Marvous Saunders – Glen Echo 5: 1960
Marvous Saunders’ mug shot from his arrest at Glen Echo Amusement Park in Maryland for sitting on the park’s carousel June 30, 1960
The park was the focus of a months-long picketing and political campaign to desegregate the “whites only” facility. The facility formally desegregated shortly before re-opening for the season in the Spring of 1961.
Sauders, along with four others, had their cases go to the U.S. Supreme Court in an attempt to invalidate claims that private businesses had the right to enforce segregation.
The Court ruled in 1964 that the convictions at Glen Echo were invalid on the narrow grounds that the arresting officer (a sheriff deputy working at the park) was an agent of the state and such enforcement was prohibited by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
Later that year, the 1964 Civil Rights Act was signed by President Johnson prohibiting discrimination at facilities open to the public.
For the story behind the scenes on the effort to desegregate Glen Echo, see washingtonspark.wordpress.com/2015/06/26/contradictions-i...
For more information and related images, see Glen Echo Picket: 1960 flic.kr/s/aHsjDFaXGM
Photo is a file card from the Alabama Department of Public Safety created around 1965 and designed to alert law enforcement agencies to individuals involved in civil rights campaigns.
Marvous Saunders – Glen Echo 5: 1960
Marvous Saunders’ mug shot from his arrest at Glen Echo Amusement Park in Maryland for sitting on the park’s carousel June 30, 1960
The park was the focus of a months-long picketing and political campaign to desegregate the “whites only” facility. The facility formally desegregated shortly before re-opening for the season in the Spring of 1961.
Sauders, along with four others, had their cases go to the U.S. Supreme Court in an attempt to invalidate claims that private businesses had the right to enforce segregation.
The Court ruled in 1964 that the convictions at Glen Echo were invalid on the narrow grounds that the arresting officer (a sheriff deputy working at the park) was an agent of the state and such enforcement was prohibited by the 14th Amendment of the Constitution.
Later that year, the 1964 Civil Rights Act was signed by President Johnson prohibiting discrimination at facilities open to the public.
For the story behind the scenes on the effort to desegregate Glen Echo, see washingtonspark.wordpress.com/2015/06/26/contradictions-i...
For more information and related images, see Glen Echo Picket: 1960 flic.kr/s/aHsjDFaXGM
Photo is a file card from the Alabama Department of Public Safety created around 1965 and designed to alert law enforcement agencies to individuals involved in civil rights campaigns.