LANSING, Mich. — Governor Gretchen Whitmer has signed Executive Order 2020-139 to rename the state-owned Lewis Cass Building in downtown Lansing to the “Elliott-Larsen Building,” honoring the legislators who sponsored Michigan’s landmark civil rights act. The legislation was introduced by Republican State Rep. Melvin Larsen and Democratic State Rep. Daisy Elliott in 1976 and was signed into law by Governor William Milliken in January of 1977.
Monday, during a live ceremony, the building’s new sign was officially unveiled. The change marks the first time in Michigan history that a state building is named after an African-American woman.
Lewis Cass was the 2nd Territorial Governor of the Michigan. Cass had supported slavery, owned a slave himself, and implemented a policy that forcibly removed Native communities from their tribal lands. The name change comes as cities throughout the world re-examine their statues, monuments and buildings amid calls for an end to racism.
In 1976, the people of Michigan led by Daisy Elliott, a former Democratic member of the Michigan House of Representatives, and Melvin Larsen, a former Republican member of the Michigan House of Representatives, passed Public Act 453, known as the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act. The act declared that the right to be free from discrimination is a civil right and expanded constitutional protections to a broader class of individuals.
“I am humbled and thrilled at this announcement and give all credit to Daisy who initiated working together to sponsor the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act,” said Melvin Larsen. “Having the honor of this building named after the two of us is the ultimate honor of the work she began decades ago to guarantee equality and justice for all of Michigan’s people.”
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