Civil Rights Struggle

During his years in the Civil Rights Division, John was involved in many of the most important challenges of the civil rights struggle. As the lead person in the South for the federal government, he was called the "law-bringer south of the Mason-Dixon Line." In 1961, he was in Montgomery, Alabama when the Freedom Riders arrived; in 1962, he escorted James Meredith as the first Black to be admitted to the University of Mississippi; in 1964, he supervised the enforcement of the newly enacted Civil Rights Act; and he represented the federal government in Selma, Alabama in the days leading up to, and during, the historic Selma to Montgomery march. In 1963, after the funeral of slain civil rights leader Medgar Evers in Jackson, Mississippi, Doar helped calm angry protesters.

New Richmond, Wisconsin · United States