Ruth Willis Perry was an American librarian, journalist, and civil rights activist. She is known for her work with the Miami chapter of the

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is a civil rights organization in the United States, formed in 1909 as an interracial endeavor to advance justice for African Americans by a group including W. E.&nb ...

and her stand against the Johns Committee, also known as the Florida Legislative Investigation Committee, which investigated alleged subversive actions by the NAACP.

Early life

Her grandfather was a slaveholding Confederate officer, who was with

Robert E. Lee Robert Edward Lee (January 19, 1807 – October 12, 1870) was a Confederate general during the American Civil War, towards the end of which he was appointed the overall commander of the Confederate States Army. He led the Army of Nort ...

at Appomattox. Her father, Francis Morris Willis, was a successful dentist, who held an interest in politics. Perry grew up in both

Ithaca, New York Ithaca is a city in the Finger Lakes region of New York (state), New York, United States. Situated on the southern shore of Cayuga Lake, Ithaca is the seat of Tompkins County, New York, Tompkins County and the largest community in the Ithaca m ...

, and

Williston, South Carolina Williston is a town in Barnwell County, South Carolina, United States. The population was 3,139 at the 2010 census. The town lies in the center of the Charleston-Hamburg railroad line, the line of the Best Friend locomotive. The train tracks wer ...

. She spent her summers in Williston but attended elementary through high school in Ithaca, where churches and schools were integrated. She had a degree in English from

Converse College Converse University is a private university in Spartanburg, South Carolina. It was established in 1889 by a group of Spartanburg residents and named after textile pioneer Dexter Edgar Converse. It was originally a women's college but now admits ...

in South Carolina and a degree in library science from

Drexel University Drexel University is a private research university with its main campus in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Drexel's undergraduate school was founded in 1891 by Anthony J. Drexel, a financier and philanthropist. Founded as Drexel Institute of Ar ...

Civil rights work

Perry joined the local branch of the NAACP when she moved to Miami in 1945, and she later became secretary of the state branch of the NAACP. While working for the Miami NAACP, Perry helped increase the number of members in the 1950s and 1960s. As secretary of the Miami branch, she maintained the lists of members which would become a central aspect of the Johns Committees interactions with her. While working at the NAACP, Perry corresponded with

Thurgood Marshall Thurgood Marshall (July 2, 1908 – January 24, 1993) was an American civil rights lawyer and jurist who served as an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1967 until 1991. He was the Supreme Court's first African- ...

, chief counsel and director of the national NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, about the 1956 Miami bus boycott and a 1956 lawsuit seeking to end segregation in Miami's Dade County. In her role as the Florida secretary of the NAACP Perry was called three times to testify before the Johns Committee, also known as the

Florida Legislative Investigation Committee The Florida Legislative Investigation Committee (commonly known as the Johns Committee) was established by the Florida Legislature in 1956, during the era of the Second Red Scare and the Lavender Scare. Like the more famous anti-Communist investi ...

. The committee investigated subversive activities and focused on communist activities within the NAACP. She was first subpoenaed in 1957. Despite threats against her from the

White Citizens Council The Citizens' Councils (commonly referred to as the White Citizens' Councils) were an associated network of white supremacist, segregationist organizations in the United States, concentrated in the South and created as part of a white backlash ...

, she refused to cooperate with the committee. At the advice of Thurgood Marshall, she and the NAACP's attorney Grattan E. Graves Jr. had shipped the records to the NAACP headquarters in New York State. In 1958, Perry was again called to testify before the Johns Committee, and again refused to cooperate with their request for information about the membership. She was scolded by the Johns Committee for not providing the records and Cliff Herrell, a member of the Johns Committee, called her not fit to be a citizen of the state of Florida and fined her for contempt. Perry was subpoened a third time in 1959. This time she stated that the records were with Theodore Gibson, the president of the Miami branch, thereby supporting the NAACP's preparation for a court case before the

Supreme Court of the United States The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that involve a point ...

. In 1963, the Supreme Court heard the case of ''

Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee ''Gibson v. Florida Legislative Investigation Committee'', 372 U.S. 539 (1963), was a United States Supreme Court case based on the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution The Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the Un ...

'', and Perry was questioned at length about the records and membership information held by the Miami NAACP branch. The NAACP was ultimately protected from the Johns Committee requests by the ruling from the Supreme Court.

Journalism

Perry hosted a radio show and wrote newspaper columns. Her radio show on

WMBM WMBM (1490 AM) is a radio station broadcasting a gospel format. Licensed to Miami Beach, Florida, United States, the station serves the Miami area. The station is currently owned by New Birth Broadcasting Corp. Inc. and features programming from ...

, Miami's African-American radio station, aired on Sunday afternoons starting in June 1953. As the audience grew from her broadcast, she got anonymous calls and letters who described the show as "vilifying and malicious". The many that disagreed with her broadcast assumed she was African-American and she considered if her detractors would have been angrier had they known she was white. Her radio show's final broadcast was in August 1956, and during the final episode she noted she had no respect for those who anonymously criticized others. When the show received threats from people who wanted her silenced, ''

The Miami Times ''The Miami Times'' is South Florida's African-American newspaper African-American newspapers (also known as the Black press or Black newspapers) are news publications in the United States serving African-American communities. Samuel Cornis ...

'' newspaper provided her the opportunity for a regular column. Her column, 'Along Freedom's Road', ran from 1956 to 1962. Her columns called for an end to segregation, to give full equity to African-Americans rights, and denounced Klan violence and other forms of terrorism.

Personal life

Perry and her husband, Walter Dean Perry, had a daughter named Caroline who was born in 1940.

References

External links