Later he faced some criticism in the black community for supporting Daniel Patrick Moynihan (see then U.S. Assistant Secretary of Labor; controversy over the War on Poverty, later a noted U.S.

On March 23, 1984, the Sharp Street Memorial United Methodist Church overflowed with 2,500 mourners who gathered from around the country to pay their respects.

Clarence Mitchell was raised in a large household consisting of 11 family members (him, along with his parents, his maternal grandparents, and six siblings.)

Mitchell saw their hardships; his mother took in meal boarders to supplement his father's income from working at the historic Rennert Hotel on the northeastern corner of West Saratoga and North Liberty Streets.

Clarence spent time at the YMCA (Colored – Young Men's Christian Association) learning how to box, and earned the nickname "the Shamrock Kid."

Mitchell excelled in his early childhood education and worked hard to learn lessons taught to him by his illiterate mother.

When Mitchell was in elementary school, one of his teachers was the mother of Thurgood Marshall, future attorney and United States Supreme Court Justice.

[6][page needed] Mitchell attended Old Douglass High School, and after graduating, he enrolled at Lincoln University, a historically black college in Pennsylvania.

He wrote the song for his graduating class at Lincoln, but was not able to join his fellows on stage, as he was unable to pay overdue tuition.

While in Minnesota, he led a successful campaign to end employment discrimination practices against African Americans who worked for the city.

Mitchell had not seen the lynching but arrived as the white mob set Williams' body on fire and dragged it through the black neighborhood of the city.

[9] After Mitchell returned home and recounted the events, his brother Parren vowed to one day take up the fight for racial justice.

[10] In the 1940s, Mitchell began working as staff to the Fair Employment Practices Committee, established by President Franklin D. Roosevelt by Executive Order 8802 in 1941, to oversee ending discrimination in defense industries with contracts with the federal government, and provide fair employment opportunities to all Americans.

Mitchell was present in the Senate chamber gallery during the speech along with several hundred other people when it started at 8:54 p.m.EST and had the stamina to stay there during the early morning while the filibuster was still ongoing.

[15][16]Mitchell continued to serve as an NAACP lobbyist to Congress through the 1960s, as the civil rights movement reached new peaks in demonstrations and increasing national awareness through campaigns in the South.

[11] In 1938, Mitchell married Juanita Jackson, a civil rights activist with the NAACP and the first black woman to practice law in Maryland.

Although confined to bed at the time of Lorenzo's death, his mother Elsie Davis Mitchell had her other sons carry her into the church for his funeral service, so that she did not have to use a wheelchair.