Board of Education case. This decision legally ended segregation of schools, though it took many years for it to be fully implemented. As state field secretary, Evers traveled around Mississippi extensively, recruiting new members for the NAACP and organizing voter-registration efforts. Evers also led demonstrations and economic boycotts of white-owned companies that practiced discrimination. While a virtual unknown elsewhere, Evers was one of Mississippi's most prominent civil rights activists.
He fought racial injustices in many forms, including how the state and local legal systems handled crimes against African Americans. Evers called for a new investigation into the lynching of Emmett Till , a year-old African American boy who had allegedly been killed for talking to a white woman. He also protested the conviction of his fellow Mississippi civil rights activist Clyde Kennard on theft charges in Evers's efforts made him a target for those who opposed racial equality and desegregation.
He and his family were subjected to numerous threats and violent actions, including a firebombing of his house in May , shortly before his assassination. He died less than an hour later at a nearby hospital. The national outrage over Evers' murder increased support for legislation that would become the Civil Rights Act of Charles Evers went on to become a major political figure in the state; in , he was elected the mayor of Fayette, Mississippi, becoming the first African American mayor of a racially mixed Southern town since Reconstruction.
Despite mounting evidence against him — a rifle found near the crime scene was registered to Beckwith and had his fingerprints on the scope, and several witnesses placed him in the area — Beckwith denied shooting Evers. He maintained that the gun had been stolen, and produced several witnesses to testify that he was elsewhere on the night of the murder.
The bitter conflict over segregation surrounded the two trials that followed. Beckwith received the support of some of Mississippi's most prominent citizens, including then-Governor Ross Barnett, who appeared at Beckwith's first trial to shake hands with the defendant in full view of the jury. In , Beckwith was set free after two all-white juries deadlocked. After Beckwith's second trial, Evers' wife moved their children to California, where she earned a degree from Pomona College and was later named to the Los Angeles Commission of Public Works.
Convinced that her husband's killer had not been brought to justice, she continued to search for new evidence in the case. Related: Mississippi tries to heal wounds with a civil rights museum—but can it own up to its past? His family was threatened, as well; in May , his home was firebombed and subsequently saved by his wife, who put out the blaze with a garden hose. Myrlie and Medgar Evers trained their three children in what to do if they heard gunfire: crawl to the bathroom on the floor, then hide in the bathtub.
The grisly drill became reality in the early morning hours of June 12, , when Evers was shot in the back in his driveway mere hours after President John F.
Kennedy had delivered an address announcing the landmark civil rights legislation that would become the Civil Rights Act of Evers died in an all-white hospital a few hours later; his family had to beg for him to be admitted after he was initially turned away because of his race.
He was just Kennedy, then the U. On July 2, , President Lyndon B. His home is a national monument. Each resulted in a hung jury and a mistrial.
I believe in what is possible for the state of Mississippi. I believe that it will be one of the best places to live in America when we have solved the race problem. I was born in Vicksburg. You are wasting your time. And I fear for your life. All rights reserved. Share Tweet Email. Why it's so hard to treat pain in infants. In , he played an instrumental role in the campaign to have African American student James Meredith admitted to the University of Mississippi.
And she made valuable contributions to the Civil Rights Movement in her own right as a helpmate, researcher for speeches, hostess, chauffeur, and musician. By this time, threats on his life were a regular occurrence, with the Evers name featured prominently on many white supremacist death lists. Nevertheless, Evers remained completely absorbed in the struggle for freedom. His workday often lasted up to twenty hours, consisting of organizing boycotts, marches, prayer vigils, and bailing out those who had been arrested.
In early , the Evers home was firebombed. A few weeks later, on June 12, , President John F. Fifty minutes later, Medgar Evers was dead.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation FBI undertook an investigation of the case and soon came up with a suspect, white supremacist Byron de la Beckwith, whose fingerprints were found on a gun at the murder scene.
De la Beckwith was tried by all-white juries twice in the mids, and both times jurors failed to convict him. It took thirty years for de la Beckwith to be brought to trial a third time. On February 5, , a racially mixed jury found him guilty of the murder of Medgar Evers.
Sentenced to life imprisonment, De la Beckwith died of heart failure in
0コメント