Norman C. Francis, a civil rights figure who helped steer Louisiana’s recovery after Hurricane Katrina and spent decades building an academic institution recognized for its work with Black students, died Wednesday at age 94, according to Xavier University of Louisiana’s confirmation of his death.
Francis took a high-profile role in the state’s response to Katrina, heading the Louisiana Recovery Authority, which was tasked with overseeing the multi-billion-dollar rebuilding effort after the storm. Former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu said that after Katrina, Francis “stood in the breach,” adding that he often sought Francis’s advice and counsel during “his toughest moments.”
Landrieu also highlighted Francis’s personal approach in a post on X on Wednesday, saying, “The most defining part of his character is that he treats every human being with dignity and respect.” Louisiana U.S. Rep. Troy Carter wrote on social media that Francis “was more than an administrator,” describing him as “an institution builder, a civil rights champion, and a man of quiet generosity,” who believed education was “the pathway to justice.”
Francis was widely known for his leadership of Xavier University in New Orleans, described as the nation’s only predominantly Black Catholic university. He held the presidency for 47 years beginning in 1968, a tenure that, according to reporting, saw enrollment more than double, the endowment grow, and the campus expand.
After Hurricane Katrina, when parts of Xavier’s campus were submerged under 8 feet (2.4 meters) of water, Francis pledged that the college would return. Multiple civil rights groups, including the American Civil Liberties Union, honored Francis as one of the nation’s top college presidents, and in 2006 then-President George W. Bush awarded Francis the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Francis also built his reputation in education earlier in his life through the process of integrating professional training. He grew up in Lafayette, received his bachelor’s degree from Xavier in 1952, became the first Black student at Loyola University’s law school, and earned his law degree in 1955. The reporting said he later spent two years in the Army and joined the U.S. Attorney General’s office to help integrate federal agencies.
Even as he pursued those roles, Francis said he faced segregation in everyday life, according to an Associated Press interview in 2008. He said, “Some people say to me, ‘My God! How did you take that?’” and added, “Well, you took that because you had to believe that one day, the words that your parents said to you ‘You’re good enough to be president of the United States’ yes, we held onto that.”
Francis joined Xavier in 1957 as Dean of Men, beginning a decades-long career at the university. His wife, Blanche, died in 2015; Francis and his wife had six children and multiple grandchildren.