AUGUST 18

On this date in 1963, the year I graduated from high school, James Meredith graduated from the University of Mississippi.  Meredith is a significant figure in the American civil rights movement.  He was the first black person admitted to that school in its 115 year history.  It was with the assistance of the National Guard, with guns raised against the state and school administrations, that he entered.

With this background, you would think he was a leader in the civil rights movement.  Not so.  He rejected the concept of civil rights for blacks.  He did not demand to go to the University of Mississippi because he was black even though that is the way it played out.  Instead, he relied on the constitution as his standard.  He wanted the federal government (the Kennedy administration) to enforce his rights as a citizen - the same rights every citizen should have.   This, of course, distanced him from the black civil rights movement.

James Meredith was an Air Force veteran before admittance to UM and a Columbia Law School graduate in 1968.  He dabbled in politics and authored several books in his lifetime.  James Meredith is 81 years old.
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