James Howard Meredith, born on June 25, 1933, in Kosciusko, Mississippi, is an American civil rights activist, writer, political adviser, and United States Air Force veteran. He became a pivotal figure in the Civil Rights Movement when he became the first African-American student admitted to the racially segregated University of Mississippi in 1962. This event marked a significant flashpoint in the struggle for racial equality in the United States.
James Meredith, 1962
Early Life and Education
Growing up in rural Mississippi was difficult for Meredith. In June 1933, Meredith was born the 7th of 13 children in rural Kosciusko, Mississippi.
Unlike many African Americans in Mississippi at the time, his father, Moses, was an independent farmer and a registered voter. Moses Meredith or “Captain”-James Meredith’s father- played a big role in his son’s life, and instilled pride and self-sufficiency in Meredith at a young age. Nestled on the Yockanookany River a little over an hour's drive from Jackson, Kosciusko, Mississippi, was home to James Howard Meredith, who grew up on his family’s 84-acre farm.
Meredith first experienced the humiliation of racial discrimination at age fifteen, on a return train to Mississippi after visiting family in the North. He remembered in 1962, “The train wasn’t segregated when we left Detroit, but when we got to Memphis the conductor told my brother and me we had to go to another car.
Read also: Significance of the Firstborn Plague
He moved to St. Petersburg, Florida, to live with his aunt and attend public schools superior to those available in Kosciusko. Meredith completed 11th grade at Attala County Training School (which was segregated as "white" and "colored" under the state's Jim Crow laws) and completed 12th grade at Gibbs High School in St. Petersburg, Florida. He graduated from high school in 1951.
Military Service and College Application
Meredith enlisted in the armed forces after high school, joining the air force. Meredith enlisted in the armed forces after high school, joining the air force. As the most recently formed branch of military service, the air force lacked a tradition of racism. Over five years, he became known for his meticulous attention to detail and frugality with his work, and in 1956, he received a post in Japan, bringing his new bride, Mary June Wiggins.
In 1960, after an honorable discharge, he returned to Mississippi, where he registered for the fall semester at the all-black Jackson State College. Air Force in 1960, Meredith focused his attention on uprooting White supremacy when he registered at historically Black Jackson State College, now Jackson State University.
Inspired by President John F. Kennedy’s inaugural address in January 1961, Meredith decided to apply to the University of Mississippi (also known as Ole Miss), which was closed to African American students. The day after John F. Kennedy’s presidential inauguration, Meredith decided to submit his first application to the University of Mississippi (also known as Ole Miss), which was closed to African American students.
Applying to the University of Mississippi on January 20, 1961, Meredith was immediately rejected after writing in his application that he was a Black man. He wrote in his application that he wanted admission for his country, race, family, and himself.
Read also: Black Education Pioneers
The university rejected his application twice, but with the help of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, Meredith legally challenged the university’s segregation policy. Unwavering in his mission to be admitted, he reached out to Medgar Evers, field secretary for National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Working closely with Evers, the two young men mirrored each other in courage and boldness, and Meredith wrote to NAACP counsel Thurgood Marshall for legal help.
The fight to attend the University of Mississippi took Meredith and his legal team all over Mississippi, where he appeared before several judges to argue that his admission to the public university was denied due to his skin color. District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi, alleging that the university had rejected him only because of his race, as he had a highly successful record of military service and academic courses.
The case went through many hearings, after which the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit ruled that Meredith had the right to be admitted to the state school.
On September 13, 1962, the District Court entered an injunction directing the members of the Board of Trustees and the officials of the University to register Meredith.
Confrontation and Enrollment
The Democratic Governor of Mississippi, Ross Barnett, declared "no school will be integrated in Mississippi while I am your governor". Claiming state sovereignty in matters of public education, Barnett directed university officials to defy the orders of the Supreme Court.
Read also: Sade Adu's Grammy Achievement
Eager to find another means of stopping Meredith, the state of Mississippi charged him with the crime of moral turpitude. Calling a special session of the legislature, the governor obtained passage of a bill on September 20, 1962, the very day Meredith was to register, denying admission to institutions of higher learning to anyone charged with such a crime.
The same day it became law, Meredith was accused and convicted of "false voter registration," in absentia, in Jackson County.
On September 20, the federal government obtained an injunction against enforcement of this Act and of the two state court decrees that had barred Meredith's registration.
That day Meredith was rebuffed again by Governor Barnett in his efforts to gain admission, though university officials were prepared to admit him.
On September 25, Meredith attempted to register again, but Governor Barnett blocked Meredith’s entry to the College Board office.
On September 28, the Court of Appeals, en banc and after a hearing, found the Governor in civil contempt and ordered that he be arrested and pay a fine of $10,000 for each day that he kept up the refusal, unless he complied by October 2.
On September 29, Lieutenant Governor Paul B. Johnson Jr. Attorney General Robert F. Barnett committed to maintain civil order.
On September 29, Governor Barnett made a spirited speech at halftime of the Ole Miss-Kentucky football game, firing up the crowd and encouraging people to block Meredith’s entry to the university. He said, in part, "I love Mississippi! I love her people, our customs ... I call upon every Mississippian to stand firm now. No compromise with surrender. With our faith in our God, and our love for our state, we will either find a way, or make one.”
Hundreds of civilians, many of them armed, began to take action themselves by entering Oxford and the university’s campus in protest.
On September 30, 1962, a group of marshals, including the deputy attorney general, escorted Meredith to his dormitory. Hundreds of United States marshals, Mississippi National Guards, and members of the regular military lined the front of the administration building. As crowds began to gather, James Meredith was quietly installed, unseen, in a dormitory.
As dusk fell on the 30th, angry students gathered outside the building. Their numbers quickly grew. The contingent of deputy marshals spaced themselves on the sidewalk outside of the building and held guard. The deputies concealed loaded side arms under their suit coats, but they were ordered not to use them. About every third man had a teargas launcher with blast dispersion ammunition rather than projectile ammunition. They were outfitted in makeshift military gear.
The confrontation between the mob and the deputies raged on. The earliest backup came from Mississippi National Guard soldiers, whom the president federalized. The chaos continued.
Meredith was the first black student to attend "Ole Miss" and was registered at the school after a violent confrontation between students and Deputies. One hundred and sixty Deputies were injured - 28 by gunfire.
The crowd assaulted the marshals with bricks and bullets outside the Lyceum, the university’s administration building, until the arrival of federal troops quelled the violence in the early morning hours. Two bystanders died in the confrontation, 206 marshals and soldiers were wounded and 200 individuals were arrested.
On October 1, 1962, Meredith finally registered for his classes, but his presence at the University of Mississippi drew hostility from students. James Meredith officially became the first African American student at the University of Mississippi on October 2, 1962. deputy marshals and army troops, and he endured constant verbal harassment from a minority of students.
Federal troops remained on campus for more than a year to ensure his safety. Five hundred troops were maintained at the university to ensure his safety.
James Meredith escorted to class at Ole Miss, 1962
As a result, he described himself as “the most segregated Negro in America.” The broadside “Rebel Resistance” was created by students, in collaboration with the Citizens’ Council, to urge students to avoid any association with Meredith. Many students harassed Meredith during his two semesters on campus, but others accepted him. According to first-person accounts, students living in Meredith's dorm bounced basketballs on the floor just above his room through all hours of the night. Other students ostracized him: when Meredith walked into the cafeteria for meals, the students eating would turn their backs.
Graduation and Later Life
Despite these challenges, Meredith graduated with a bachelor’s degree in August 1963. When Meredith graduated in August, 1963, two lives had been lost, and the federal government had spent nearly $5 million.
Meredith continued his studies, receiving a law degree from Columbia University. He went on to earn his LL.B.
In 1966 Meredith began a “March Against Fear,” a solitary march from Memphis, Tennessee, to Jackson, Mississippi, to encourage African American voter registration. In 1966, Meredith organized and led a solo, personal March Against Fear for 220 miles from Memphis, Tennessee, to Jackson, Mississippi, beginning on June 6, 1966. Inviting only black men to join him, he wanted to highlight continuing racial oppression in the Mississippi Delta, as well as to encourage blacks to register and vote following passage of the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965, which authorized federal oversight and enforcement of rights.
Inviting only black men to join him, he wanted to highlight continuing racial oppression in the Mississippi Delta, as well as to encourage blacks to register and vote following passage of the federal Voting Rights Act of 1965, which authorized federal oversight and enforcement of rights.
On the second day of the march, Meredith absorbed nearly one hundred pellet wounds when a sniper opened fire. When a sniper wounded him on the second day of the march, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Congress of Racial Equality, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee rallied behind his cause.
In 1967, while living and studying in New York, Meredith decided to run as a Republican against incumbent Adam Clayton Powell Jr., a multi-term Democrat, in a special election for the Congressional seat in Harlem.
Over the next several years Meredith became more politically involved, making several unsuccessful bids for public office, including a run for the Republican nomination for senator from Mississippi.
An active Republican, Meredith served from 1989 to 1991 as a domestic adviser on the staff of United States Senator Jesse Helms. Faced with criticism from the civil rights community for working for the avowed segregationist, Meredith said that he had applied to every member of the Senate and House offering his services, and only Helms' office responded.
In 2002, officials at the University of Mississippi celebrated the 40th anniversary of Meredith's historic admission and integration of the institution with a year-long series of events.
When interviewed in 2002, the 40th anniversary of his enrollment at University of Mississippi, Meredith said, "Nothing could be more insulting to me than the concept of civil rights. I was engaged in a war. I considered myself engaged in a war from Day One."
Legacy and Recognition
In a March 1963 letter published in the New York Amsterdam News, King asked for the public’s support of Meredith, describing him as “a symbol of self-respect and dignity.” In Martin Luther King’s famous “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” he called James Meredith, the first African American to integrate the University of Mississippi in 1962, a hero of the civil rights movement.
Messages of support for Meredith arrived from all over the world, including from Rosa Parks, Josephine Baker and Langston Hughes. He honored Meredith and others for their strong sense of purpose that allowed them to stand up to the hostility directed at them by opponents of civil rights.
By January, 1966, all but one of the public institutions of higher learning in Mississippi had signed an agreement to comply with the stipulations of Title VI.
In 2002 and again in 2012, the University of Mississippi led year-long series of events to celebrate the 40th and 50th anniversaries of Meredith's integration of the institution. He was among numerous speakers invited to the campus, where a statue of him commemorates his role.
James Meredith's courageous stand against segregation at the University of Mississippi remains a landmark moment in the Civil Rights Movement. His perseverance in the face of intense opposition paved the way for future generations of African American students and contributed significantly to the advancement of racial equality in the United States.
