Feb 28 2009
Civil Rights
The NHL Vessel SS Columbia and the struggle for Civil Rights.
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In 1945, over a decade before Rosa Parks famously defied Jim Crow segregation laws another African-American woman began her own struggle against racial discrimination in Detroit, Michigan and won an important vindication by the United States Supreme Court. Because of her race Sarah Elizabeth Ray had been denied passage aboard the steamship SS Columbia on an excursion to Bob-Lo Island. According to the assistant general manager of the Bob-Lo Excursion Company, which operated the steamship, the Company had a policy of excluding “ ‘Zoot-suiters,’ the rowdyish, the rough, and the boisterous, and… colored.” Born in 1921, the 11th of 13 children, Ray was raised in an all-black community in Wauhatchie, Tennessee. As a result of her isolated upbringing Ms. Ray was at first spared the sting of Jim Crow segregation. While in her 20’s she moved to Detroit with her first husband in search of a better life. She found her new home disappointing, “I thought I’d find absolute freedom…But day after day, year after year, I discovered it wasn’t so.” In June 1945, Sarah Elizabeth Ray was the only African-American among forty girls enrolled in a secretarial class conducted at a Detroit High School. On the morning of June 21 Ray and 12 of her classmates boarded the Columbia for a celebratory graduation trip to Bob-Lo, “The man who was taking the tickets saw my brown hand and looked up at me, but he didn’t say anything.” After taking their seats on the top deck “Two men, one dressed in uniform and one in plainclothes, came toward where we were sitting…They asked one of the white girls…sitting next to me if she knew me.” After Ray’s teacher asked the men what they wanted, “they said I could not go along with the girls because I was colored.” Initially Ray refused to leave the ship but after one of the men instructed a group of waiters “to throw this woman off” she left. Throwing the offered 85 cent refunded fare back at the officers of the line, she had the presence of mind to take the names of the men who had approached her and went to the NAACP, and through the NAACP filed a criminal complaint against the Company. |
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The local courts found in Ms. Ray’s favor. The owners of the line appealed to the Michigan State Supreme Court which subsequently also ruled in Ms. Ray’s favor. Finally the company appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the Court to hold the state’s civil rights act unconstitutional because it infringed upon the power of Congress to regulate interstate and foreign commerce. The Court disagreed and in Bob-Lo Excursion Co. v. People of the State of Michigan, 333 U.S. 28 upheld the Michigan civil rights law. In affirming the ruling of the lower courts, the Supreme Court signaled its willingness to protect the civil rights of African-American’s, thus preparing the way for Brown v. Board of Education.
Following Detroit’s racial strife in 1967, Ms Ray co-founded Action House, a community center serving the young and poor.
Ms Sarah Elizabeth Ray’s story of standing up for her rights may be less well known than that of Rosa Parks’ that followed 10 years later, but their stories are in some ways remarkably similar. Both women refused to surrender to the prevalent racism that limited their freedom and each demonstrated how personal courage in propelling the Civil Rights Movement forward.
This wonderful story underscores the value of the NHL SS Columbia as a teaching tool regarding social justice and the need to fight for what is right.
For further information Please contact:
Richard Anderson
President
The S.S. Columbia Project
232 East 11th Street
New York, NY 10003
t: 212-228-3128
f: 212-471-9987
c :917-532-4300
randerson@sscolumbia.org
http://www.sscolumbia.org
