Attorney Linda Gallant, who died at age 75, was committed to social justice

In the maelstrom of protest that embodied the 1960s, Linda Gallant attended Pembroke College, a part of Brown University, in Providence, R.I., where her values were shaped — as was the trajectory of her life in public service.

The college newspaper listed her as one of 21 Brown students arrested in a sit-in, blocking a road entrance to the Pentagon during a march against the Vietnam War in 1967. She was one of the organizers of the Brown contingent.

In 1968, with the nation in turmoil after the assassination of the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., she helped organize another sit-in at the Rhode Island State House in support of fair housing legislation. The bill passed.

"She was a very determined young woman and stayed that way till she died," said her sister, Leslie Crowe, of Burlington, Mass. "If something had to be addressed, she went out and did it 100 percent. She was driven by causes."

Gallant, who was being treated for lymphoma, died of cardiac arrest on June 13, a week after celebrating her 75th birthday.

"She was very progressive with so much empathy for people," said Michael Davis, a senior U.S. district judge for the Minnesota district. "It was always a joy to be around her."

Gallant went on to a legal career in Minneapolis, helping lawyers defend American Indian leaders on trial for their role in the occupation of Wounded Knee, S.D., in 1973. She represented demonstrators, arrested for sit-ins outside the Honeywell Corp., to protest the manufacture of cluster bombs that maimed and killed civilians.

Davis and his wife, Sara Wahl, frequently invited Gallant to their Thanksgiving dinner. "She was part of our family," said Wahl, whose mother, Rosalie Wahl, was a mentor to Gallant when she was studying for her law degree at William Mitchell College of Law. Rosalie Wahl was a professor there before becoming a state Supreme Court justice.

Born and raised in Massachusetts, Gallant won a scholarship to Pembroke where she became involved in civil rights and spent a semester at Tougaloo College, a historical Black liberal arts college that made a deep impression on her.

"She was a positive steady spirit, you had a feeling of a sense of gravity," recalls Wing Tek Lum, a college classmate who remained a lifelong friend.

She moved to Minneapolis after graduation to teach school at City Inc. in north Minneapolis, then enrolled at William Mitchell and earned a law degree. While there she worked as a law clerk at the Legal Rights Center, later going into private practice, sharing an office with attorney Mark Wernick, who later became a judge. Wernick, and his wife, Nancy Entwistle, remained Gallant's close friends.

Gallant argued a Honeywell protest case before the state Supreme Court, brought by her, Wernick and attorney Ken Tilsen, winning a decision that criminal defendants can tell a jury why they did what they did, even if their reasons are not a legal defense.

She remained committed to issues of social justice. "On one of her last calls, she spoke of going down to one of the protests" in Minneapolis, said Eva Hanhardt, a friend and college classmate.

Besides her sister, Gallant is survived by brothers Edward Gallant of Port St. Lucie, Fla., and George Gallant of Weymouth, Mass. A memorial is planned for the fall.

Randy Furst • 612-673-4224