Civics
2
Charles Goode Gomillion (1900-1995) was born on April 1, 1900, in Johnston, South Carolina. He joined the faculty at Tuskegee University in 1928, where he served as dean of students and chair of the social sciences department. As president of the Tuskegee Civic Association, he learned in 1957 that members of the all-white city council were seeking to gerrymander the city limits in order to disenfranchise black voters. Gomillion and others alleged that the act violated the due process and equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The subsequent litigation, C. G. Gomillion, et.al. v. Phil M. Lightfoot, led to the U.S. Supreme Court's unanimous decision on November 14, 1960, in Gomillion's favor. The case prohibited states from passing laws depriving citizens of the right to vote and was instrumental in the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Gomillion retired from Tuskegee University in 1970 and died in Montgomery, Alabama.
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Tuskegee, Alabama · United States
