John Lewis & the Nashville Sit-Ins

John Lewis came to Nashville to attend Fisk University and American Baptist College. He quickly became a local and national leader of the Civil Rights Movement, which used nonviolent sit-ins and marches to change the Jim Crow laws. On February 27, 1960, Lewis and almost 200 students were arrested for sitting at the segregated lunch counters on 5th Avenue (now renamed Rep. John Lewis Way). He was handcuffed, loaded into a paddy wagon, and taken to jail. The students were charged with disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace, and resisting arrest while trying to sit and eat at the all-white lunch counters.

The students were represented in court by a dream team of local African American lawyers, including Z. Alexander Looby, Avon Williams, Jr., Sr., Adolpho A. Birch, Jr., Coyness Ennix, and Robert Lillard. These lawyers raised constitutional issues in this first of many cases where the students went to court in Nashville.

The next month, on April 19, 1960, at 5:00 am, the home of lead attorney and City Councilman Z. Alexander Looby was bombed. The massive explosion blew off the front of his house (Looby and his wife were not injured because they were in the rear of the home at the time.)

Word about the bombing quickly spread through the historically black college campuses in Nashville. That afternoon, 4,000 students marched to City Hall where Fisk University student Diane Nash confronted Mayor Ben West and asked if segregation at the lunch counters was right. Mayor West said it was not, and the 5th Avenue lunch counter segregation soon ended.

But that did not end segregation in all Nashville eating establishments. While African Americans could now get service at the four lunch counters on 5th Avenue, establishments located just one block away on 6th Avenue and on Church, including B&W Cafeteria, Cross Keys, Candyland, and Tic-Toc, all still excluded this group from dining in their restaurants.

Neither did Lewis end his marching and sit-ins after the Woolworth victory. He was arrested another eight times in Nashville using the nonviolent protest methods he learned here.

The most significant of these arrests happened on Sunday, October 21, 1962, when Lewis and seven other students went after church services to the B&W Cafeteria on 6th Avenue. The popular establishment had recently hired a doorman to block all African Americans from entering the restaurant. When the students arrived, the doorman told them they could not enter. The students said, “we are coming in and are going to eat when we get in.” The students were arrested.

The case was heard by an all-white jury, which convicted all eight students, fined them $50 each, and sent them to the Davidson County Workhouse for 90 days. Attorneys Looby and Williams immediately appealed the decision. The Tennessee Supreme Court affirmed their convictions on January 8, 1964.1

Chief Justice Hamilton Burnett’s opinion held “the securing of constitutional rights must be done in a lawful man-

(continued on page 23)

ner,” and the students “cannot interfere with B&W’s trade by blocking the latter’s entrance in order to redress a wrong that they feel that the cafeteria has visited upon them.”2 The opinion did not address Looby and Williams’ arguments about the violation of the students’ civil rights and their access to public accommodations.

The Tennessee Supreme Court also upheld the use of an all-white jury, citing Kennedy v. State, 210 S.W.2d 132 (1947).3 Ignoring Looby and Williams’ evidence and arguments that members of the jury said they held racial bias, the court ruled “no such discrimination is shown in this case.”4

Looby and Williams appealed the ruling to the United State Supreme Court, which heard the case on March 8, 1965. Attorney James Nabrit III of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund argued the case in front of the Court, with briefs provided by Looby, Williams, Constance Baker Motley, Jack Greenberg, and Charles Black, Jr. Assistant Attorney General Thomas E. Fox argued the case for the State, and Attorney General George McCanless provided a brief for the State.

The United States Supreme Court overturned the convictions based on its decision in Hamm v. City of Rock Hill, which was based on the newly passed Civil Rights Act of 1964 that banned discrimination in restaurants and hotels.5 Like the Hamm decision, the justices in McKinnie were divided 5-4, with the majority holding the convictions should be thrown out even though the sit-ins took place prior to passage of the Civil Rights Act.6

Although it may be overshadowed by the United States Supreme Court’s landmark decision in Katzenbach v. McClung, 7 the McKinnie ruling is still notable as it affirmed John Lewis’s first acts of “Good Trouble”—helping to successfully integrate lunch counters and restaurants in Nashville. n

DAVID EWING is a ninth generation Nashvillian and historian. In 2016, he located the lost mugshots of John Lewis’ first arrests in Nashville.

1 See McKinnie v. State, 379 S.W.2d 214 (Tenn. 1964). 2 Id. at 221. 3 See id. at 220. 4 Id. 5 McKinnie v. Tennessee, 380 U.S. 449, 449 (1965) (relying on Hamm v. City of Rock Hill, 379 U.S. 306 (1964)). 6 See id.; see also Hamm, 379 U.S. at 312-17. 7 379 U.S. 294 (1964).

The YLD will be hosting an event for donors to meet Omari Booker and view his artwork as well as the artwork of Henry L. Jones at the Kindred Links exhibit on display at the Parthenon on February 3, 2022 from 5:30 pm to 7:30 pm. This reception will be for donors only and will allow attendees to hear from these two artists. To receive an exclusive invitation and other benefits, we have several sponsorship opportunities available.