Virginia Memory, Library of Virginia
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THIS DAY IN VIRGINIA HISTORY

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September 05, 1956

Sideviews on the News: Virginia General Assembly Public Hearings on School Legislation, 5–6 September 1956 (WRVA–141), WRVA Radio Collection, Accession 38210, Library of Virginia, Richmond, Virginia.

Lester Banks Testified Before the General Assembly on School Segregation

In this radio broadcast, William Lester Banks (1911–1986), executive secretary for the Virginia State Conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), testified at a General Assembly hearing on public school integration. Banks stated that the Virginia NAACP opposed all plans that obstructed desegregation. In 1956 Senator Harry Flood Byrd (1887–1966) promoted a policy of Massive Resistance to prevent public school desegregation after the U.S. Supreme Court's Brown v. Board of Education decision. That September the General Assembly passed legislation severely impeding the NAACP's legal maneuvering for integration. The NAACP filed lawsuits in response, and Virginia's Massive Resistance laws were eventually declared unconstitutional.

09-05-1956_Lester_Banks-clip.mp3Listen to Lester Banks Testified Before the General Assembly on School Segregation (Transcription)