Robert M. Bell: Difference between revisions

Born in [[Rocky Mount, North Carolina]], Bell's mother, a [[Sharecropper#United States|sharecropper]], moved him and his two brothers to East Baltimore when he was one and a half years old.<ref name="state1">{{cite web|url=http://www.courts.state.md.us/publications/jmonline/2011fall/interviewcjb.html |title=Justice Matters |publisher=courts.state.md.us |accessdate=July 20, 2013}}</ref> He attended [[Paul Laurence Dunbar High School (Baltimore, Maryland)|Dunbar High School]] with classmate and friend [[Reginald Lewis|Reginald F. Lewis]].<ref name="baltimoresun1"/> As a 16-year-old, he and a group of students participated in a [[sit-in]] to protest [[racial segregation]] at a local restaurant.<ref name="baltimoresun1"/> On June 17, 1960, the group of 12 students entered Hooper's Restaurant, formerly located at [[Maryland Route 139|Charles]] and [[Baltimore Street-Fayette Street|Fayette Streets]] in [[downtown Baltimore]], where they were refused service and asked to leave. The students, including Bell, refused.<ref name="maryland1">{{cite web|url=http://msa.maryland.gov/msa/speccol/sc5600/sc5604/html/june.html |title=Students conduct sit-in at local restaurant; June 1960 |publisher=msa.maryland.gov |accessdate=July 20, 2013}}</ref> He and the other students were arrested and convicted in the Circuit Court of Baltimore City for criminal trespassing, and fined $10.<ref name="maryland1"/> The [[National Association for the Advancement of Colored People|NAACP]] hired a team of lawyers, including [[Thurgood Marshall]] and [[Juanita Jackson Mitchell]], to represent the students and appeal the conviction to the [[Maryland Court of Appeals]].<ref name="maryland1"/> The appellants argued that the use of the state's trespassing laws to support segregation of public accommodations violated the [[Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution|Fourteenth Amendment]] to the [[United States Constitution]].<ref name="teachingamericanhistorymd1">{{cite web|url=http://teachingamericanhistorymd.net/000001/000000/000032/html/t32.html |title=Teaching American History in Maryland |publisher=teachingamericanhistorymd.net |accessdate=July 20, 2013}}</ref> In 1962, the Court of Appeals upheld the decision of the circuit court.<ref name="teachingamericanhistorymd1"/>

The case was then appealed to the [[U.S Supreme Court]], where Bell was represented by [[Constance Baker Motley]] and [[Jack Greenberg (lawyer)|Jack Greenberg]]. In ''[[Bell v. Maryland]]'' (1964), the Supreme Court, noting that in the period since the students' conviction the [[Maryland General Assembly]] passed [[public accommodation]] laws and Congress passed the [[Civil Rights Act of 1964]],<ref name="webster">{{cite journal|last=Webster|first=McKenzie|url=https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?action=DocumentDisplay&crawlid=1&doctype=cite&docid=17+J.+L.+%26+Politics+373&srctype=smi&srcid=3B15&key=81ba325ca87db02324b9b8823be6cf4c|title=The Warren Court's Struggle With the Sit-In Cases and the Constitutionality of Segregation in Places of Public Accommodations|journal=Journal of Law and Politics|volume=17|issue=Spring 2001|pages=373–407|accessdate=July 19, 2013}}</ref> refused to rule whether the state's trespassing laws could be used to exclude blacks from public accommodations. The Court [[Vacated judgment|vacated]] the decision and [[Remand (court procedure)|remanded]] the case to allow the state court to rule whether the conviction should be reversed due to the change in state law.<ref name="teachingamericanhistorymd1"/><ref name="state1"/> On April 9, 1965, Bell's conviction was reversed by the state Court of Appeals and all of the students were cleared of all charges.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://teachingamericanhistorymd.net/000001/000000/000032/html/t32.html|title=Desegregation of Maryland's Restaurants: ''Robert Mack Bell v. Maryland''|publisher=Maryland State Archives|accessdate=May 14, 2008}}</ref> The decision of the Supreme Court came just two days after the [[United States Senate|Senate]] ended a [[filibuster]] and passed the Civil Rights Act. It has been suggested that the Supreme Court refrained from reaching the merits of the case in consideration of the pending civil rights legislation, as had it done so, it would have eliminated the basis for passing the Act.<ref name="webster">{{cite journal|last=Webster|first=McKenzie|title=The Warren Court's Struggle With the Sit-In Cases and the Constitutionality of Segregation in Places of Public Accommodations|journal=Journal of Law and Politics|volume=17|issue=Spring 2001|pages=373–407}}</ref>