This day in history — April 29, 1963 — United States Supreme Court Outlaws Segregated Courtroom Seating

Posted on April 29, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

In April 1962, Ford T. Johnson, Jr. appeared in a Richmond, Virginia, city traffic court and was convicted of contempt because he refused to sit in the segregated courtroom’s “Negro” section. Mr. Johnson was unaware of the segregated seating and first sat in a section reserved for whites. When ordered to move, Mr. Johnson refused the judge’s order to re-seat himself in the black section and said he would prefer to stand. He was immediately convicted of contempt and fined ten dollars.

When Mr. Johnson appealed, the Virginia Supreme Court ruled his conviction was “plainly right.” He then appealed to the United States Supreme Court, which agreed to hear the case. The State of Virginia admitted that the Richmond traffic court maintained a segregated seating policy but argued the policy was irrelevant and Mr. Johnson’s contempt conviction was justified because he disobeyed a judge’s order.

The Supreme Court disagreed. Reasoning that one could not be held in contempt for refusing to comply with unconstitutional segregation rules, the Court unanimously overturned Mr. Johnson’s conviction on April 29, 1963, in Johnson v. Virginia. The majority opinion declared that “such a conviction cannot stand, for it is no longer open to question that a State may not constitutionally require segregation of its public facilities.” The decision was lauded by civil rights activists nationwide. The Richmond Afro-American newspaper hailed it as a “ruling against this long injustice practiced in what are supposed to be chambers of impartial justice.”

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 28, 1936 — Lint Shaw Lynched in Georgia Eight Hours Before Trial

Posted on April 28, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

On April 28, 1936, a 45-year-old black farmer named Lint Shaw was shot to death by a mob of forty men in Colbert, Georgia – just eight hours before he was scheduled to go on trial for an attempted criminal assault. Mr. Shaw was accused of molesting two white women after their car had broken down.

During this era, accusations of “attempted assault” lodged against black men were often based on merely looking at or accidentally bumping into a white woman, smiling, winking, getting too close, or being alone with a white woman in the wrong place. The deep racial hostility permeating Southern society meant that accusations lodged against black people – especially against black men by white women or girls – were rarely subject to serious scrutiny by the police, press, or lynch mobs.

Following his arrest, Mr. Shaw was at constant risk of lynching and was moved multiple times to avoid mob attack. During a transfer to the jail at Danielsville, Georgia, Mr. Shaw was shot twice and rushed to Atlanta for protection and medical attention.

Mr. Shaw survived those injuries and was then returned to Danielsville to await trial, but a threatening mob again led him to be transferred. According to news reports, Superior Judge Berry T. Moseley, a 74-year-old white man, left his sick bed to scold the lynch mob and commanded officers to return Mr. Shaw to jail to await the orderly process of law. Nevertheless, while Mr. Shaw was being transported back to the jail, a group of angry men seized him. The riddled his body with bullets, and tied his corpse to a pine tree near a creek in Colbert, Georgia.

Lint Shaw was one of at least six victims of racial terror lynching killed in Madison County, Georgia, between 1907 and 1936. No one was every prosecuted for his murder.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in History — April 1, 1875 — United States Supreme Court Hears Argument in United States v. Cruikshank and Later Invalidates Convictions for Participating in Colfax, Louisiana Massacre

Posted on April 27, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

On April 13, 1873, in Colfax, Louisiana, hundreds of white men clashed with freedmen at the Grant Parish courthouse. While only three white men died, it is estimated that nearly 150 black people died in the ensuing struggle – many murdered in cold blood after surrendering.

The massacre was precipitated by the hotly contested 1872 Louisiana gubernatorial election. When a federal judge declared William Kellogg the winner, he began making appointments to fill local parish offices. Meanwhile, Kellogg’s white supremacist opponent John McEnery and his supporters declared McEnery the winner of the election. In the ensuing unrest, black supporters of Kellogg surrounded the Grant Parish courthouse and other municipal buildings in Colfax to protect them from being overtaken by McEnery supporters.

On Easter Sunday, more than 300 armed white men, including members of white supremacist groups, attacked the courthouse building to forcefully remove Kellogg’s black supporters. When the white posse aimed a cannon to fire on the courthouse, some of the sixty black defenders fled; others surrendered then, and more surrendered after the courthouse was set on fire. Many of the men were nevertheless killed as the mob began shooting unarmed members of the militia as they fled.

After the massacre, the federal government indicted over 100 members of the white mob under the Enforcement Act of 1870, a law enacted during Reconstruction to protect newly freed black voters from the terrorist threats of the Ku Klux Klan and other disgruntled white southerners. Only three members of the mob were convicted, and they appealed. In one of the final blows to the Reconstruction era protections, those men were freed when the United States Supreme Court declared that they had been convicted unconstitutionally.

The Supreme Court heard arguments in United States v. Cruikshank on March 31 and April 1, 1875. In its ruling, the Supreme Court dismissed the charges against the three white men, ruling that the Fourteenth Amendment protects only against intentionally discriminatory state acts, not the acts of one citizen towards another not clearly motivated by racial animus. This ruling severely limited the federal government’s role in protecting black citizens from racially-motivated violence, especially at the hands of white terrorist groups intent on restoring whites’ racial dominance in the post-civil war South.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 25, 1959 — Mack Charles Parker Lynched in Mississippi

Posted on April 27, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

In what some historians call the “last classic lynching in the United States,” Mack Charles Parker was killed on April 25, 1959, after he was accused of raping a pregnant white woman in Mississippi. Parker, a black man, denied the accusations and statements from those in the community suggested that the woman fabricated the rape claims to hide her consensual affair with a white man in a nearby town. Police officers garnered no conclusive evidence implicating Parker.

Days after Parker was transferred from the Hinds County Jail in Jackson to the Pearl River County Jail, a vigilante mob entered the jail and beat him. They then dragged Parker out of the jail while, bleeding profusely, he begged for his life. The mob drove to the Bogalusa bridge where they pulled Parker out of the car and shot him twice in the chest, killing him instantly. The mob then put chains around him and threw Parker into the Pearl River., where his body was found over a week later.

Despite an FBI investigation that identified many members of the lynch mob, no one was ever indicted in Parker’s murder. All of the suspects have since died.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 24, 2013 — Alabama Man Sentenced to Jail for Consensual Homosexual Sex

Posted on April 27, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

On April 24, 2013, a Dallas County, Alabama, trial judge sentenced DeWayne Williams to one year incarceration for violating a state law that criminalizes certain types of consensual sex between unmarried partners. Mr. Williams had originally been charged with 1st degree Sodomy, but the State’s evidence at trial – including the alleged victim’s testimony – failed to establish or even allege that the sexual encounter between the two men had been forced. Rather than drop the charges altogether, the prosecutors urged the trial judge to instruct the jury to also consider whether Mr. Williams had violated the state’s sexual misconduct statute.

Alabama’s sexual misconduct statute prohibits “deviate sexual behavior,”and defines such acts as “any act of sexual gratification between persons not married to each other involving the sex organs of one person and the mouth or anus of another.” Passed in 1977, the law was intended to criminalize same sex relations regardless of the role of consent; in addition, because same sex marriage remains illegal and unrecognized in Alabama, the law effectively criminalizes all same-sex relations regardless of marital status.

At trial, the jury acquitted Mr. Williams of the sodomy charge but convicted him of sexual misconduct, concluding that the evidence did establish sexual contact between Mr. Williams and another man. Mr. Williams was sentenced to twelve months in Dallas County jail and a subsequent two year period of supervised probation along with requirements to pay a $100 fine and the cost of his court-appointed attorney. For his act of engaging in private, consensual sex with another man, Mr. Williams was also required to register as a sex offender.

Throughout his trial and on appeal, Mr. Williams objected that the state sexual misconduct statute could not be enforced against him because it was unconstitutional under the United Supreme Court’s 2003 decision in Lawrence v. Texas. In that case, the Court had held that any laws prohibiting consensual sex between same sex individuals violated their Fourteenth Amendment right to “engage in the private conduct in the exercise of their liberty under the Due Process Clause.”

On June 14, 2014, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals agreed with Mr. Williams and reversed his conviction and sentence, holding that the sexual misconduct statute is unconstitutional and unenforceable. The court’s decision also held that the State of Alabama could not re-try Mr. Williams without violating double jeopardy protections, since he had been acquitted of sodomy at the first trial. Though the decision enforced national law that had been established more than a decade before, Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange publicly denounced the decision as one that “leaves all Alabamians less protected from nonconsensual sex.” Sodomy, rape, and other sexual offenses remain illegal in the state.

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This day in history — April 10, 1956 — Nat King Cole Attacked by White Men While Performing in Birmingham, Alabama

Posted on April 27, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

On April 10, 1956, African American singer and pianist Nat King Cole was performing before a white-only audience of 4000 at the Municipal Auditorium in Birmingham, Alabama, when he was attacked and knocked down by a group of white men. The attack happened so quickly that some audience members believed the attackers had rushed the stage to attack a drunk man near the front row who had been jeering at Mr. Cole, “Negro, go home.” Police present at the concert in case of trouble apprehended Cole’s attackers quickly. Four men were charged with inciting a riot while two others were held for questioning. Outside the arena, officers later found a car containing rifles, a blackjack, and brass knuckles.

Nat King Cole was born in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1919 and moved with his family to Chicago as a child. He was a popular national performer in 1956 and, in observance of Birmingham’s racial segregation laws, had scheduled separate performances for white and black audiences. The night before the attack, he performed before a segregated audience in Mobile, Alabama, and was booed by scattered members of the crowd.

After the attack during the Birmingham whites-only show, Mr. Cole returned to the stage and received a ten-minute standing ovation but did not finish the concert. “I just came here to entertain you,” he told the crowd. “That was what I thought you wanted. I was born in Alabama. Those folks hurt my back. I cannot continue, because I need to see a doctor.” After being examined by a physician, Mr. Cole went on to perform at the scheduled blacks-only show later that night.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 27, 2015 — States Continue to Celebrate Confederate Memorial Day

Posted on April 27, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

In 2015, several Southern states continued to celebrate Confederate Memorial Day in memory of the surrender of Confederate General Joseph Johnston and his army on April 26, 1865. In Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia, the last Monday of the month is an official state holiday. Alabama also continues to celebrate the birthdays of Confederate General Robert E. Lee and Confederate President Jefferson Davis.

Confederate Memorial Day ceremonies originated immediately after the Civil War and were seen as a celebration of the Confederacy. Veterans would parade in full uniforms with songs, flowers, and speeches about the “Lost Cause”. According to Purdue University professor Caroline E. Janney, “It is a way to sustain an identification as a Confederate. It’s a way to sustain your southern identity and to continue to resist the federal government.” But for many, the Confederate identity that the holiday celebrates is inextricably linked with a history of racism and slavery. Slavery was, after all, written into the Constitution of the Confederate states, which mandated that no law could curtail the right of whites to own negro slaves, and that slaves could not ever be discharged from their service as slaves. For many, a state holiday honoring the Confederacy is a hurtful reminder of a brutal and unjust history.

This perception is heightened when overtly racist groups like the Ku Klux Klan mark Confederate Memorial Day with hate-filled ceremonies. In Mississippi, the KKK group United Dixie White Knights celebrated Confederate Memorial Day in 2015 by burning a cross, in addition to raising the Confederate flag and reciting the Confederate pledge.

Mississippi state representative Earle Banks has been trying to get legislation passed to remove this holiday from the state, but he has met with resistance from conservatives in the state legislature. In response, Banks has offered a compromise that would make Mississippi’s Confederate Memorial Day a joint holiday that also celebrates “Civil Rights Memorial Day.” He thinks that either people should have the option of celebrating one or the other of the holidays, or that the holiday should not exist at all. Of supporters of the Confederate Memorial Day, Banks said, “They may be proud of the fact that their families were Confederates and pro-slavery. They may be ashamed that their families were pro-slavery. My family didn’t have a choice on being slaves.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 26, 1960 — Whites Attack Black Protesters at Segregated Mississippi Beach

Posted on April 26, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

The Biloxi beach wade-in was a locally-organized nonviolent protest that turned into what the New York Times called the “worse race riot in Mississippi history.” The protesters walked onto Biloxi beach in order to hold a “wade-in” in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. They were met by a group of angry whites who told them to leave the beach. When the protestors refused to leave, the white mob attacked them with sticks, clubs, pipes, and whips. Local law enforcement did nothing to intervene. When white airmen from a nearby Air Force base tried to protect injured protesters, they too were attacked.

The violence on the beach spurred several more violent encounters in the city of Biloxi where whites harassed, attacked, and even shot at black residents. Many blacks had to be escorted from their jobs to their homes by deputies in order to avoid being attacked. Others chose to stay at their workplaces rather than attempt to travel home that night.

The Biloxi beach riots led to the creation of a Biloxi NAACP branch and also catalyzed a legal fight to open local beaches to people of color. The U.S. Department of Justice filed a lawsuit to desegregate beaches in 1960. Twelve years later, in 1972, beaches in Mississippi were officially desegregated.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 24, 2013 — Alabama Man Sentenced to Jail for Consensual Homosexual Sex

Posted on April 26, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

On April 24, 2013, a Dallas County, Alabama, trial judge sentenced DeWayne Williams to one year incarceration for violating a state law that criminalizes certain types of consensual sex between unmarried partners. Mr. Williams had originally been charged with 1st degree Sodomy, but the State’s evidence at trial – including the alleged victim’s testimony – failed to establish or even allege that the sexual encounter between the two men had been forced. Rather than drop the charges altogether, the prosecutors urged the trial judge to instruct the jury to also consider whether Mr. Williams had violated the state’s sexual misconduct statute.

Alabama’s sexual misconduct statute prohibits “deviate sexual behavior,”and defines such acts as “any act of sexual gratification between persons not married to each other involving the sex organs of one person and the mouth or anus of another.” Passed in 1977, the law was intended to criminalize same sex relations regardless of the role of consent; in addition, because same sex marriage remains illegal and unrecognized in Alabama, the law effectively criminalizes all same-sex relations regardless of marital status.

At trial, the jury acquitted Mr. Williams of the sodomy charge but convicted him of sexual misconduct, concluding that the evidence did establish sexual contact between Mr. Williams and another man. Mr. Williams was sentenced to twelve months in Dallas County jail and a subsequent two year period of supervised probation along with requirements to pay a $100 fine and the cost of his court-appointed attorney. For his act of engaging in private, consensual sex with another man, Mr. Williams was also required to register as a sex offender.

Throughout his trial and on appeal, Mr. Williams objected that the state sexual misconduct statute could not be enforced against him because it was unconstitutional under the United Supreme Court’s 2003 decision in Lawrence v. Texas. In that case, the Court had held that any laws prohibiting consensual sex between same sex individuals violated their Fourteenth Amendment right to “engage in the private conduct in the exercise of their liberty under the Due Process Clause.”

On June 14, 2014, the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals agreed with Mr. Williams and reversed his conviction and sentence, holding that the sexual misconduct statute is unconstitutional and unenforceable. The court’s decision also held that the State of Alabama could not re-try Mr. Williams without violating double jeopardy protections, since he had been acquitted of sodomy at the first trial. Though the decision enforced national law that had been established more than a decade before, Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange publicly denounced the decision as one that “leaves all Alabamians less protected from nonconsensual sex.” Sodomy, rape, and other sexual offenses remain illegal in the state.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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This day in history — April 24, 1877 — Federal Troops Withdraw from Louisiana, Marking the End of Reconstruction

Posted on April 26, 2018 by William Eric Waters, aka Easy Waters

On April 24, 1877, President Rutherford B. Hayes withdrew federal troops from Louisiana, the last federally-occupied former Confederate state. The withdrawal marked the end of Reconstruction and paved the way for the unrestrained resurgence of white Democratic rule in the South, carrying with it the rapid deterioration of political rights for Southern blacks.

In the years leading up to 1877, public support for federal intervention in the South waned. By the presidential election of 1876, federal troops had withdrawn from all but three Southern states, Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina. These three states became the battlegrounds in a highly contested election between Mr. Hayes, the Republican candidate, and Democratic candidate Samuel Tilden. Mr. Tilden appeared to have won the popular vote, but the Republican Party disputed the electoral college results from the remaining occupied Southern states.

In January 1877, an electoral commission was created to resolve the election controversy. The bipartisan commission voted to award the popular vote and the electoral college votes of the contested states to Mr. Hayes, giving him a narrow victory over Mr. Tilden. President Hayes garnered Democratic support for the commission’s decision by pledging to end Reconstruction and withdraw the last of the 3000 federal troops from Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina.

From the Equal Justice Initiative’s A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.

“The Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) is proud to present A History of Racial Injustice – 2018 Calendar.  America’s history of racial inequality continues to undermine fair treatment, equal justice, and opportunity for many Americans.  The genocide of Native people, the legacy of slavery and racial terror, and the legally supported abuse of racial minorities are not well understood.  EJI believes that a deeper engagement with our nation’s history of racial injustice is important to addressing present-day questions of social justice and equality.

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