Mae Bertha Carter (January 13, 1923 – April 28, 1999) was an activist during the

Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...

from

Drew, Mississippi Drew is a city in Sunflower County, Mississippi. The population was 1,927 at the 2010 census. Drew is in the vicinity of several plantations and the Mississippi State Penitentiary, a Mississippi Department of Corrections prison for men. It is note ...

.Moye, J. Todd. '' Let the People Decide: Black Freedom and White Resistance Movements in Sunflower County, Mississippi, 1945-1986''.

University of North Carolina Press The University of North Carolina Press (or UNC Press), founded in 1922, is a university press that is part of the University of North Carolina. It was the first university press founded in the Southern United States. It is a member of the Ass ...

, November 29, 2004
28
Retrieved from

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on February 26, 2012. , 9780807855614. Carter was born on January 13, 1923, in

Sunflower County, Mississippi Sunflower County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2010 census, the population was 29,450. Its largest city and county seat is Indianola. Sunflower County comprises the Indianola, MS Micropolitan Statistical Are ...

. In 1943 Mae Bertha married Mathew Carter, with whom she had thirteen children. In Sunflower County she enrolled 7 of her 13 children in schools previously reserved for Whites in the fall of 1965. She continued to keep her children in the schools even though a person fired bullets into her house, and even though her landlord evicted her and her family. Carter and

Marian Wright Edelman Marian Wright Edelman (born June 6, 1939) is an American activist for civil rights and children's rights. She is the founder and president emerita of the Children's Defense Fund. She influenced leaders such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Hillary ...

, a lawyer who worked for the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund Inc., sued the Drew School District to challenge the Mississippi "freedom of choice" law. In 1969 the plaintiffs won the suit.Ravo, Nick.
Mae Bertha Carter, 76, Mother Who Defied Segregation Law
" ''

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''. May 6, 1999. Retrieved on March 30, 2012. In 1969 a court order ended the segregation system in the Drew School District. All seven of her children graduated from the previously all-White Drew High School.Glisson, p
224
/ref> Mae Bertha Carter credits a woman named Hattie Leggett with being the person who most influenced her life. She died in her home in Drew on April 28, 1999. Mrs. Carter is the central figure in Constance Curry's book ''Silver Rights'' (1995, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill).

References

* Glisson, Susan M. ''The Human Tradition in the Civil Rights Movement''.

Rowman & Littlefield Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group is an independent publishing house founded in 1949. Under several imprints, the company offers scholarly books for the academic market, as well as trade books. The company also owns the book distributing compa ...

, 2006. , 9780742544093.

Notes

1923 births 1999 deaths African-American activists People from Sunflower County, Mississippi People from Drew, Mississippi {{Mississippi-stub

See also

References

Notes