National Association for the Advancement of Colored People v. Alabama 1958

Petitioner: National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

Respondent: State of Alabama

Petitioner's Claim: That forcing the NAACP to reveal the names of its Alabama members violated their freedom of association.

Chief Lawyer for Petitioner: Robert L. Carter

Chief Lawyer for Respondent: Edmond L. Rinehart, Assistant Attorney General of Alabama

Justices for the Court: Hugo Lafayette Black, William J. Brennan, Jr., Harold Burton, Tom C. Clark, William O. Douglas, John Marshall Harlan II (writing for the Court), Potter Stewart, Earl Warren, Charles Evans Whittaker

Justices Dissenting: None

Date of Decision: June 30, 1958

Decision: The NAACP did not have to reveal the names of its Alabama members.

Significance: The decision said privacy is an essential part of the freedom of association. Privacy was important for many African Americans during the civil rights movement, which was unpopular among many white Americans.

Separate is not equal

In the landmark case of Brown v. Board of Education (1954), the U.S. Supreme Court said segregation in public schools is unconstitutional. Segregation was the practice of separating black and white people in different facilities. After Brown, however, segregation continued in public places such as restaurants, buses, restrooms, and water fountains.

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People ("NAACP") is an organization that works to ensure equality for minorities in the United States. It has headquarters in New York and branch offices throughout the nation. In the 1950s, the NAACP fought to help African Americans end segregation. Many white Americans who did not want African Americans to be equal fought against the NAACP. This was especially true in southern states.

Way down south

In Alabama in the 1950s, the NAACP had a branch office plus affiliate organizations, which acted as local associations. The NAACP worked in Alabama to recruit members, seek donations, and help African American students get into the state university. In 1955, an African American and NAACP worker named Rosa Parks was arrested for violating a bus segregation law in Montgomery, Alabama, by refusing to give her bus seat to a white person. In protest, African Americans boycotted the Montgomery buses for over one year, forcing Montgomery to close some bus lines. The NAACP supported the boycott.

At the time, Alabama had a law that required corporations with headquarters outside the state to register with the Alabama Secretary of State before operating in Alabama. The NAACP did not register because it did not think the law applied to its organization. In 1956, during the Montgomery bus boycott, Alabama attorney general John Patterson filed a lawsuit against the NAACP for breaking the law. Patterson asked the court to ban the NAACP from ever working in the state again.

To prove that the NAACP was operating in Alabama, Patterson asked it to turn over records and papers, including a list of all NAACP members in Alabama. Because the NAACP was unpopular in some areas, revealing its members was dangerous. In the past, members had been physically attacked and fired from their jobs for being part of the association. Because of these dangers, the NAACP refused to turn over its membership list.

Upon Patterson's request, the court ordered the NAACP to turn over its membership list plus other papers related to its business in Alabama. The NAACP refused, so the court held the NAACP in contempt and fined it $10,000. The court said the fine would increase to $100,000 if the NAACP failed to comply with its order within five days.

At the end of five days, the NAACP turned over all of the business papers Alabama sought except the membership list. As it had threatened to do, the court raised the fine to $100,000. The NAACP appealed this order twice to the Alabama Supreme Court, which refused to review the case. As its last resort, the NAACP took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Before the Supreme Court, the NAACP argued that revealing its members would violate their freedom of association. The freedom of association comes from the First Amendment freedom of assembly. It protects the right to form an organization to fight for a cause. States, including Alabama, must obey the freedom of association under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Privacy prevails

With a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the NAACP and reversed the contempt order. Writing for the Court, Justice John Marshall Harlan II said privacy is an essential part of the freedom of association. Without privacy, members might be attacked, fired, or otherwise punished by persons who were hostile to the NAACP. With such fears, minorities might not join or remain with the NAACP, an organization that was fighting for their rights. In this way, lack of privacy would interfere with the freedom of association.

ROSA PARKS

O ne of the reasons Alabama went after the NAACP was an African American boycott of the public buses in Montgomery. That boycott was sparked by one woman, Rosa Parks, an African American who lived in Montgomery in 1955. Parks used the public buses to go to her job at the NAACP. In Montgomery at the time, the law required blacks and whites to sit in separate sections of the bus. If the white section filled up, blacks had to give up their seats for whites who were standing.

On December 1, 1955, Parks was riding home from work when the white section filled up. The bus driver told Parks to stand to allow a white person to sit. Tired of being treated unfairly, Parks refused to get up. She was arrested and eventually convicted of violating the bus segregation law. In protest, African Americans—led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.—boycotted the public buses in Montgomery for over one year. In November 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court finally declared that bus segregation was illegal. In honor of Parks, Montgomery eventually renamed the street on which she rode home from work the Rosa Parks Boulevard.

Justice Harlan said Alabama could interfere with the freedom of association only if had a very good reason for doing so. Alabama said it needed the membership list to prove that the NAACP was operating in the state without obeying the registration law. Alabama, however, could prove this with the other business records that the NAACP turned over. It did not need to know the names and addresses of ordinary members who were not even working for the NAACP. Because Alabama did not have a good reason for seeking the membership list, the trials court's order violated the freedom of association. Justice Harlan overturned that order and eliminated the $100,000 fine.

Suggestions for further reading

Farish, Leah. The First Amendment: Freedom of Speech, Religion, and the Press. Hillside, NJ: Enslow Publishers, Inc., 1998.

King, David C. Freedom of Assembly. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook Press, 1997.

Klinker, Philip A. The First Amendment. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Silver Burdett Press, 1991.

Moss, Joyce, and George Wilson. Profiles in American History: Significant Events and the People Who Shaped Them. Vol. 7, Great Depression to the Cuban Missile Crisis. Detroit: Gale Research, 1995.

Pascoe, Elaine. Freedom of Expression: The Right to Speak Out in America. Brookfield, CT: Millbrook Press, 1992.