Irene Morgan

Irene Morgan v Commonwealth of Virginia, 328 U.S. 373 (1946)

     Morgan (1917 - 2007) worked for a defense contractor on the production line for B-26 Marauders in Baltimore, MD, supporting the World War II effort.  She had been recuperating with her mother in Gloucester County, VA, after suffering a miscarriage.  She wanted to return to work and needed to visit her doctor, so she boarded a Greyhound Bus bound for Baltimore, MD, on July 16, 1944. There were no Black or White seat designations on the bus, but a Black person could not sit next to or across from a White person.

     A White couple boarded the bus at the Middlesex County, VA, stop. The bus driver ordered Morgan and her seatmate to move. Morgan's seatmate moved, but Morgan refused. The driver got off the bus and summoned the sheriff.  The sheriff presented Morgan with an arrest warrant. She tore it up and threw it out of the window.  When the sheriff grabbed her to remove her, she kicked him in the groin. That sheriff left and another came on the bus. Morgan said she was going to bite him, but he looked dirty, so she clawed him instead. The sheriff said he would use his nightstick on her, and Morgan said, "We'll whip each other."

     Morgan was arrested and charged with resisting arrest and violating Virginia's Jim Crow transit law. She was convicted in 1944 for violating state segregation laws in public facilities and transportation. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund took on her case. The Virginia Supreme Court ruled that she violated the law. She appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court.  William H. Hastie and Thurgood Marshall were assigned the case. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-1 in 1946 that Virginia's law enforcing segregation on interstate buses was unconstitutional.  Hastie and Marshall argued that segregation on interstate travel violated the Interstate Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution instead of arguing the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment Morgan's case, Irene Morgan v Commonwealth of Virginia, 328 U.S. 373 (1946) inspired the Journey of Reconciliation (1947), also called the "First Freedom Ride", wherein a group of eight White and eight Black men (including Bayard Rustin) travelled through the upper South using interstate transportation to test enforcement of the Morgan ruling.