Twiley W. Barker, 83, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Illinois at Chicago, died July 13, 2009.
Barker was a founding faculty member of University of Illinois at Chicago's Department of Political Science. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign in 1955. He taught at Southern Illinois University from 1955–1960, and at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign from 1961–1962. In 1962 he became an associate professor at the predecessor to modern University of Illinois at Chicago when it was housed at Navy Pier. He then taught at the new UIC campus from 1965–1994 where he became known for his knowledge of constitutional law.
At UIC, in addition to his teaching and publishing, he helped shape the political science curriculum, hire faculty, set up a pre-law program, and was undergraduate director for nearly two decades. As a leader in the field of political science, Professor Barker served on the executive council of the American Political Science Association and was a charter member of its committee on the status of African Americans in political science.
Many of Barker's students became leaders in Chicago's civic life, including former U.S. senator and ambassador Carol Moseley Braun; Chicago Park District board president Gery Chico; Cook County commissioner Tony Peraica, Washington, D.C.; lobbyist Tony Podesta; and many famous distinguished attorneys.
“He motivated and inspired students by his example. We were given a chance to live up to his high expectations,” Ambassador Moseley Braun said. “I did the best I could to make him proud.”
Former White House staff member Tony Podesta said that he learned from Professor Barker the value of “being exact, being prepared, being careful—all things that are important to what I do now.”
A native of Louisiana, Barker attended Tuskegee University before joining the Air Force. After military service, he earned a bachelors degree in political science at Southern University in Baton Rouge, and then a doctoral degree at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
In 1969, Barker received the national E. Harris Harbison Prize from the Danforth Foundation for “unusual accomplishments in college teaching, but not at the expense of other types of responsibility which the competent teacher-scholar bears.” He received the highest teaching award from the university, the first UIC Silver Circle Award for excellence in teaching in 1966.
With his brother Lucius, a Stanford University professor, Twiley Barker coauthored the textbook Civil Liberties and the Constitution: Cases and Commentaries, published by Prentice-Hall in eight editions from 1970 to 1999. The Barkers were joined by coauthors Michael W. Combs (University of Nebraska at Lincoln), H.W. Perry (University of Texas at Austin), and Kevin L. Lyles (UIC) in 1997. Twiley Barker was instrumental in facilitating the ninth edition that is expected to be published this year. It has become the classic civil rights and civil liberties textbook used for nearly four decades at universities throughout the nation.
His later research included a comparative analysis of the first-term performance of Supreme Court justices Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas.
Twiley Barker was a good friend and a good colleague to all faculty and was adored by the thousands of students he taught over the decades.
Notes and other remembrances may be forwarded to the family through the UIC Department of Political Science, Professor Twiley W. Barker Jr. Memorial Fund, 1007 W. Harrison St., M/C 276, Room 1102, Chicago, IL 60607. Former students and political science colleagues may contact the family at [email protected].
