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Fred Gray (attorney)
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Fred Gray (attorney)
Fred David Gray (born December 14, 1930) is an American civil rights attorney, preacher, activist, and state legislator from Alabama. He handled many prominent civil rights cases, such as Browder v. Gayle, and was elected to the Alabama House of Representatives in 1970, along with Thomas Reed, both from Tuskegee. They were the first black state legislators in Alabama in the 20th century. He served as the president of the National Bar Association in 1985, and in 2001 was elected as the first African-American President of the Alabama State Bar.
Born in Montgomery, Alabama, Gray attended the Loveless School, where his aunt taught, until the seventh grade. He attended the Nashville Christian Institute (NCI), a boarding school operated by the Churches of Christ, where he assisted NCI president and noted preacher Marshall Keeble in visiting other churches of the racially diverse nondenominational fellowship. After graduation, Gray matriculated at Alabama State College for Negroes, and received a baccalaureate degree in 1951. Encouraged by a teacher to apply to law school despite his earlier plans to become an historian and preacher, Gray moved to Cleveland, Ohio, and received a juris doctor degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Law in 1954. At the time there was no law school in Alabama that would accept African Americans.
After passing the bar examination, Gray returned to his home town and established a law office. He also began preaching at the Holt Street Church of Christ, where his parents had long been devout members.
In 1957, Gray fulfilled his mother's dream by becoming a preacher in Churches of Christ. In 1974, he helped merge white and black congregations in Tuskegee, Alabama, where he had moved. Gray also served on the board of trustees for Southwestern Christian College, a historically black college near Dallas, Texas affiliated with the Churches of Christ. In 2012 Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tennessee, also affiliated with the Churches of Christ bestowed a doctorate of humane letters honoris causa upon Gray in 2012. Gray once challenged Lipscomb's segregation practices.
During the Civil Rights Movement, Gray came to prominence working with Martin Luther King Jr. and E.D. Nixon, among others. In some of his first cases as a young Alabama attorney (and solo practitioner), Gray defended Claudette Colvin and later Rosa Parks, who were charged with disorderly conduct for refusing to seat themselves in the rear of segregated city buses.
After Alabama Attorney General John Malcolm Patterson effectively prohibited the NAACP from operating in Alabama in 1956, Gray provided legal counsel for eight years (including three trips through the state court system and two through federal courts) until the organization was permitted to operate in the state. He also successfully defended Martin Luther King Jr. from charges of tax evasion in 1960, winning an acquittal from an all-white jury.
Other notable civil rights cases brought and argued by Gray included Dixon v. Alabama (1961, which established due process rights for students at public universities), Gomillion v. Lightfoot (1962, which overturned state redistricting of Tuskegee that excluded most of the majority-black residents; this contributed to laying a foundation for "one man, one vote") and Williams v. Wallace (1963, which protected the Selma to Montgomery marchers). In another Supreme Court case, Gray was driven in his efforts to have the NAACP organize in Alabama after the group was forbidden in the state.
Alabama resisted integration of public schools following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954) that ruled segregation of public schools was unconstitutional. Gray successfully represented Vivian Malone and James Hood, who had been denied admission to the University of Alabama, and they entered the university despite Governor George Wallace's Stand in the Schoolhouse Door incident. In 1963 Gray successfully sued Florence State University (now University of North Alabama) on behalf of Wendell Wilkie Gunn, who had been denied admission based on race. Gray also led the successful effort to desegregate Auburn University. In 1963 Gray filed the Lee v. Macon County Board of Education case, which in 1967 led a three-judge panel of U.S. District Judges to order all Alabama public schools not already subject to court orders to desegregate. Lawsuits filed by Gray helped desegregate more than 100 local school systems, as well as all public colleges and universities in his home state.
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Fred Gray (attorney)
Fred David Gray (born December 14, 1930) is an American civil rights attorney, preacher, activist, and state legislator from Alabama. He handled many prominent civil rights cases, such as Browder v. Gayle, and was elected to the Alabama House of Representatives in 1970, along with Thomas Reed, both from Tuskegee. They were the first black state legislators in Alabama in the 20th century. He served as the president of the National Bar Association in 1985, and in 2001 was elected as the first African-American President of the Alabama State Bar.
Born in Montgomery, Alabama, Gray attended the Loveless School, where his aunt taught, until the seventh grade. He attended the Nashville Christian Institute (NCI), a boarding school operated by the Churches of Christ, where he assisted NCI president and noted preacher Marshall Keeble in visiting other churches of the racially diverse nondenominational fellowship. After graduation, Gray matriculated at Alabama State College for Negroes, and received a baccalaureate degree in 1951. Encouraged by a teacher to apply to law school despite his earlier plans to become an historian and preacher, Gray moved to Cleveland, Ohio, and received a juris doctor degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Law in 1954. At the time there was no law school in Alabama that would accept African Americans.
After passing the bar examination, Gray returned to his home town and established a law office. He also began preaching at the Holt Street Church of Christ, where his parents had long been devout members.
In 1957, Gray fulfilled his mother's dream by becoming a preacher in Churches of Christ. In 1974, he helped merge white and black congregations in Tuskegee, Alabama, where he had moved. Gray also served on the board of trustees for Southwestern Christian College, a historically black college near Dallas, Texas affiliated with the Churches of Christ. In 2012 Lipscomb University in Nashville, Tennessee, also affiliated with the Churches of Christ bestowed a doctorate of humane letters honoris causa upon Gray in 2012. Gray once challenged Lipscomb's segregation practices.
During the Civil Rights Movement, Gray came to prominence working with Martin Luther King Jr. and E.D. Nixon, among others. In some of his first cases as a young Alabama attorney (and solo practitioner), Gray defended Claudette Colvin and later Rosa Parks, who were charged with disorderly conduct for refusing to seat themselves in the rear of segregated city buses.
After Alabama Attorney General John Malcolm Patterson effectively prohibited the NAACP from operating in Alabama in 1956, Gray provided legal counsel for eight years (including three trips through the state court system and two through federal courts) until the organization was permitted to operate in the state. He also successfully defended Martin Luther King Jr. from charges of tax evasion in 1960, winning an acquittal from an all-white jury.
Other notable civil rights cases brought and argued by Gray included Dixon v. Alabama (1961, which established due process rights for students at public universities), Gomillion v. Lightfoot (1962, which overturned state redistricting of Tuskegee that excluded most of the majority-black residents; this contributed to laying a foundation for "one man, one vote") and Williams v. Wallace (1963, which protected the Selma to Montgomery marchers). In another Supreme Court case, Gray was driven in his efforts to have the NAACP organize in Alabama after the group was forbidden in the state.
Alabama resisted integration of public schools following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Brown v. Board of Education (1954) that ruled segregation of public schools was unconstitutional. Gray successfully represented Vivian Malone and James Hood, who had been denied admission to the University of Alabama, and they entered the university despite Governor George Wallace's Stand in the Schoolhouse Door incident. In 1963 Gray successfully sued Florence State University (now University of North Alabama) on behalf of Wendell Wilkie Gunn, who had been denied admission based on race. Gray also led the successful effort to desegregate Auburn University. In 1963 Gray filed the Lee v. Macon County Board of Education case, which in 1967 led a three-judge panel of U.S. District Judges to order all Alabama public schools not already subject to court orders to desegregate. Lawsuits filed by Gray helped desegregate more than 100 local school systems, as well as all public colleges and universities in his home state.
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