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Before he stood with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. ...

Before he launched Operation PUSH ...

Before he ran for president and changed American politics ...

Fifty years ago, the Rev. Jesse Jackson was a college student who wanted to use a public library.

When he was a freshman at the University of Illinois, home in Greenville, S.C. on a Christmas break, he visited the "colored library" in town to do research on a speech for a course. The assignment required citations from 25 books.

The library didn't have much - no surprise in those times.

"I asked the librarian for help and she told me she'd call a friend at the central public library," Jackson told us. "By the time I went over there to get the books, there were two cops there.

"The librarian said she had nobody to go to the stacks and told me to come back in six days,'" Jackson said. "Six days. I was shocked. I told her I would be happy to get them myself because I needed those books right then."

Jackson did not get the books. He did get what he described as a "coded message" from one of the officers. "You heard what she said," the officer told him. The message: Leave, or get arrested.

"I walked outside, and I just cried," Jackson said. "I just cried. It wasn't right, and I was determined to challenge that system."

Months later, on July 16, 1960, Jackson staged a sit-in at the whites-only central library with seven other students: Margaree Seawright Crosby, Joan Mattison Daniel, Benjamin Downs, Elaine Means, Deedee Dorris Wright, Hattie Smith Wright and Willie Joe Wright.

They went to the library, picked up books, took seats and started to read. Police arrived in less than 20 minutes and arrested them.

"In the paper write-up about our arrest, I remember them calling us leftists," Jackson said with a rueful laugh. "I remember us saying, 'We weren't left; we were right.'"

A lot has happened since then. The story of the Greenville Eight didn't gain the prominence of other flashpoints in the civil rights movement, such as the Birmingham bus boycott, the attempt at school integration in Arkansas by the Little Rock Nine, the Greensboro Four's arrest for sitting down at a Woolworth's lunch counter.

But the Greenville Eight largely launched Jackson's role in the civil rights movement.

Jackson, of course, is known for much more than his arrest at a Greenville library. He has been the most prominent - and controversial - leader of the civil rights movement since the death of Martin Luther King Jr. Jackson's 1984 and 1988 presidential campaigns changed American politics. He secured the release of an American pilot held in Syria in 2003 and the release of three U.S. prisoners of war held by Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic in 1999. And he has infuriated people by thrusting himself into many public controversies, from the Terry Schiavo right-to-die case to LeBron James' decision to leave the Cleveland Cavaliers. That penchant for the limelight - any limelight - will always be a large part of his public image.

Yet anyone who has watched Jackson preach at Rainbow/Push, or who witnessed his presidential campaigns, will credit his astonishing ability to excite and inspire, and to keep the nation's focus on the journey to repair its sorry history of inequality.

It's a good moment to give Jackson his due. Fifty years ago, he was a college kid who wanted to use the same library that white residents of Greenville used. He was a kid who was already weary, he says, of the cruel "war on black dignity" in America. Weary of moving to the back of the bus, burying relatives in "colored graveyards," being turned away from the whites-only library.

Two months after the Greenville Eight were arrested, the Greenville library system was opened to all races.

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Before he stood with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. ... Before he launched Operation PUSH ... Before he ran for president and changed American politics ... Fifty years ago, the Rev. Jesse Jackson was a college student who wanted to use a public library.

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CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT DESEGREGATION TIMELINE

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CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT DESEGREGATION TIMELINE

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Civil Rights Movement: Desegregation Timeline of Important Dates

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Civil Rights Movement: Desegregation timeline. Key US History events and dates

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Freedom is coming - Liz's World Choir at SOAS

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My Friend Joan Daniel with the Greenville 8 and their  Lawyers

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My Friend Joan Daniel with the Greenville 8 and their  Lawyers

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Image Gallery
Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system which operated primarily, but not exclusively in southern and border states, between 1877 and the mid-1960s. Jim Crow was more than a series of rigid anti-black laws. It was a way of life. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were relegated to the status of second class citizens. Jim Crow represented the legitimization of anti-black racism. Many Christian ministers and theologians taught that whites were the Chosen people, blacks were cursed to be servants, and God supported racial segregation. Craniologists, eugenicists, phrenologists, and Social Darwinists, at every educational level, buttressed the belief that blacks were innately intellectually and culturally inferior to whites. Pro-segregation politicians gave eloquent speeches on the great danger of integration: the mongrelization of the white race. Newspaper and magazine writers routinely referred to blacks as niggers, coons, and darkies; and worse, their articles reinforced anti-black stereotypes. Even children's games portrayed blacks as inferior beings (see "From Hostility to Reverence: 100 Years of African-American Imagery in Games"). All major societal institutions reflected and supported the oppression of blacks.

The Jim Crow system was undergirded by the following beliefs or rationalizations: whites were superior to blacks in all important ways, including but not limited to intelligence, morality, and civilized behavior; sexual relations between blacks and whites would produce a mongrel race which would destroy America; treating blacks as equals would encourage interracial sexual unions; any activity which suggested social equality encouraged interracial sexual relations; if necessary, violence must be used to keep blacks at the bottom of the racial hierarchy. The following Jim Crow etiquette norms show how inclusive and pervasive these norms were:

A black male could not offer his hand (to shake hands) with a white male because it implied being socially equal. Obviously, a black male could not offer his hand or any other part of his body to a white woman, because he risked being accused of rape.

Blacks and whites were not supposed to eat together. If they did eat together, whites were to be served first, and some sort of partition was to be placed between them.

Under no circumstance was a black male to offer to light the cigarette of a white female -- that gesture implied intimacy.

Blacks were not allowed to show public affection toward one another in public, especially kissing, because it offended whites.

Jim Crow etiquette prescribed that blacks were introduced to whites, never whites to blacks. For example: "Mr. Peters (the white person), this is Charlie (the black person), that I spoke to you about."

Whites did not use courtesy titles of respect when referring to blacks, for example, Mr., Mrs., Miss., Sir, or Ma'am. Instead, blacks were called by their first names. Blacks had to use courtesy titles when referring to whites, and were not allowed to call them by their first names.

If a black person rode in a car driven by a white person, the black person sat in the back seat, or the back of a truck.

White motorists had the right-of-way at all intersections.

Stetson Kennedy, the author of Jim Crow Guide (1990), offered these simple rules that blacks were supposed to observe in conversing with whites:

1. Never assert or even intimate that a white person is lying.

2. Never impute dishonorable intentions to a white person.

3. Never suggest that a white person is from an inferior class.

4. Never lay claim to, or overly demonstrate, superior knowledge or intelligence.

5. Never curse a white person.

6. Never laugh derisively at a white person.

7. Never comment upon the appearance of a white female.

Jim Crow etiquette operated in conjunction with Jim Crow laws (black codes). When most people think of Jim Crow they think of laws (not the Jim Crow etiquette) which excluded blacks from public transport and facilities, juries, jobs, and neighborhoods. The passage of the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution had granted blacks the same legal protections as whites. However, after 1877, and the election of Republican Rutherford B. Hayes, southern and border states began restricting the liberties of blacks. Unfortunately for blacks, the Supreme Court helped undermine the Constitutional protections of blacks with the infamous Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) case, which legitimized Jim Crow laws and the Jim Crow way of life.

In 1890, Louisiana passed the "Separate Car Law," which purported to aid passenger comfort by creating "equal but separate" cars for blacks and whites. This was a ruse. No public accommodations, including railway travel, provided blacks with equal facilities. The Louisiana law made it illegal for blacks to sit in coach seats reserved for whites, and whites could not sit in seats reserved for blacks. In 1891, a group of blacks decided to test the Jim Crow law. They had Homer A. Plessy, who was seven-eighths white and one-eighth black (therefore, black), sit in the white-only railroad coach. He was arrested. Plessy's lawyer argued that Louisiana did not have the right to label one citizen as white and another black for the purposes of restricting their rights and privileges. In Plessy, the Supreme Court stated that so long as state governments provided legal process and legal freedoms for blacks, equal to those of whites, they could maintain separate institutions to facilitate these rights. The Court, by a 7-2 vote, upheld the Louisiana law, declaring that racial separation did not necessarily mean an abrogation of equality. In practice, Plessy represented the legitimization of two societies: one white, and advantaged; the other, black, disadvantaged and despised.

Blacks were denied the right to vote by grandfather clauses (laws that restricted the right to vote to people whose ancestors had voted before the Civil War), poll taxes (fees charged to poor blacks), white primaries (only Democrats could vote, only whites could be Democrats), and literacy tests ("Name all the Vice Presidents and Supreme Court Justices throughout America's history"). Plessy sent this message to southern and border states: Discrimination against blacks is acceptable.

Jim Crow states passed statutes severely regulating social interactions between the races. Jim Crow signs were placed above water fountains, door entrances and exits, and in front of public facilities. There were separate hospitals for blacks and whites, separate prisons, separate public and private schools, separate churches, separate cemeteries, separate public restrooms, and separate public accommodations. In most instances, the black facilities were grossly inferior -- generally, older, less-well-kept. In other cases, there were no black facilities -- no Colored public restroom, no public beach, no place to sit or eat. Plessy gave Jim Crow states a legal way to ignore their constitutional obligations to their black citizens.

Jim Crow laws touched every aspect of everyday life. For example, in 1935, Oklahoma prohibited blacks and whites from boating together. Boating implied social equality. In 1905, Georgia established separate parks for blacks and whites. In 1930, Birmingham, Alabama, made it illegal for blacks and whites to play checkers or dominoes together. Here are some of the typical Jim Crow laws, as compiled by the Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site Interpretive Staff:

Barbers. No colored barber shall serve as a barber (to) white girls or women (Georgia).

Blind Wards. The board of trustees shall...maintain a separate building...on separate ground for the admission, care, instruction, and support of all blind persons of the colored or black race (Louisiana).

Burial. The officer in charge shall not bury, or allow to be buried, any colored persons upon ground set apart or used for the burial of white persons (Georgia).

Buses.All passenger stations in this state operated by any motor transportation company shall have separate waiting rooms or space and separate ticket windows for the white and colored races (Alabama).

Child Custody. It shall be unlawful for any parent, relative, or other white person in this State, having the control or custody of any white child, by right of guardianship, natural or acquired, or otherwise, to dispose of, give or surrender such white child permanently into the custody, control, maintenance, or support, of a negro (South Carolina).

Education.The schools for white children and the schools for negro children shall be conducted separately (Florida).

Libraries. The state librarian is directed to fit up and maintain a separate place for the use of the colored people who may come to the library for the purpose of reading books or periodicals (North Carolina).

Mental Hospitals. The Board of Control shall see that proper and distinct apartments are arranged for said patients, so that in no case shall Negroes and white persons be together (Georgia).

Militia. The white and colored militia shall be separately enrolled, and shall never be compelled to serve in the same organization. No organization of colored troops shall be permitted where white troops are available and where whites are permitted to be organized, colored troops shall be under the command of white officers (North Carolina).

Nurses. No person or corporation shall require any White female nurse to nurse in wards or rooms in hospitals, either public or private, in which negro men are placed (Alabama).

Prisons. The warden shall see that the white convicts shall have separate apartments for both eating and sleeping from the negro convicts (Mississippi).

Reform Schools. The children of white and colored races committed to the houses of reform shall be kept entirely separate from each other (Kentucky).

Teaching. Any instructor who shall teach in any school, college or institution where members of the white and colored race are received and enrolled as pupils for instruction shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof, shall be fined... (Oklahoma).

Wine and Beer. All persons licensed to conduct the business of selling beer or wine...shall serve either white people exclusively or colored people exclusively and shall not sell to the two races within the same room at any time (Georgia).¹

The Jim Crow laws and system of etiquette were undergirded by violence, real and threatened. Blacks who violated Jim Crow norms, for example, drinking from the white water fountain or trying to vote, risked their homes, their jobs, even their lives. Whites could physically beat blacks with impunity. Blacks had little legal recourse against these assaults because the Jim Crow criminal justice system was all-white: police, prosecutors, judges, juries, and prison officials. Violence was instrumental for Jim Crow. It was a method of social control. The most extreme forms of Jim Crow violence were lynchings.

Lynchings were public, often sadistic, murders carried out by mobs. Between 1882, when the first reliable data were collected, and 1968, when lynchings had become rare, there were 4,730 known lynchings, including 3,440 black men and women. Most of the victims of Lynch Law were hanged or shot, but some were burned at the stake, castrated, beaten with clubs, or dismembered. In the mid-1800s, whites constituted the majority of victims (and perpetrators); however, by the period of Radical Reconstruction, blacks became the most frequent lynching victims. This is an early indication that lynching was used as an intimidation tool to keep blacks, in this case the newly freed people, "in their places." The great majority of lynchings occurred in southern and border states, where the resentment against blacks ran deepest. According to the social economist Gunnar Myrdal (1944): "The southern states account for nine-tenths of the lynchings. More than two thirds of the remaining one-tenth occurred in the six states which immediately border the South" (pp. 560-561).

Many whites claimed that although lynchings were distasteful, they were necessary supplements to the criminal justice system because blacks were prone to violent crimes, especially the rapes of white women. Arthur Raper investigated nearly a century of lynchings and concluded that approximately one-third of all the victims were falsely accused (Myrdal, 1944, p. 561).

Under Jim Crow any and all sexual interactions between black men and white women was illegal, illicit, socially repugnant, and within the Jim Crow definition of rape. Although only 19.2 percent of the lynching victims between 1882 to 1951 were even accused of rape, lynch law was often supported on the popular belief that lynchings were necessary to protect white women from black rapists. Myrdal (1944) refutes this belief in this way: "There is much reason to believe that this figure (19.2) has been inflated by the fact that a mob which makes the accusation of rape is secure from any further investigation; by the broad Southern definition of rape to include all sexual relations between Negro men and white women; and by the psychopathic fears of white women in their contacts with Negro men" (pp. 561-562). Most blacks were lynched for demanding civil rights, violating Jim Crow etiquette or laws, or in the aftermath of race riots.

Lynchings were most common in small and middle-sized towns where blacks often were economic competitors to the local whites. These whites resented any economic and political gains made by blacks. Lynchers were seldomly arrested, and if arrested, rarely convicted. Raper (1933) estimated that "at least one-half of the lynchings are carried out with police officers participating, and that in nine-tenths of the others the officers either condone or wink at the mob action" (pp. 13-14). Lynching served many purposes: it was cheap entertainment; it served as a rallying, uniting point for whites; it functioned as an ego-massage for low-income, low-status whites; it was a method of defending white domination and helped stop or retard the fledgling social equality movement.

Lynch mobs directed their hatred against one (sometimes several) victims. The victim was an example of what happened to a black man who tried to vote, or who looked at a white woman, or who tried to get a white man's job. Unfortunately for blacks, sometimes the mob was not satisfied to murder a single or several victims. Instead, in the spirit of pogroms, the mobs went into black communities and destroyed additional lives and property. Their immediate goal was to drive out -- through death or expulsion -- all blacks; the larger goal was to maintain, at all costs, white supremacy. These pogrom-like actions are often referred to as riots; however, Gunnar Myrdal (1944) was right when he described these "riots" as "a terrorization or massacre...a mass lynching" (p. 566). Interestingly, these mass lynchings were primarily urban phenomena, whereas the lynching of single victims was primarily a rural phenomena.

James Weldon Johnson, the famous black writer, labeled 1919 as "The Red Summer." It was red from racial tension; it was red from bloodletting. During the summer of 1919, there were race riots in Chicago, Illinois; Knoxville and Nashville, Tennessee; Charleston, South Carolina; Omaha, Nebraska; and two dozen other cities. W.E.B. DuBois (1986), the black social scientist and civil rights activist, wrote: "During that year seventy-seven Negroes were lynched, of whom one was a woman and eleven were soldiers; of these, fourteen were publicly burned, eleven of them being burned alive. That year there were race riots large and small in twenty-six American cities including thirty-eight killed in a Chicago riot of August; from twenty-five to fifty in Phillips County, Arkansas; and six killed in Washington" (p. 747).

The riots of 1919 were not the first or last "mass lynchings" of blacks, as evidenced by the race riots in Wilmington, North Carolina (1898); Atlanta, Georgia (1906); Springfield, Illinois (1908); East St. Louis, Illinois (1917); Tulsa, Oklahoma (1921); and Detroit, Michigan (1943). Joseph Boskin, author of Urban Racial Violence (1976), claimed that the riots of the 1900s had the following traits:

1. In each of the race riots, with few exceptions, it was white people that sparked the incident by attacking black people.

2. In the majority of the riots, some extraordinary social condition prevailed at the time of the riot: prewar social changes, wartime mobility, post-war adjustment, or economic depression.

3. The majority of the riots occurred during the hot summer months.

4. Rumor played an extremely important role in causing many riots. Rumors of some criminal activity by blacks against whites perpetuated the actions of the white mobs.

5. The police force, more than any other institution, was invariably involved as a precipitating cause or perpetuating factor in the riots. In almost every one of the riots, the police sided with the attackers, either by actually participating in, or by failing to quell the attack.

6. In almost every instance, the fighting occurred within the black community. (pp. 14-15)

Boskin omitted the following: the mass media, especially newspapers often published inflammatory articles about "black criminals" immediately before the riots; blacks were not only killed, but their homes and businesses were looted, and many who did not flee were left homeless; and, the goal of the white rioters, as was true of white lynchers of single victims, was to instill fear and terror into blacks, thereby buttressing white domination. The Jim Crow hierarchy could not work without violence being used against those on the bottom rung. George Fredrickson (1971), a historian, stated it this way: "Lynching represented...a way of using fear and terror to check 'dangerous' tendencies in a black community considered to be ineffectively regimented or supervised. As such it constituted a confession that the regular institutions of a segregated society provided an inadequate measure of day-to-day control" (p. 272).

Many blacks resisted the indignities of Jim Crow, and, far too often, they paid for their bravery with their lives.

© Dr. David Pilgrim
Professor of Sociology
Ferris State University
Sept., 2000
Edited 2012

Note

1 This list was derived from a larger list composed by the Martin Luther King, Jr., National Historic Site Interpretive Staff. Last Updated January 5, 1998. The web address is: http//www.nps.gov/malu/documents/jim crowlaws.htm.

References

Boskin, J. (1976). Urban racial violence in the twentieth century (2nd ed.). Beverly Hills, CA: Glencoe Press.

Dubois, W. E. B. (1986). Writings. N. Huggins, (Ed.). New York NY: Literary Classics of the United States.

Kennedy, S. (1959/1990). Jim Crow guide: The way it was. Boca Raton, FL: Florida Atlantic University Press.

Myrdal, G. (1944). An American dilemma: the Negro problem and modern democracy. New York, NY: Harper.

Raper, A. F. (1933). The tragedy of lynching. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press.

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Image Gallery Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system which operated primarily, but not exclusively in southern and border states, between 1877 and the mid-1960s. Jim Crow was more than a series of rigid anti-black laws. It was a way of life.

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From the 1880s into the 1960s, a majority of American states enforced segregation through "Jim Crow" laws (so called after a black character in minstrel shows). From Delaware to California, and from North Dakota to Texas, many states (and cities, too) could impose legal punishments on people for consorting with members of another race. The most common types of laws forbade intermarriage and ordered business owners and public institutions to keep their black and white clientele separated. Here is a sampling of laws from various states.

Amateur Baseball

Georgia - It shall be unlawful for any amateur white baseball team to play baseball on any vacant lot or baseball diamond within two blocks of a playground devoted to the Negro race, and it shall be unlawful for any amateur colored baseball team to play baseball in any vacant lot or baseball diamond within two blocks of any playground devoted to the white race.

Barbers

Georgia - No colored barber shall serve as a barber [to] white women or girls.

Bathroom Facilities, Male

Alabama - Every employer of white or negro males shall provide for such white or negro males reasonably accessible and separate toilet facilities.

The Blind

Louisiana - The board of trustees shall...maintain a separate building...on separate ground for the admission, care, instruction, and support of all blind persons of the colored or black race.

Burial

Georgia - The officer in charge shall not bury, or allow to be buried, any colored persons upon ground set apart or used for the burial of white persons.

Buses

Alabama - All passenger stations in this state operated by any motor transportation company shall have separate waiting rooms or space and separate ticket windows for the white and colored races.

Child Custody

South Carolina - It shall be unlawful for any parent, relative, or other white person in this State, having the control or custody of any white child, by right of guardianship, natural or acquired, or otherwise, to dispose of, give or surrender such white child permanently into the custody, control, maintenance, or support, of a negro.

Circus Tickets

Louisiana - All circuses, shows, and tent exhibitions, to which the attendance of...more than one race is invited or expected to attend shall provide for the convenience of its patrons not less than two ticket offices with individual ticket sellers, and not less than two entrances to the said performance, with individual ticket takers and receivers, and in the case of outside or tent performances, the said ticket offices shall not be less than twenty-five (25) feet apart.

Cohabitation

Florida - Any negro man and white woman, or any white man and negro woman, who are not married to each other, who shall habitually live in and occupy in the nighttime the same room shall each be punished by imprisonment not exceeding twelve (12) months, or by fine not exceeding five hundred ($500.00) dollars.

Education

Florida - The schools for white children and the schools for negro children shall be conducted separately.

Mississippi - Separate schools shall be maintained for the children of the white and colored races.

Missouri - Separate free schools shall be established for the education of children of African descent; and it shall be unlawful for any colored child to attend any white school, or any white child to attend a colored school.

New Mexico - Separate rooms [shall] be provided for the teaching of pupils of African descent, and [when] said rooms are so provided, such pupils may not be admitted to the school rooms occupied and used by pupils of Caucasian or other descent.

Texas - [The County Board of Education] shall provide schools of two kinds; those for white children and those for colored children.

Fishing, Boating, and Bathing

Oklahoma - The [Conservation] Commission shall have the right to make segregation of the white and colored races as to the exercise of rights of fishing, boating and bathing.

Hospital Entrances

Mississippi - There shall be maintained by the governing authorities of every hospital maintained by the state for treatment of white and colored patients separate entrances for white and colored patients and visitors, and such entrances shall be used by the race only for which they are prepared.

Housing

Louisiana - Any person...who shall rent any part of any such building to a negro person or a negro family when such building is already in whole or in part in occupancy by a white person or white family, or vice versa when the building is in occupancy by a negro person or negro family, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and on conviction thereof shall be punished by a fine of not less than twenty-five ($25.00) nor more than one hundred ($100.00) dollars or be imprisoned not less than 10, or more than 60 days, or both such fine and imprisonment in the discretion of the court.

Intermarriage

Arizona - The marriage of a person of Caucasian blood with a Negro, Mongolian, Malay, or Hindu shall be null and void.

Florida - All marriages between a white person and a negro, or between a white person and a person of negro descent to the fourth generation inclusive, are hereby forever prohibited.

Georgia - It shall be unlawful for a white person to marry anyone except a white person. Any marriage in violation of this section shall be void.

Maryland - All marriages between a white person and a negro, or between a white person and a person of negro descent, to the third generation, inclusive, or between a white person and a member of the Malay race; or between the negro a nd a member of the Malay race; or between a person of Negro descent, to the third generation, inclusive, and a member of the Malay race, are forever prohibited, and shall be void.

Mississippi - The marriage of a white person with a negro or mulatto or person who shall have one-eighth or more of negro blood, shall be unlawful and void.

Missouri - All marriages between...white persons and negroes or white persons and Mongolians...are prohibited and declared absolutely void...No person having one-eighth part or more of negro blood shall be permitted to marry any white person, nor shall any white person be permitted to marry any negro or person having one-eighth part or more of negro blood.

Wyoming - All marriages of white persons with Negroes, Mulattos, Mongolians, or Malaya hereafter contracted in the State of Wyoming are and shall be illegal and void.

Juvenile Delinquents

Florida - There shall be separate buildings, not nearer than one fourth mile to each other, one for white boys and one for negro boys. White boys and negro boys shall not, in any manner, be associated together or worked together.

Libraries

North Carolina - The state librarian is directed to fit up and maintain a separate place for the use of the colored people who may come to the library for the purpose of reading books or periodicals.

Texas - Any white person of such county may use the county free library under the rules and regulations prescribed by the commissioners court and may be entitled to all the privileges thereof. Said court shall make proper provision for the negroes of said county to be served through a separate branch or branches of the county free library, which shall be administered by [a] custodian of the negro race under the supervision of the county librarian.

Lunch Counters

South Carolina - No persons, firms, or corporations, who or which furnish meals to passengers at station restaurants or station eating houses, in times limited by common carriers of said passengers, shall furnish said meals to white and colored passengers in the same room, or at the same table, or at the same counter.

Mental Hospitals

Georgia - The Board of Control shall see that proper and distinct apartments are arranged for said patients, so that in no case shall Negroes and white persons be together.

Militia

North Carolina - The white and colored militia shall be separately enrolled, and shall never be compelled to serve in the same organization.No organization of colored troops shall be permitted where white troops are available, and while white permitted to be organized, colored troops shall be under the command of white officers.

Mining

Oklahoma - The baths and lockers for the negroes shall be separate from the white race, but may be in the same building.

Nurses

Alabama - No person or corporation shall require any white female nurse to nurse in wards or rooms in hospitals, either public or private, in which negro men are placed.

Parks

Georgia - It shall be unlawful for colored people to frequent any park owned or maintained by the city for the benefit, use and enjoyment of white persons...and unlawful for any white person to frequent any park owned or maintained by the city for the use and benefit of colored persons.

Pool and Billiard Rooms

Alabama - It shall be unlawful for a negro and white person to play together or in company with each other at any game of pool or billiards.

Prisons

Mississippi - The warden shall see that the white convicts shall have separate apartments for both eating and sleeping from the negro convicts.

Promotion of Equality

Mississippi - Any person...who shall be guilty of printing, publishing or circulating printed, typewritten or written matter urging or presenting for public acceptance or general information, arguments or suggestions in favor of social equality or of intermarriage between whites and negroes, shall be guilty of a misdemeanor and subject to fine or not exceeding five hundred (500.00) dollars or imprisonment not exceeding six (6) months or both.

Railroads

Alabama - The conductor of each passenger train is authorized and required to assign each passenger to the car or the division of the car, when it is divided by a partition, designated for the race to which such passenger belongs.

Maryland - All railroad companies and corporations, and all persons running or operating cars or coaches by steam on any railroad line or track in the State of Maryland, for the transportation of passengers, are hereby required to provide separate cars or coaches for the travel and transportation of the white and colored passengers.

Virginia - The conductors or managers on all such railroads shall have power, and are hereby required, to assign to each white or colored passenger his or her respective car, coach or compartment. If the passenger fails to disclose his race, the conductor and managers, acting in good faith, shall be the sole judges of his race.

Reform Schools

Kentucky - The children of white and colored races committed to the houses of reform shall be kept entirely separate from each other.

Restaurants

Alabama - It shall be unlawful to conduct a restaurant or other place for the serving of food in the city, at which white and colored people are served in the same room, unless such white and colored persons are effectually separated by a solid partition extending from the floor upward to a distance of seven feet or higher, and unless a separate entrance from the street is provided for each compartment.

Georgia - All persons licensed to conduct a restaurant, shall serve either white people exclusively or colored people exclusively and shall not sell to the two races within the same room or serve the two races anywhere under the same license.

Teaching

Oklahoma - Any instructor who shall teach in any school, college or institution where members of the white and colored race are received and enrolled as pupils for instruction shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and upon conviction thereof, shall be fined in any sum not less than ten dollars ($10.00) nor more than fifty dollars ($50.00) for each offense.

Telephone Booths

Oklahoma - The Corporation Commission is hereby vested with power and authority to require telephone companies...to maintain separate booths for white and colored patrons when there is a demand for such separate booths. That the Corporation Commission shall determine the necessity for said separate booths only upon complaint of the people in the town and vicinity to be served after due hearing as now provided by law in other complaints filed with the Corporation Commission.

Textbooks

North Carolina - Books shall not be interchangeable between the white and colored schools, but shall continue to be used by the race first using them.

Theaters

Virginia - Every person...operating...any public hall, theatre, opera house, motion picture show or any place of public entertainment or public assemblage which is attended by both white and colored persons, shall separate the white race and the colored race and shall set apart and designate...certain seats therein to be occupied by white persons and a portion thereof , or certain seats therein, to be occupied by colored persons.

Transportation

North Carolina - The...Utilities Commission...is empowered and directed to require the establishment of separate waiting rooms at all stations for the white and colored races.

Wine and Beer

Georgia - All persons licensed to conduct the business of selling beer or wine...shall serve either white people exclusively or colored people exclusively and shall not sell to the two races within the same room at any time.

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Jim Crow Laws - Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historical Park (U.S. National Park Service)

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From the 1880s into the 1960s, a majority of American states enforced segregation through "Jim Crow" laws (so called after a black character in minstrel shows). From Delaware to California, and from North Dakota to Texas, many states (and cities, too) could impose legal punishments on people for consorting with members of another race.

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Lynchings

On January 2, 1944 15-year-old Willie James Howard was taken to the Suwannee River by the father of a young girl to whom he had sent a Christmas card. Willie James' body was removed from the river the following day.

There are two accounts of what happened on the banks of the Suwannee that day: that of former state legislator Phil Goff, the father of the young girl, and that of James and Lula Howard, the parents of Willie James.

The lynching was brought to the attention of the NAACP by an attorney visiting Live Oak over the Christmas holidays. Thurgood Marshall quickly demanded that Governor Spessard Holland call for a full investigation in the case. Holland forwarded Phil Goff's sworn statement to Marshall and said the matter would be brought before a Grand Jury, but he warned Marshall of the "particular difficulties involved where there will be testimony of three white men and probably the girl against the testimony of one Negro man." [Read Goff's statement and Holland's letter]
Moore Investigates
When Harry T. Moore heard about the lynching he immediately took action. He sent his own letter to the NAACP expressing his special interest in the case: he grew up down the road from Live Oak and was a former classmate of Lula Howard.

Frustrated by the failure of his past attempts to get state officials to pursue lynching cases he decided to conduct his own investigation. He went to Orlando, where the Howards had fled following the funeral of their son, and took sworn statements from James and Lula Howard [Read Lula Howard's affidavit]. He sent these statements to Roy Wilkins of the NAACP and in an accompanying letter strongly encouraged bypassing the state and pursuing a federal investigation.

Despite these efforts, the Live Oak grand jury failed to return an indictment. This came as no surprise to Moore. He continued to press the NAACP for a federal investigation. [Moore letter to Marshall]. The Justice Department, citing lack of jurisdiction, declined to intervene.

As late as 1947, Moore was still seeking a course of action. He again wrote Thurgood Marshall this time about a Carolina detective agency that offered to re-open the investigation. But Marshall was unwilling to commit further NAACP funding for the investigation.

So the Willie James Howard investigation came to an end, but Harry Moore continued his efforts to expose those who engaged in or condoned lynching. He investigated cases, took affidavits, wrote letters and called for the resignation and punishment of law enforcement officers. And some believe it was this constant pushing of the boundaries, particularly in the highly publicized Groveland case, that would lead to his murder.

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PBS - Freedom Never Dies: The Story of Harry T. Moore - Florida Terror - Lynchings - Willie James Howard Lynching

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Lynchings On January 2, 1944 15-year-old Willie James Howard was taken to the Suwannee River by the father of a young girl to whom he had sent a Christmas card. Willie James' body was removed from the river the following day.

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During the pre-civil rights era, lynching was tragically prevalent, especially in the Southern United States. The states with the highest rates of lynching Black people were:

1. Mississippi: This state had the highest number of lynchings, with an estimated 581 victims, 93% of whom were Black ¹.

2. Georgia: Georgia saw the second most lynchings, with 531 victims, also 93% of whom were Black ¹.

3. Florida: Florida had the highest rate of lynchings per capita, with 0.594 Black residents being lynched annually per 100,000 ².

4. Louisiana: Louisiana recorded 540 lynchings ².

These states were part of the former Confederacy, where racial violence was used as a tool of oppression against Black people during and after the Reconstruction era.

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White Americans used lynching to terrorize and control Black people in the 19th and early 20th centuries. NAACP led a courageous battle against lynching.

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"Southern trees bear a strange fruit, blood on the leaves and blood at the root. Black bodies swinging in the Southern breeze, strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees."

— "Strange Fruit," written by Abel Meeropol and recorded in 1939 by Billie Holiday

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The Little Rock Nine, Directed by Fern Levitt (2001)

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GRACE LORCH who protected one of the Little Rock 9

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GRACE LORCH who protected one of the Little Rock 9

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Grace Lorch, Teacher and Activist born

*Grace Lorch was born on this date in 1903. She was a teacher and activist.

Grace Lonergan was born to William and Delia Lonergan in Boston, Massachusetts. She and her brother Thomas grew up in a working-class household where her father was a railroad worker, and her mother was a homemaker. Lonergan became a public school teacher in Boston at a young age, serving as President of the Boston Teachers Union and a Boston Central Labor Council member.

Grace Lonergan married her husband Lee Lorch in 1943 as he was about to leave for military service in World War II. Despite having been a teacher for two decades, she was dismissed due to an 1880s-era rule of the Boston School Committee that banned teachers from marrying. Although unsuccessfully, she was the first teacher to challenge a Boston school regulation that female teachers resign after marriage. Lorch appealed, but the committee upheld the rule in 1944. The publicity around Lorch's case led to a campaign to end the prohibition, which was successful nine years later when, in 1953, the legislature voted to end the ban on married female teachers.

The couple was an activist in the American Civil Rights struggle in the 1940s and 1950s. They and their infant daughter, Alice, moved into New York City's Stuyvesant Town and fought to desegregate the housing development bringing the issue to a head by allowing a black family to live in their apartment as guests. The controversy cost her husband his job as a math professor, and the family moved to the south, where her husband found work with historically black colleges. Two weeks after moving to Little Rock, Grace Lorch wrote a letter to the local school superintendent.

She asked that her eleven-year-old daughter be allowed to attend the neighborhood school. The letter said: "Since we live at 1801 High Street, located in a Negro neighborhood, this would be a Negro school," she wrote, adding that it "might also provide a useful and unobtrusive example of benefit to the process of integrating Little Rock schools." The request was denied.

In 1957, the Lorches were involved in the Little Rock branch of the NAACP and were intimately involved in the Little Rock Nine's struggle to desegregate Little Rock Central High School. On their first day of school, the Nine were to arrive together; however, this instruction never reached fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Eckford, who arrived separately and found herself facing an angry mob threatening to lynch her. Having just dropped off her daughter at a nearby junior high, Grace Lorch arrived, rescued Eckford, and escorted her home.

Lorch's rescue of Eckford made her family a target. Dynamite was placed in their garage, harassed in the press, Alice faced bullying at school, and the Senate Subcommittee on Internal Security subpoenaed Grace. By 1959, Lee Lorch was blacklisted by the House Un-American Committee, and the family moved to Canada, where Grace died in 1974. Grace Lorch died on October 28, 1974, and is buried in Dudley, Massachusetts.

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Grace Lorch was born on this date in 1903. She was a teacher and activist. Grace Lonergan was born to William and Delia Lonergan in Boston, Massachusetts. She and her brother Thomas grew up in a working-class household where her father was a railroad worker, and her mother was a homemaker.

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Willie James Howoard was 15 years old when he was kidnapped by white men in Live Oak, Florida and murdered. No one was ever convicted of the crime.

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PBS - Freedom Never Dies: The Story of Harry T. Moore - Florida Terror - Lynchings - Willie James Howard Lynching

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Lynchings Willie James Howard Lynching On January 2, 1944 15-year-old Willie James Howard was taken to the Suwannee River by the father of a young girl to whom he had sent a Christmas card. Willie James’ body was removed from the river the following day. There are two accounts of what happened on the banks of the Suwannee that day: that of former state legislator Phil Goff, the father of the young girl, and that of James and Lula Howard, the parents of Willie James. The lynching was brought to the attention of the NAACP by an attorney visiting Live Oak over the Christmas holidays. Thurgood Marshall quickly demanded that Governor Spessard Holland call for a full investigation in the case. Holland forwarded Phil Goff’s sworn statement to Marshall and said the matter would be brought before a Grand Jury, but he warned Marshall of the “particular difficulties involved where there will be testimony of three white men and probably the girl against the testimony of one Negro man.” [Read Goff’s statement and Holland’s letter] Moore Investigates When Harry T. Moore heard about the lynching he immediately took action. He sent his own letter to the NAACP expressing his special interest in the case: he grew up down the road from Live Oak and was a former classmate of Lula Howard. Frustrated by the failure of his past attempts to get state officials to pursue lynching cases he decided to conduct his own investigation. He went to Orlando, where the Howards had fled following the funeral of their son, and took sworn statements from James and Lula Howard [Read Lula Howard’s affidavit]. He sent these statements to Roy Wilkins of the NAACP and in an accompanying letter strongly encouraged bypassing the state and pursuing a federal investigation. Despite these efforts, the Live Oak grand jury failed to return an indictment. This came as no surprise to Moore. He continued to press the NAACP for a federal investigation. [Moore letter to Marshall]. The Justice Department, citing lack of jurisdiction, declined to intervene. As late as 1947, Moore was still seeking a course of action. He again wrote Thurgood Marshall this time about a Carolina detective agency that offered to re-open the investigation. But Marshall was unwilling to commit further NAACP funding for the investigation. So the Willie James Howard investigation came to an end, but Harry Moore continued his efforts to expose those who engaged in or condoned lynching. He investigated cases, took affidavits, wrote letters and called for the resignation and punishment of law enforcement officers. And some believe it was this constant pushing of the boundaries, particularly in the highly publicized Groveland case, that would lead to his murder.

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JOAN MADDISON DANIEL: Marched and went to jail with Jesse Jackson in the "Greenville Eight"

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JOAN MADDISON DANIEL: Marched and went to jail with Jesse Jackson in the "Greenville Eight"

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Honoring the legends who shaped history. Black History Month ❤️

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Florida Memory • The Civil Rights Movement in Florida