DOVER -- Speaking to about 220 people gathered for a Martin Luther King Jr. Day observance, Attorney General Beau Biden promised Monday to operate his office in tune with the legacy of the slain civil rights leader. But the state's chief law enforcement officer acknowledged that in at least one area, the office has a long, long way to go.

When he took over the attorney general's office last January, Biden said, the sole black employee in the criminal division of a department that encompasses about 100 lawyers was a woman who worked part-time. The department will do better in the future, Biden said, and to that end, he introduced Teresa Mason, who is black, as his new chief of staff.

In the newly created position, Mason will run the office's administrative division, which handles policy and hiring, among other things.

By virtue of her title, Mason, a former New York sheriff and prosecutor who joined Biden's team earlier this month, will share the designation as second-in-charge with Chief Deputy Attorney General Richard S. Gebelein. The chief of staff position was filled initially in January 2007 by Jennifer Oliva, a retired Army captain who now serves Biden's office as deputy solicitor in the civil division.

"Dr. King would have pulled me aside and said, 'Son, this is unacceptable,' and he would have been right," Biden said. "We have strived over the last 12 months to change that, and I'm happy and proud of where we've come, but we have a long way to go."

When she stood up and waved, Mason touched off loud applause among a crowd that included Gov. Ruth Ann Minner, U.S. Sen. Tom Carper, D-Del., Dover Mayor Carleton E. Carey Sr. and a big contingent of other elected officials. The occasion was the 23rd Martin Luther King Jr. National Holiday Program, sponsored by the Inner City Cultural League and staged at Mt. Zion AME Church on Queen Street near downtown Dover.

The event was one of several held around the state.

In Seaford, about 1,000 people turned out for a morning prayer breakfast and daylong festival, organizer Pat Jones said. People came from all over Delaware, the Eastern Shore of Maryland and even Washington, D.C., Virginia and Georgia, she said.

"It went phenomenally well," said Jones, executive director of the AFRAM Festival, a summer African-American heritage and cultural celebration in Seaford.

"This is an event [today] that is very well embraced -- it's a diverse group that we reach. The age barrier, race -- it's all broken when we come together for this celebration.

"It was overwhelming, the response of the people who supposedly had a day off and decided to turn that day on to keep Martin Luther King's dreams and visions alive," Jones said.

In Dover, Biden, a year deep into a four-year term, pledged that the state's criminal laws will be enforced fairly and that his prosecutors will be "voices for victims of crime and the communities they come from." His remarks were received warmly by an audience that included many residents from the surrounding neighborhood, which is within one of Dover's acknowledged high-crime areas.

Much of Biden's talk inspired "amens" from the overwhelmingly black gathering, but he provoked groans when noting that, according to federal statistics, black people accounted for almost half of the country's homicide victims in 2005.

"That's the kind of number that might cause some people to give up trying to turn things around," he said, "but not the folks in this community, not the folks in this state, and not the attorney general.

"At the Delaware Department of Justice, we're working hard to hold up our end of the bargain, that is, to do justice not just by prosecuting criminals, which is my charge, but by also representing victims and hopefully being part of preventing crime rather than prosecuting it."

Biden noted his creation of a family division within his office, saying he was the first attorney general in the country to do so. He also pledged that his prosecutors would not just prosecute violent crimes, but would go after perpetrators of financial crimes, identity theft and predatory lending. And he drew applause by saying that irresponsible keepers of a few residences along Queen Street near the church might fall victim to enforcement of a nuisance abatement law which, he said, largely has been ignored since it was enacted six years ago.

As well as celebrating King's legacy, Monday's event afforded an opportunity to pay tribute to Dover City Councilman Reuben Salters, founder and executive director of the Inner City Cultural league and the Sankofa African Dance Company, which offers cultural enrichment opportunities to children. The event featured a surprisingly accomplished version of "His Eye is On the Sparrow" by 10-year-old Moriah O. Graham, a dance company member who, according to Salters, has won a role in the Broadway production of "The Lion King."

"For many years, in his own right, (Salters) has been literally and figuratively a drum major for peace, social action and hope for all people," Harold Stafford, the cultural league's president, said of the 78-year-old councilman.

In his talk, Biden said that King probably would be happy to know that the Democratic Party most likely would nominate a black man or a woman as its standard-bearer for this year's presidential election.

"We've come a long way," he said.

And the Rev. Wayne A. Johnson, pastor of the host church, called on his parishioners to register to vote so they could participate in the upcoming elections -- noting that black Southerners during King's era had died as they fought for the right to vote freely.

It's too late to register for the presidential primary set for Feb. 5; the deadline was Jan. 12. But registration is open until Aug. 16 for Delaware's Sept. 9 primaries, and until Oct. 11 for the Nov. 4 general election.

"This is a critical time," the pastor said, "and we are praying that all of you in the state of Delaware are registered voters.

"If you are not, you have just a little time to do what you need to do. We are hoping and trusting that you will not allow the opportunity for voting to escape you."

Reporter Dan Shortridge contributed to this story. Contact James Merriweather at 678-4273 or jmerriweather@delawareonline.com.

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