CLEVELANDURBANNEWS.COM-CLEVELAND, Ohio- Democratic Ohio 8th District Court of Appeals Judge Melody Stewart was elected to the Ohio Supreme Court on Tuesday and became the first Black ever elected to the state's seven-member high court, which is currently all-White and all-Republican.

Michael .P Donnelly, a Cuyahoga County Common Pleas judge, won the other open seat to join Stewart as the two Democrats along with five Republicans on the court next year.

Also the first Black woman elected to the Ohio Supreme Court, Stewart won with 52 percent of the vote with 99 percent of the precincts counted and Donnelly had 66 percent.

Cuyahoga County is the second largest of 88 counties statewide and includes the majority Black major metropolitan city of Cleveland.

It is roughly 29 percent Black.

Stewart defeated Ohio Supreme Court Chief Justice Mary DeGenaro, a Youngstown Republican appointed by Gov Kasich to the unexpired term left  by the resignation earlier this year of Bill O'Neil, and Donnelly won over Republican Craig Baldwin, a 5th District Court of Appeals judge.

Aside from the two open seats on the all-White and all- Republican Ohio Supreme Court Ohio Dems lost down the ballot in statewide elections for governor, state treasurer, Ohio attorney general, secretary of state and state auditor, a remake of 2014 and 2010 when Democrat Ted Strickland lost reelection to term-limited GOP governor John Kasich.

Cleveland area community activists had endorsed Stewart.

"We have researched this issue and Judge Melody Stewart, who is Black and scholarly, has a judicial record of fairness and competence on the bench and she is not afraid to do right even when the establishment seeks otherwise," said Cleveland activist Kathy Wray Coleman of the Imperial Women Coalition in endorsing Judge Stewart.

"It is long overdue that a qualified Black is  elected to the Ohio Supreme Court, said longtime activist Ada Averyhart, 84. "Judge Stewart is more than qualified to serve on Ohio's highest court."

While other Blacks were appointed and lost elections thereafter, and some ran straight out, none were victorious in convincing voters to elect them.

Justices Robert Duncan, Lloyd Brown and Yvette McGee Brown were all three appointed by sitting governors to the state's high court, Duncan, the first appointee who served from 1968-1971, opting not seek election because he accepted a federal judgeship. and Lloyd Brown and Yvette McGee Brown pursuing a subsequent election bid but losing to White opponents.

The late former Ohio Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones of Cleveland, also a former county prosecutor, ran for election to the Ohio Supreme Court as did former Cleveland Municipal Court judge C. Ellen Connally, also a former county council president, and former 8th District Court of Appeals Judge Sara J. Harper, also of Cleveland, and a Republican, unlike Tubbs Jones and Connally, both of them Democrats. But all three of them lost, Connally nearly beating then Chief Justice Thomas Moyer for his seat in 2004, Moyer a seemingly popular Republican who died unexpectedly in 2010 while still serving on the bench.

One of three Blacks on the 8th District Court of Appeals that serves Cuyahoga County, Stewart,  56, has been an appellate court judge for nearly 12 years.

A proponent of lifelong learning, Judge Stewart earned a bachelor’s degree in music from the College-Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, a law degree from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law at Cleveland State University, and a Ph.D. from the Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences at Case Western Reserve University as a Mandel leadership fellow.

Prior to first being elected to the appellate bench in 2006, Judge Stewart worked as an assistant dean at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law where she also taught as a lecturer and an adjunct instructor before joining the full-time faculty.

She was also a member of the faculty at the University of Toledo College of Law, taught at Ursuline College, and has served as an administrator at the law school at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland.

Clevelandurbannews.com and Kathywraycolemanonlinenewsblog.com, Ohio's most read Black digital newspaper and Black blog with some 5 million views on Google Plus alone.Tel: (216) 659-0473 and Email: editor@clevelandurbannews.com. Kathy Wray Coleman, editor-in-chief, and who trained for 17 years at the Call and Post Newspaper in Cleveland, Ohio. We interviewed former president Barack Obama one-on-one when he was campaigning for president. As to the Obama interview, CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE AT CLEVELAND URBAN NEWS.COM, OHIO'S LEADER IN BLACK DIGITAL NEWS.