Attorneys ask Alabama Supreme Court for stay of Jail Sentences for Negro Leaders in Birmingham

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May 15, 1963

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Press Releases, Loose Pages. Attorneys ask Alabama Supreme Court for stay of Jail Sentences for Negro Leaders in Birmingham, 1963. 63aa673c-bd92-ee11-be37-6045bddb811f. LDF Archives, Thurgood Marshall Institute. https://ldfrecollection.org/archives/archives-search/archives-item/c6ef82f6-5fd9-47de-b00f-03b307bdb49f/attorneys-ask-alabama-supreme-court-for-stay-of-jail-sentences-for-negro-leaders-in-birmingham. Accessed November 23, 2025.

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    PRESS RELEASE @ @ 

NAACP LEGAL DEFENSE AND EDUCATIONAL FUND 
1OCOLUMBUS CIRCLE + NEW YORK19,N.Y. © JUdson 6-8397 
DR. ALLAN KNIGHT CHALMERS JACK GREENBERG 
President CONSTANCE BAKER MOTLEY 

Director-Counsel Associate Counsel 

os 

ATTORNEYS ASK ALABAMA SUPREME COURT 
FOR STAY OF JAIL SENTENCES FOR 

NEGRO LEADERS IN BIRMINGHAM 
May 15, 1963 

NEW YORK -- NAACP Legal Defense Fund attorneys Arthur D. Shores and 

Norman Amaker asked the Supreme Court of Alabama today to stay the 

sentences, issued April 26th by a Birmingham Circuit Court, of 

Dr. Martin Luther King and ten of his aides. An appeal was filed 

Monday with the Alabama high court. 

The Southern Christian Leadership Conference officials are 

scheduled to begin serving five day jail terms tomorrow. They were 

also fined $50 each. They were convicted of criminal contempt by 

Judge W, A, Jenkins for violating his injunction against anti-segre- 

gation demonstrations which was issued April 10th. The injunction 

prohibited unlawful picketing, parading and other forms of demonstrat- 

ing. 

SCLC officials who face sentence, in addition to Dr. King, are 

Ralph Abernathy, F. L. Shuttlesworth, Wyatt T. Walker, Andrew Young, 

James Bevel, T. L. Fisher, J. W. Hayes, A. D. King, John T, Porter 

and Nelson H, Smith, Jr. 

The brief filed by Legal Defense Fund attorneys argues, among 

other things, that the “injunction [of April 10th] is void as a denial 

of due process of law under the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitu- 

tion of the United States." 

Fund attorneys are representing all of the more than 2,000 Negro 

citizens who have been convicted in Birmingham for demonstrations dur- 

ing the last month. The attorneys are Arthur D. Shores and Orzell 

Billingsley, Jr. of Birmingham, and Norman C, Amaker, Leroy Clark, 

Jack Greenberg and Mrs. Constance Baker Motley of New York City. 

HHH

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Attorneys ask Alabama Supreme Court for stay of Jail Sentences for Negro Leaders in Birmingham

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