Ten new bi-racial "Freedom Riders" who were arrested yesterday in Montgomery, Ala….

Press Release
May 26, 1961

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Ten new bi-racial "Freedom Riders" who were arrested yesterday in Montgomery, Ala…. preview

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Press Releases, Loose Pages. Ten new bi-racial "Freedom Riders" who were arrested yesterday in Montgomery, Ala…., 1961. 96b3fedb-bc92-ee11-be37-00224827e97b. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/67046ccd-682a-493a-b789-e671bde94174/ten-new-bi-racial-freedom-riders-who-were-arrested-yesterday-in-montgomery-ala. Accessed July 30, 2025.

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    PRESS RELEASE® r) 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
10 COLUMBUS CIRCLE » NEW YORK 19,N.Y. © JUdson 6-8397 

DR. ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS oe THURGOOD MARSHALL 
President Director-Counsel 

May 26, 1961 

NEW YORK, -- Ten new bi-racial "Freedom Riders" who were 

arrested yesterday in Montgomery, Ala., moved today to intervene in 

a pending federal suit which challenges Alabama's segregation of 

buses, bus terminals, and terminal facilities. 

The new group was arrested for attempting to use Montgomery bus 

terminal lunch counters on a desegregated basis, and they are cur- 

rently being held under $1,000 bond each. 

The 10 plaintiffs include@ Negro leaders Ralph D. 

Abernathy and Fred M. Shuttlesworth, students Wyatt T. Walker and 

Bernard S. Lee of Atlanta, Ga., two Yale University professors, two 

Wesleyan University professors, and three students, two from 

Johnson C. Smith University and one from Yale. 

The pending suit was filed last night in behalf of "Freedom 

Riders" who were victimized in Saturday's rioting in Montgomery. It 

asked the federal district court to dissolve a state court injunction 

against the "Freedom Riders," and to uphold desegregation in bus 

transportation and terminal facilities, 

The suit was filed in the Federal District Court for the Middle 

District of Alabama, Northern Division, in Montgomery by NAACP Legal 

Defense and Educational Fund attorneys. The Justice Department also 

entered the case as a "friend of the court." 

The court was asked to prohibit interstate and intrastate bus 

companies and Alabama officials from (a) segregating passengers on 

the basis of race; (b) segregating terminal facilities and services; 

(c) enforcing segregation by use of racial signs, and "arresting, 

harassing, intimidating and threatening" Negro citizens who seek to 

use such facilities on a desegregated basis. 



A June, 1956 decision desegregating all Montgomery buses and 

facilities, issued by the Federal District Court in which the May 25, 

1961 action was filed, was cited in support of the requested court 

order. 

The court was also asked to enjoin Attorney General MacDonald 

Gallion of Alabama from proceeding with contempt actions against the 

"Ereedom Riders." The state court injunction, entered May 19, 1961, 

charged that the "Freedom Riders" were "performing acts calculated to 

cause breaches of the peace." 

The NAACP Legal Defense Fund complaint states that the Alabama 

injunction "controverts" the 1956 desegregation order of the federal 

court and "would enforce" segregation of buses and bus terminals. 

A hearing in the state court had been scheduled for May 26, 

1961, but no warrants as yet have been served on any of the twenty 

"Freedom Riders" cited in the injunction. 

Several of the "Freedom Riders" named in the state court injunc- 

tion left Montgomery on Wednesday's trip through Mississippi, and are 

presently jailed in Jackson, Miss. 

Defendants cited are Alabama Attorney General MacDonald Gallion; 

Montgomery County Sheriff Mac Sim Butler; William F. Thetford, Cir- 

cuit Solicitor for the 15th Judicial Circuit; Alabama Public Service 

Commissioners C. C. Owen, J. S. Foster and Sibyl Pool; Montgomery 

Police Chief Goodwin J. Ruppenthal; Montgomery City Commissioners 

Earl James, L. B. Sullivan and Frank Parks; the Southeastern Grey- 

hound Lines, a Division of Greyhound Corp., Capital Motor Lines, Inc., 

Continental Cresent Lines, Inc., and Gulf Transport Company, Inc. 

NAACP Legal Defense Fund attorneys representing the "Freedom 

Riders" are Thurgood Marshall, Jack Greenberg and Constance Baker 

Motley, all of New York City; S. S. Seay and Fred Gray of Montgomery, 

Ala. 

630: =

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Ten new bi-racial "Freedom Riders" who were arrested yesterday in Montgomery, Ala….

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