Keep On Keeping On

The NAACP and the Implementation of Brown v. Board of Education in Virginia

Brian J. Daugherity

• Publisher: University of Virginia Press
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9780813938905
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Storia nordamericana

Virginia was a battleground state in the struggle to implement Brown v. Board of Education, with one of the South's largest and strongest NAACP units fighting against a program of noncompliance crafted by the state's political leaders. Keep On Keeping On offers a detailed examination of how African Americans and the NAACP in Virginia successfully pursued a legal agenda that provided new educational opportunities for the state's black population in the face of fierce opposition from segregationists and the Democratic Party of Harry F. Byrd Sr.

Keep On Keeping On is the first book to offer a comprehensive view of African Americans' efforts to obtain racial equality in Virginia in the later twentieth century. Brian J. Daugherity considers the relationship between the various levels of the NAACP, the ideas and actions of other African American organizations, and the stances of Virginia's political leaders, white liberals and moderates, and segregationists. In doing so, the author provides a better understanding of the connections between the actions of white political leaders and those of black civil rights activists working to bring about school desegregation. Blending social, legal, southern, and African American history, this book sheds new light on the civil rights movement and white resistance to civil rights in Virginia and the South.

INDEX

Italicized page numbers refer to illustrations.

Abbitt, Watkins M., Sr., 30, 47, 52, 72

Abingdon, VA, 7

African American population in Virginia, 13, 14–15, 24

Agricultural and Technical College of North Carolina, 80

Alabama, 48, 52, 65–66, 69, 77, 83, 94, 166n3

Albemarle County, VA, 95, 101, 118

Alexander v. Holmes County Board of Education (1969), 136–37

Allen v. School Board of the City of Charlottesville (1956), 49, 51, 53, 57, 66

Almond, J. Lindsay, Jr., 15, 23; assassination attempt, 75; attorney general of Virginia, 21, 32, 34, 52–53, 56, 60–61; governor, 59, 68, 69, 70, 72, 74–76; gubernatorial campaign of 1957, 67–68; opposition to NAACP, 33, 38

Alston v. School Board of the City of Norfolk (1940), 11, 16

anti-NAACP laws, 52–53, 54–58, 61, 68–69, 87–88. See also General Assembly of Virginia; massive resistance

Alexandria, VA, 37, 46, 51, 55, 75, 82, 101

Amelia County, VA, 110, 117–18

American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), 113

Amherst County, VA, 137

anti-communism. See Cold War Arkansas, 23, 52, 67–69, 83

Arlington County, VA, 49–50, 51–52, 82, 86, 95–96, 99; initial school desegregation, 59, 74–75; NAACP branch, 37, 43, 50; school board, 32, 47, 53

Ashe, Victor J., 46

Atlanta, GA, 26, 28, 35, 36, 45–46, 66

Atlanta Declaration, 26

Baltimore Afro-American, 35

Banks, W. Lester, 2, 6, 28, 29, 33–34, 46, 57, 64, 70, 88, 95, 100, 112, 114; arrests, 85, 103, 190n102; background, 12; in Davis v. Prince Edward County, 20; equalization campaign, 17; executive secretary of Virginia St...