jesuit High School, he founded the Student Association for Black Achievement, and organized the school’s first Black History Month celebration.

Morial was included in Who’s Who Among High School Students and Who’s Who in America and Outstanding Young Men of America in high school.

In 1980 Morial earned a bachelor’s degree in economics and African American studies at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

Morial earned a Juris Doctor degree in 1983 from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. At Georgetown, he was elected first-year Delegate to the Student Bar Association and served as a member and head of fundraising for the National Black Law Students Association.

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