User:Traciavant

James Meredith was born. In the Wikipedia article it starts with when he was born and the fact that he was an American civil rights movement figure. I would then state that in 1962, he was the first African-American student admitted to the segregated University of Mississippi. I would give the following background to Mr. Meredith’s decision to apply for entrance to the University of Mississippi later to be referred to as “Ole Miss.” “While he was in the air force, Meredith received special inspiration from a white colonel from Mississippi” (Eagles, 2009). I would include the information about James Meredith being in the Air Force; because his service in the military was later used by the Mississippi state attorney’s office as a means to disqualify Mr. Meredith for admission to Ole Miss. Then I would state the turning point for James Meredith to move on his desire to attend the University of Mississippi. “One day after watching the flickering black-and-white TV images of John Kennedy taking the oath of office on January 20, 1961, James Meredith sat down at his Smith-Corona portable typewriter and wrote to the University of Mississippi, asked for a brochure and an application, and in so doing, quietly launched a one-man revolution” (Doyle, 2001). I would go on to state that it was his goal to put pressure on the University of Mississippi and the Kennedy administration to enforce civil rights for African Americans. In my webpage I would talk about the many legal procedures that James Meredith had to endure to be accepted to the University of Mississippi. I would include information on the original court proceedings by Judge Sidney Mize. And finally I would print the statement by Judge John Minor Wisdom: “He intended that the court’s decision would pierce the veil of innocuity surrounding the state’s segregation policy, but he recognized, as he said, “There are none so blind as those that will not see.”  The court reversed Judge Mize’s ruling and directed him to issue the injunction requested by the plaintiff. Ole Miss would have to admit its first black student” (Eagles, 2009). I would go on and state that James Meredith wrote that he wanted admission for his country, race, family, and himself. I would create links with scholarly journals and books that gave an accurate assessment of the trials and tribulations that James Meredith had to go through just to get into the University of Mississippi. Finally, the Wikipedia website had some factual mistakes, and I felt it didn’t go into the legal gymnastics that the racist judges in Mississippi used to deny James Meredith his constitutional right to equal education under the law.

Resources Doyle, W. (2001). An American Insurrection. New York: Random House, Inc. Eagles, C. W. (2009). The Price of Defiance: James Meredith and the Integration of Ole Miss. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press.