Solomon Snowden Seay, Sr. (January 25, 1899 – 1988) was an American activist, religious leader, and

memoir A memoir (; , ) is any nonfiction narrative writing based in the author's personal memories. The assertions made in the work are thus understood to be factual. While memoir has historically been defined as a subcategory of biography or autobio ...

ist. He was born on January 25, 1899, in

Macon County, Alabama Macon County is a county located in the east central part of the U.S. state of Alabama. As of the 2020 census, the population was 19,532. Its county seat is Tuskegee. Its name is in honor of Nathaniel Macon, a member of the United States Sen ...

, and studied at

Alabama State Alabama State University (ASU) is a public historically black university in Montgomery, Alabama. Founded in 1867, ASU is a member-school of the Thurgood Marshall College Fund. History Alabama State University was founded in 1867 as the Lin ...

and

Talladega College Talladega College is a private historically black college in Talladega, Alabama. It is Alabama's oldest private historically black college and offers 17 degree programs. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. Hi ...

. He preached in the

South South is one of the cardinal directions or compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Proto-Germanic ''*sunþa ...

at various

African Methodist Episcopal Zion African or Africans may refer to: * Anything from or pertaining to the continent of Africa: ** People who are native to Africa, descendants of natives of Africa, or individuals who trace their ancestry to indigenous inhabitants of Africa *** Et ...

churches, from 1916 until undertaking the pastorship of Mount Zion AME Zion Church in

Montgomery, Alabama Montgomery is the capital city of the U.S. state of Alabama and the county seat of Montgomery County. Named for the Irish soldier Richard Montgomery, it stands beside the Alabama River, on the coastal Plain of the Gulf of Mexico. In the 202 ...

, in 1947. "Seay, Solomor[sic
/nowiki> Snowden, Sr. (1899-1988)"">ic">"Seay, Solomor[sic
/nowiki> Snowden, Sr. (1899-1988)" ''King Papers'', Martin Luther King, Jr. Research and Education Institute His unsuccessful efforts in 1949 on behalf of a black teenage girl who claimed rape by two white police officers marked him as a pioneering Montgomery activist. He was indicted for his participation in the Montgomery bus boycott, and arraigned on February 24, 1956, along with 88 other boycott supporters. "Montgomery Bus Boycott: The story of Rosa Parks and the Civil Rights Movement", presented as reproduction of "89 Enter Not Guilty Pleas to Bus Boycott Indictment", ''The Montgomery Advertiser'' February 24, 1956
/ref> On March 23, 1960, the "Committee to Defend Martin Luther King and the Struggle for Freedom in the South" published a full-page advertisement in the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' seeking to defend

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...

and support the

Civil Rights Movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional Racial segregation in the United States, racial segregation, Racial discrimination ...

. The ad ran in the March 29, 1960, edition of the ''Times'' with the title, "

Heed Their Rising Voices "Heed Their Rising Voices" is a 1960 newspaper advertisement published in ''The New York Times''. It was published on March 29, 1960 and paid for by the "Committee to Defend Martin Luther King and the Struggle for Freedom in the South". The purpo ...

". He was listed as one of the ad's supporters and was consequently included along with three other black ministers -

Ralph Abernathy Ralph David Abernathy Sr. (March 11, 1926 – April 17, 1990) was an American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was ordained in the Baptist tradition in 1948. As a leader of the civil rights movement, he was a close friend and ...

Joseph Lowery Joseph Echols Lowery (October 6, 1921 – March 27, 2020) was an American minister in the United Methodist Church and leader in the civil rights movement. He founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference with Martin Luther King Jr. an ...

, and

Fred Shuttlesworth Frederick Lee Shuttlesworth (born Fred Lee Robinson, March 18, 1922 – October 5, 2011) was a U.S. civil rights activist who led the fight against segregation and other forms of racism as a minister in Birmingham, Alabama. He was a co-founder ...

- as the defendants in a

libel Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defi ...

suit. The claims of the Montgomery city commissioner L. B. Sullivan, who brought that suit, also led to the ''

New York Times Co. v. Sullivan ''New York Times Co. v. Sullivan'', 376 U.S. 254 (1964), was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision ruling that the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution's freedom of speech protections limit the ability of American public officials to sue for ...

'' (1964) case that established the

public figure A public figure is a person who has achieved notoriety, prominence or fame within a society, whether through achievement, luck, action, or in some cases through no purposeful action of their own, In the context of defamation actions (libel and s ...

principle in U.S.

defamation Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defi ...

law. From 1972, he served his denomination above the congregational level in the

Greenville, Alabama Greenville is a city and the county seat of Butler County, Alabama, United States. At the 2020 census, the population was 7,374. Greenville is known as the Camellia City, wherein originated the movement to change the official Alabama state flow ...

, area until retiring in 1982. He died in 1988, and in 1990 his autobiography ''I Was There by the Grace of God'' was published.

References

1899 births 1988 deaths {{US-activist-stub