ATLANTA - The funeral will be held Thursday in Atlanta for former state legislator and union leader Horace Tate. <br>
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Tate died Friday. The funeral will be at noon at Cascade United Methodist Church. A wake will be held from 7 p-m to 8 p-m Wednesday at Sellers Brothers Funeral Home on Martin Luther King Junior Drive. <br>
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Tate was a 1943 graduate of Fort Valley State College. He became known as an edvocate of education, notably for black children. <br>
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He also was a former Atlanta public schools principal and was the city's first black mayoral candidate. He lost to Sam Massell in 1969 but later became a state senator. <br>
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Tate came up with a way to make a merger between the state's white and black teachers unions run smoothly in the 60s. <br>
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Tate was the first black president of the inttegrated Georgia Association of Educators and was G-A-E's executive secretary several years. <br>
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His 18 years in the state Senate were devoted primarily to education legislation. <br>
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His daughter, Horacena Tate -- an Atlanta Democrat -- now holds the 38th District Senate seat her father held from 1974 to 1992. <br>
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