Isn’t it interesting that during some of the most pivotal moments in history, there stood a woman—more specifically a Black woman—in the shadows? Well today I’m pulling another amazing figure out of the shadows and into the marvelous light.
Pauli Murray, born Anna Pauline Murray on November 20, 1910, was a woman of many firsts. Her life was no crystal stair (the Langston Hughes reference seems that much more appropriate due to the fact that they were friends). When she was three years old, her mother died of a massive cerebral hemorrhage—leaving her father to raise six children under that age of 10.
Following her mother’s death, Pauli’s father sent her to live with her aunt—and namesake—Pauline and her maternal grandparents in Durham, North Carolina. A few years later, her father was sent to Crownsville State Hospital for the Negro Insane. His life tragically came to an end in 1923 when a white guard beat him to death with a bat. I can only imagine what it must’ve been like for 12 year old Pauli to learn of the horrific ending to her father’s life. I won’t even go into the description of her father’s body at the funeral—again, her life was no crystal stair.
Pauli was a natural achiever, activist, and leader. Can you believe she taught herself to read at age five? Even as a child she understood the bias of the Jim Crow South. In fact, she chose to walk everywhere to avoid the segregated streetcars. She even boycotted movie theaters rather than sit in the balcony—which was designated for Blacks. A bit of a foreshadowing of her future works in the Civil Rights Movement.
While in high school, she was the editor-in-chief of the school paper, a member of the debate club, president of the literary society, class secretary, and on the basketball team—and she probably did even more, I mean that’s just how amazing she was. After graduating from Hillside High School in 1926 with a certificate of distinction, her academic achievements could have easily gotten her into the North Carolina College for Negros, but she had much bigger aspirations. Pauli had her sights set on Columbia—only one problem, women weren’t allowed.
Never one to be defeated, Pauli pivoted and decided that since she couldn’t afford Barnard, Hunter College was the next best option. The problem? Her transcript didn’t qualify her as black North Carolina schools ended at eleventh grade. And so, she moved to New York and attended Richmond Hill High School as the only African-American student out of 4,000.
After Richmond Hill, she began her education at Hunter College—an all women’s college at the time. During her time at Hunter, she lived in Harlem and rubbed elbows with some very well known African-American figures including Langston Hughes, W.E.B. Debois, and Mary McLeod Bethune. She graduated during the height of the Great Depression—unemployment rates in Harlem were more than 50%. But that didn’t discourage Pauli. She worked odd jobs at places such as the National Urban League and the Workers Education Project and kept working to improve conditions for African-Americans. After taking an interest in the labor movement, she sought to enroll in a graduate program at the University of North Carolina. One problem—they did not allow African-Americans. Seems this is becoming a trend in Pauli’s quest for higher education.
I’m sure you’ve figured out that Pauli didn’t take this lying down. When the NAACP wouldn’t help her, she wrote to President FDR. He didn’t reply but his wife, Eleanor Roosevelt did. And thus a life-long friendship was born. After yet another defeat, Pauli kept pushing forward. She joined the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR) and worked to end segregation on public transport. Fifteen years before Rosa Parks gained popularity for not giving up her seat, Pauli was arrested for refusing to move to the back of a bus in Richmond, Virginia. Although the NAACP did take interest in this case, Virginia only charged her with disorderly conduct—preventing the opportunity to challenge the constitutionality of segregated public interstate transportation.
In 1941, she caught the attention of Thurgood Marshall and Howard law professor Leon Ransom. They convinced her to apply to Howard University—one of the nation’s finest HBCUs (Historically Black Colleges and Universities). While her race was not an issue at Howard, her gender most certainly was. All of her classmates and professors were men—and they made no secret of their opposition to her being there. She coined this treatment “Jane Crow” and spent her lifetime working to end it.
Now for the bet. The wager—a mere $10. The terms—Plessy v. Ferguson would be overturned in 25 years. Ok, let me explain. In 1944, Pauli’s law class was discussing how Jim Crow could be brought to its knees. Most of the conversations around putting an end to Jim Crow were about the “equal” portion of separate but equal. Pauli, always a visionary, begged the question, why not challenge the “separate” part?
Remember, she’s the only woman in a discussion full of men. You can image the looks she received and the cackling that ensued. Her classmates thought that she was being completely impractical. In their eyes, any such challenge of Plessy would result in the Supreme Court affirming the idea of separate but equal. Well we all know who was right. A decade later, Plessy was overturned with Brown v. Board of Education.
For her final law paper, she formalized her idea of challenging the separate part of separate but equal. She argued that segregation was a direct violation of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments. Here’s the amazing part of this story. Her profession at the time, Spottswood Robinson, would later join Thurgood Marshall as a member of the team that argued Brown v. Board of Education. And guess what he leveraged? Ms. Pauli Murray’s final law paper. Who got the last laugh?
Pauli Murray’s life is jam packed with milestones and accomplishments. She broke both racial and gender barriers. Her life is an inspiration and she deserves to be celebrated alongside the likes of Rosa Park, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Justice Thurgood Marshall.
