Renault Robinson never wavered in his belief that a just world was possible for Black people.
During his career as a Chicago police officer, Mr. Robinson co-founded the Afro-American Patrolmen’s League, an organization of Black police officers who advocated for police reform and racial equality within the force. He later had a brief, troubled tenure leading the Chicago Housing Authority.
Brian Robinson, one of Mr. Robinson’s four sons, said he remembers the preliminary meetings to form the Patrolmen’s League. He would go to sleep at night as his father and other Black officers were planning in the living room — then wake up the next day for school, and see them all still sitting there, hard at work.
“He was always in struggle for our civil rights and [for] our respect and equality in the Black community,” Annette Robinson, his wife of 60 years, said.
Mr. Robinson died July 8 following a long battle with cancer, according to his family. He was 80.
The oldest of eight children, Mr. Robinson grew up in Woodlawn. He attended Catholic schools for most of his early education, graduated from Hyde Park High School in 1960 and went on to attend the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Mr. Robinson joined the Chicago Police Department in 1964. From 1964 to 1968, he had a 97% efficiency rating and won over 50 citations for outstanding work, according to a 1970 Time magazine article.
Mr. Robinson’s status as a model policeman took a turn in 1968 when he founded the Afro-American Patrolmen’s League alongside another officer, Edward “Buzz” Palmer.
“We wanted to change the relationship between the police department and the Black community,” Mr. Robinson said in a 2002 interview with The HistoryMakers. “We wanted the institution to change from being an oppressor and an occupier of our communities to service oriented.”
Mr. Robinson knew there would be trouble forming the league, he said in the 2002 interview. He was harassed by fellow officers and suspended multiple times, according to a 1970 Time magazine article. He was also arrested by on various occasions and accused of drunk driving, disorderly conduct and violating departmental rules, Annette Robinson said.
In 1973, then-Police Supt. James B. Conlisk Jr. approved Mr. Robinson being assigned to walk a beat behind the old police headquarters at 11th and State. After Chicago Daily News columnist Mike Royko revealed the apparent retaliation, Mr. Robinson was briefly suspended for failing to make a court appearance he said he was never told about.
“Renault suspended; who’ll guard the alley?” read the Daily News headline.
When the harassment started, Brian Robinson said, their home phone would ring throughout the night, with callers threatening the lives of Mr. Robinson and his family if he did not stop the work he was doing with the League.
“There were times when we had to be taken to school in the police car because they had threatened us,” Brian Robinson said.
Still, the organization persevered. By 1970, the League claimed about 1,000 members, nearly half the Black officers in CPD at the time, according to a 1970 TIME article.
Mr. Robinson and the U.S. Department of Justice sued in 1973, accusing the police department of discriminating against women and minorities throughout the application process.
A federal judge eventually agreed. A system was implemented to increase the representation of minorities and women, and restrictive hiring rules and practices were eliminated, Mr. Robinson said in the 2002 interview.
During his time on leave from the department, Mr. Robinson studied sociology and got his bachelor’s degree from Roosevelt University and went on to get his master’s. He also took Ph.D courses at Northwestern University, Annette Robinson said.
In 1979, Mr. Robinson supported Jane Byrne’s successful challenge to Democratic machine-backed Mayor Michael Bilandic. Byrne rewarded Mr. Robinson with a seat on the Chicago Housing Authority Board, but did not support his bid for board chairman, switching her allegiance back to the machine.
Four years later, Mr. Robinson got his chance to serve as chairman when he supported Harold Washington’s ouster of Byrne.
Mr. Robinson served as chairman for about three and a half years before resigning amid accusations of nepotism, politicization of employees and tenants, and administrative foulups, including the loss of $7 million in federal funds.
With his reelection campaign looming in early 1987, Washington had inititally refused to accept Mr. Robinson’s resignation, but then relucantly did so just one week later.
“The mayor isn’t squeamish about cutting his losses,” one of Washington’s chief political advisers said at the time, “and everyone knew that this thing wouldn’t go away until Renault was gone.”
Mr. Robinson went on to a career in business and founded his own staffing agency in 2000. He also created a landscaping company, working there until retiring in 2017, his wife said.
Kobie Robinson said his father also had a lighter side and a sense of humor.
Mr. Robinson loved golf and was an avid player for the last 25 years of his life, Kobie Robinson said.
“He had made two hole-in-ones in his lifetime,” son Kivu Robinson said.
Survivors include his wife; sons Renault Jr., Brian, Kobie and Kivu Robinson; a brother, Michael Robinson; sisters Rochelle Cochran, Arlene Robinson, Diane Batiste, Sherrie Beck and Andrea Buford, a Cook County Circuit Court judge; 10 grandchildren; two great-grandchildren.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. on July 25 at St. Sabina Catholic Church, 1210 W. 78th Place.
