“We were born and raised on a plantation. So, it wasn’t a working plantation, but it was a plantation nonetheless,” recalled recent law school graduate Sister April Muhammad of her early years in the Mississippi Delta town of Clarksdale.
As she reflected on the poverty surrounding her formative years and the memory of a great-grandmother who was born a slave and a grandmother and father who grew up as sharecroppers, she knew as a little girl she wanted to become a lawyer.
“Clarksdale, that was hard living, that was a hard life. Most of our people were poor, and very few were doing well, and if you go to Clarksdale now, it looks about the same.”
“Black people lived on one side of town and Whites lived on one side and a [train] track ran right through the middle. Even in my time, there was segregation. Most of our people were suffering and I thought that law was the way to best serve those people.
Allah (God) just put that in me, because I can remember always wanting to do that. I remember thinking about what school I wanted to go to, how I wanted to go to law school, but life gets challenging because we have so many trials that come upon us and law school was hard,” Sis. April recalled.
At the age of 20, she moved to Memphis, where she registered in the Nation of Islam in 1994 and eventually met her husband, Brother Cedric Muhammad, before relocating to Arkansas.
“It was the second marriage for both of us. He had two children, and I had three, and we came together, and we had three more, and so that made eight, and we raised seven of those children, for the most part, in one household, and so, of course, that keeps you busy,” she reflected.
Their marriage was both fulfilling yet challenging, as six months into their marriage Bro. Cedric fell gravely ill with heart complications. “He never really bounced back,” Sis. April shared.
In 2021, both her husband and her mother, Virginia Davis, passed. While working through her grief, she thought of her mother’s dream that helped to refuel her own desire to become an attorney. She remembered her mother sharing with her how she had always wanted to be a nurse, but the closest she was able to get was to be a cook in the hospital cafeteria.
In 2022, at the age of 50, Sis. April decided it was time to fulfill her dream and she was accepted into a rigorous program at the University of Arkansas William H. Bowen School of Law.
For three and a half years, she made a daily two-hour round-trip commute from Pine Bluff, Arkansas, to Little Rock, while still juggling motherhood and mosque duties, yet she was never late for class or missed a class.
“It didn’t matter for me; I was going to achieve this goal. Because it was so hard to get in law school and law school is hard. They turn down far more people than they accept,” she said.
During her second year of school, she married Bro. Bilal Muhammad, who continued to support her in her goal, helping in any way that he could.
On December 13, Sis. April fulfilled her long-held goal when she walked across the stage as a law school graduate. During her school tenure, she made such an impact during a summer externship, upon graduation, she was offered a highly competitive federal judicial clerkship with Chief Justice Phyllis Jones of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern and Western District of Arkansas.
“I was steadfast in prayer, I asked Allah to uphold me; to protect me. I knew it was my purpose because the Honorable Minister Louis Farrakhan taught us how to recognize it, because everything in my being screams law. I couldn’t fail. I had to keep going. There isn’t anything we can’t accomplish if we really want it,” she told The Final Call.
Sis. April credits her mother and father, Joe Davis, and her “beloved” Cedric Muhammad for helping her get to where she is today. “Because of them, I have been able to do what I have done.”
Her daughter, Sis. Maryam Muhammad, 30, proclaimed her mother an amazing “superhero” and shared with The Final Call the impact that her mother’s journey has had on her.
“I look at her and there are no barriers. My mom is a fighter, it is amazing and inspiring. I’ve never seen her take anything and quit. It’s not what you have or don’t have, it’s not whether you are capable or not capable, it’s about do you stay disciplined, do you stay the course, do you push yourself?” said Sis. Maryam.
“She is such a force, even down to how sweet and bubbly she is. Watching her being a force is amazing. There is where I came from, so I can’t fail!” she exclaimed.
“She made it look effortless,” observed her younger sister, Sis. Lydia Muhammad, who serves as the M.G.T. Student Coordinator in the Holly Springs, Mississippi, Nation of Islam Study Group, and is married to Bro. Cedric’s brother.
“Even during family gatherings, she would cook most of the food, drive two hours to Memphis and her only caveat was that she had to be done by a certain time because she had to be back home to study.
She is not a complainer. She took everything in stride. She removed all obstacles; it was really fascinating. All I could think of was our mom and how proud she would be of April.”
“My thinking is, I am a colt and the Master has need of me. I’m not a young colt, I am an old colt, but I am a colt nonetheless and the Master has need of me, so I have to qualify myself, so when it’s time for us to separate or whatever instructions we get, I will be qualified help. So that’s my goal,” Sis. April concluded.