Giuliani, Once a Foe, Is Among First to Commemorate David Dinkins
Mr. Dinkins won office on a pledge of racial healing, and he had plans to build housing, improve health care and respond to the concerns of marginalized groups. After his death, several prominent New Yorkers, including the state’s attorney general, Letitia James, praised those liberal instincts.
“For decades, Mayor Dinkins led with compassion and an unparalleled commitment to our communities,” Ms. James, who shattered racial and gender barriers when she was elected to her current post in 2018, said in a statement. “His deliberative and graceful demeanor belied his burning passion for challenging the inequalities that plague our society.”
Mr. Dinkins was a cautious, deliberate Harlem Democrat who climbed to City Hall through relatively minor elective and appointive offices. He liked to call New Yorkers a “gorgeous mosaic,” and he saw himself as a conciliator who might subdue the passions of multicultural neighborhoods with patience and dignity.
Ms. James nodded to that idea: “The voice that gave birth to the ‘gorgeous mosaic’ is now at rest,” she wrote.
Dianne Morales, one of the candidates hoping to replace Mayor Bill de Blasio in the election next November, called Mr. Dinkins “a force to be reckoned with, and a strong advocate for a fairer city.”
