Frank Burton Ellis

Who was Frank Burton Ellis?

Frank Burton Ellis was a New Orleans, Louisiana, attorney and Democratic politician who served in the Louisiana State Senate, as director of the Office of Civil Defense and Mobilization in the administration of U.S. President John F. Kennedy, and as a judge of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana in the latter part of his career. As civil defense director, he pushed strongly for the establishment of fallout shelters as essential to civilian protection during the Cold War. On the bench, he slowed down the pace of desegregation in Orleans Parish schools and sided with Tulane University administrators in a key case against that institution.