Arthur Shores

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Arthur Davis Shores (b. 1904, d. 1996) was a civil rights attorney who was considered Alabama's "drum major for justice".

Shores graduated from Talladega College where he became a member of Alpha Phi Alpha, the first intercollegiate Greek letter organization established for blacks.

He attended only one year of law school at the University of Kansas and then pursued his law studes through correspondence schools. Shores passed the Alabama bar exam in 1937 and immediately began using his legal skills to support civil rights issues.

In 1938, Shores successfully sued on behalf of seven school teachers who denied the right to vote by the Alabama Board of Registrars. In 1941, on the behalf of black railroad workers, he won a case before the Supreme Court of the United States that a whites-only railroad union could not exclude blacks and then deny them better jobs because they were not union members. Shores represented black teachers in the the Jefferson County School Board to receive the same pay as white teachers.

Birmingham, Alabama residents viewing the bomb-damaged home of Arthur Shores on September 5, 1963. The bomb exploded the previous day, September 4, injuring Shores' wife.

In 1955, Shores successfully argued before the U.S. Supreme Court in Lucy v. Adams to prevent the University of Alabama from denying admission solely based on race or color. Autherine Lucy became the first African-American to attend the school when she was admitted in 1956. On the third day of classes, a hostile mob assembled to prevent Lucy from attending classes. The police were called to secure her admission but, that evening, the University suspended Lucy on the grounds that it could not provide a safe environment.^[1]

Shores' campaign in 1963 to integrate the Birmingham public schools brought violence to him and other residents. Shore's home was fire-bombed on August 20 and September 4 in retaliation for black parents registering their children at white schools. Five days later a bomb killed four girls at 16th Street Baptist Church.^[1] He argued before the Supreme court in the same year that the arrests of peaceful demonstrators in Birmingham should be ruled unconstitutional.

During the 1960s, he became the first black member of the Birmingham City Council.