He was born to Charles Preston Howard & Maude L. (Lewis) Howard in Des Moines Iowa.His parents were African-American.His daddy,a friend of civil rights leader Dr. Ralph Bunche.His mama has been described as Native American (Sioux).She was actually the daughter of Thomas D.Lewis (1846-1909) & Mary Adeline Tann (18551939) of Fayette,Iowa,both members of being a private in the 38th Regiment
USCT,of four USCT units that were the first US troops to march into Richmond,Virginia when it fell in April 1865.Joseph's great-uncle Theodore Wright Lewis (1853-1922),an AME pastor who served churches in Iowa,Illinois,and Kansas and of the founding members of the NAACP in the Davenport,Iowa and Rock Island,Illinois area.His daddy was a lawyer and one of the National Bar Association,an of African-American attroneys.
Joseph served in the U.S. Army from 1944-1946.During World War II,he commended
Filipino troops and ran a Japanese prisoner-of-war-war camp.He was honorably discharge with the rank of Captain.
After his discharge,he resumed his education at the University Of Iowa and graduated in 1950.Prior to the war,Joseph had tried out for made the football team,he was the only African American player on the team.During a 1944 game against the Indiana University,his coach yelled out to the Iowa defense:"We gotta stop that nigger" , referring to the opposing team's running back.Joseph immediately
walked up to his coach and asked him to apologize;he didn't,and Joseph quit the team.Later at the Drake University Law School,he became the first African-American student admitted to the Phi Alpha Delta legal fraternity.He earned his law degree in
1955 and was married to Gwendolyn Mae London that same year.
In 1959,after they moved to Baltimore,Maryland,Joseph passed the Maryland bar exam and then started a law firm (Howard & Hargrove) with his brother Charles P.Howard & John R.Hargrove,Sr.(who went on to become a U.S.district judge).In 1964,he became assistant state's attorney in Baltimore and later became the first African-American chief of the trial,section of the state's attroney's office.Two years later into the job,Joseph criticized his superiors and Baltimore police for pursuing
harser penalties against alleged African-American raptist when the victims were white than the penalties they sought when the victims were African American.Joseph
was ordered to issue a report to back up his allegations.In the report he cited that 30 African-Americans men had been executed for raping white women,no one,African-American or white,had been executed for raping African-American woman.In 1967,he became assistant city solicitor.
Prior to 1968,vacancies on the Supreme Bench of Baltimore City were filled by the
Governor of Maryland,with white males and usually confirmed by the voters of Baltimore.In 1968,81 of the 82 judges on Maryland's appellate and circuit courts were white males.Maryland governors had been slow to appoint African American to the bench,even through the city was majority African American.Joseph challenged the system and ran for judge without the blessings of the governor.He won 8,000 votes over his nearest competitor,and became the first African American to run for
and win a seat on that bench.As a judge,he challenged the racial practice of supreme
bench and helped racially diversity the offices and employ minorities at the circuit
court as well.He served on the supreme bench until May 22,1979,when he was named
by President Jimmy Carter to be the first African-American to the U.S. District Court for the District Court of Maryland,a new seat created by 92 sat.He was confirmed by the United States Senate on October 4,1979,and receive his commission on October 5,1979.Assumed senior status on November 15,1991.
In 1992,after Joseph was diagnosed with Shy-Drager Syndrone,a progressive failure of the automatic nervous system,he took a reduced case load.Joseph died in Pikesville,Maryland.His funeral was held the following Friday at the Union Baptist Church in Baltimore.
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