Viola Desmond
Our Own Civil Rights Activist
Taking a Stance in Nova Scotia
Almost 10 years before Rosa Parks step
onto a bus in Montgomery and refused to
give up her seat, ultimately igniting the
Civil Rights Movement, Viola Desmond
was dragged out of a movie theater and
later arrested in New Glasgow because
she refused to sit in the balcony section of
the theatre that was designated for Blacks.
Viola Desmond
The Case of Viola Desmond
November 8, 1946
On this day, Viola Desmond, a successful Halifax beautician and businesswoman,
decided to catch a movie at the Roseland Theatre in New Glasgow, Nova Scotia.
Viola is black, and the segregated theatre doesn't allow Blacks to sit in the
downstairs seats, only in the balcony. She will be given a balcony ticket but will sit
downstairs in spite of the "no-Blacks" rule. She will be arrested for allegedly
defrauding the government of the 1 percent amusement tax on the higher-priced
downstairs seats.
She will be thrown in jail for 12 hours and eventually fined $20 and sentenced to 30
days in prison.
Her appeal will succeed on a technicality. The recently formed Nova Scotia
Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NSAACP) will help raise the
money to pay the fine and bring the "Jim Crow" law to public attention.
Viola's efforts will not be in vain. The publicity that her case brings will help put an
end to this kind of discrimination.
Jim Crow Laws
From the 1880s into the 1960s, many States and
Provinces (kinda) enforced segregation through
"Jim Crow" laws (so called after a black
character in minstrel shows – comedy show).
Many places imposed legal punishments on
people for consorting with members of another
race. The most common types of laws forbade
intermarriage and ordered business owners and
public institutions to keep their black and white
clientele separated.
Canada did not officially have Jim Crow laws but:
“if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck…”
Success
Together, with Dr. Carrie Best, founder of
NS’s first Black newspaper, and Pearleen
Oliver, co-founder of the Nova Scotia
Association for the Advancement of Coloured
People, they lobbied the Government of NS
and after a vigorous campaign, the
government repealed its discriminatory
policies in 1954 (more than a year before
Rosa Parks and the bus Boycott).
The Case Today…
2010
Nova Scotia has apologized and granted
a pardon to Viola Desmond, a black
woman who was convicted for sitting in a
whites-only section of a movie theatre in
1946.
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nova-scotia/story/2010/04/15/ns-desmond-apologydexter.html
"Today is meant to right a 65-year-old wrong“
Said by Justice Minister Ross Landry
The free pardon for Desmond, who died in 1965, was signed
by Lt.-Gov. Francis — the first black person to serve as the
Queen's representative in the province.
"It is only on rare occasions — with the clarity of hindsight
and benefit of careful thought and measured reason — that a
society comes together to undo the wrongs of the past,"
Francis said.
This is the first time such a pardon for the innocent and
wrongly convicted has been posthumously awarded in
Canada, according to the province.
•
Clara Halfpenny on Viola
Desmond
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xk9Odkfhuw
Reading
• Pages 183 - 189
• Do questions 1-3