[ Patrick Braxton, first Black mayor of Newbern, small town in
Alabama’s Black Belt region, filed federal civil rights lawsuit
alleging the white former mayor and city council members violated the
Constitution when they locked him out of the Town Hall]
[[link removed]]

WHITE MINORITY LOCKS OUT FIRST BLACK MAYOR OF NEWBERN, ALABAMA  
[[link removed]]


 

Equal Justice Initiative
July 24, 2023
Equal Justice Initiative
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ Patrick Braxton, first Black mayor of Newbern, small town in
Alabama’s Black Belt region, filed federal civil rights lawsuit
alleging the white former mayor and city council members violated the
Constitution when they locked him out of the Town Hall _

Patrick Braxton, Credit: Michael Malcom // Equal Justice Initiative

 

A Town with Deep Roots in Slavery

Newbern’s history is deeply rooted in slavery. Incorporated in 1854
as demand for land to produce cotton soared, the town of Newbern
[[link removed]] quickly
developed into an economy dominated by labor camps where enslaved
Black people were forced to grow cotton.

Cotton produced by enslaved people was Alabama’s cash crop since it
became a state in 1819, and before long the state’s largest cotton
plantations grew up out of the dark, rich soil of the Black Belt
region.

Related Report

Slavery in America [[link removed]]
Its proximity to the fertile Black Belt region, where enslavers forced
large numbers of enslaved people to grow cotton in the fertile soil,
made Montgomery the capital of the Domestic Slave Trade in Alabama.

Cotton production depended on enslaved workers, and the number of
enslaved people in Alabama grew from 47,449 in 1820 to 435,080 by
1860. Most were concentrated in the Black Belt, where enslaved people
comprised the majority of the population by the 1840s.

Black Residents, White Officials, and No Elections

After the Civil War, emancipated Black people put aside their
enslavement and embraced education, hard work, faith, and citizenship
with extraordinary enthusiasm and devotion. By 1868, over 80% of Black
men who were eligible to vote had registered, schools for Black
children became a priority, and courageous Black leaders overcame
enormous obstacles to win elections to public office.

But in response to Black citizens’ political organizing and
exercising basic rights, white mobs targeted Black leaders and
political officials, as well as Black community members who worked to
encourage Black political engagement.

EJI’s Reconstruction in America
[[link removed]] report documents dozens of massacres
against Black people, including in New Orleans and Eufaula, Alabama,
in 1868 and Vicksburg, Mississippi, in 1874. In 1898, after former
Confederates in Wilmington, North Carolina, lost governing power to an
interracial political coalition, they successfully carried out
an insurrection
[[link removed]] against
the duly elected government and murdered as many as 100 Black people.

In Newbern, where 85% of the town’s 275 residents
[[link removed]] are
Black, white leaders have held on to political control by avoiding
elections altogether for at least six decades.

Born and raised in Newbern, 83-year-old Hattie Hollis could not recall
a single election being held. “Not that I know of,” she told
[[link removed]] Tread’s
Lee Hedgepeth. “I can’t remember any election.”

Instead, as Haywood Stokes III acknowledged in a court filing,
“[t]he title of Mayor has simply been passed from individual to
individual to anyone who would agree to be Mayor without regard to
elections.” Mr. Stokes—a white man whose ancestor Peter P. Stokes
enslaved at least five Black people—became the town’s mayor “in
this manner” in 2008, when he inherited
[[link removed]] the
position from Haywood Stokes Jr.

Janice Quarles, Barbara Patrick, James Ballard, and the Rev. James
Williams—all Newbern residents over 70—told
[[link removed]] Capital B
they recalled only two other former mayors besides Stokes: Robert
Walthall, who served as mayor
[[link removed]] for
44 years, and Paul Owens, who served on the town council for 33 years
and as mayor for 11 years
[[link removed]].

Like Ms. Hollis, they said there had been no elections in Newbern for
as long as they could remember.

Newbern’s First Black Mayor Locked Out

In 2020, Newbern resident, contractor, and volunteer firefighter
Patrick Braxton decided to run for mayor. He was fed up with
officials’ indifference to the community’s needs—especially the
majority-white council’s failure to provide disinfectant, masks, and
other critical supplies to at-risk residents during the Covid-19
pandemic, he told Capital B.

Many residents of the tiny town—where nearly 30% of residents live
below the poverty level—share that frustration, Capital B reported.
Newbern received
[[link removed]] $30,000
under the American Rescue Plan Act, according to an estimate from U.S.
Rep. Terri Sewell, but residents told Capital B they can’t see where
the money has gone.

When Mr. Braxton told the incumbent mayor he intended to run for his
seat, Mr. Stokes told him, “We’ve never had an election out
here.” As Mr. Braxton told
[[link removed]] Tread,
Mr. Stokes said, “We don’t have ballots and machines to do it.”

So Mr. Braxton called the Alabama Conference of Black Mayors
[[link removed]], which told him how and
where to file the necessary qualifying paperwork, he said in his
lawsuit. He followed their instructions, and because no one
else—including Mr. Stokes—filed the paperwork to qualify for the
office, Mr. Braxton became Newbern’s first mayor on July 22, 2020.

No one had filed to run for town council, either. As provided by
Alabama law, Mayor-Elect Braxton filled the vacancies by appointing
James Ballard, Barbara Patrick, Janice Quarles, and Wanda Scott—the
first majority-Black council in Newbern’s history.

In August, the suit alleges, Mr. Stokes and his former council members
met in secret and passed an ordinance to hold a special election on
October 6, but did not notify residents about the election. Indeed,
Tread did not find
[[link removed]] anyone
in the one-square-mile town who knew about it.

After no one else qualified for the October 6 election, the former
council members—three white people (Gary Broussard, Jesse Leverett,
Willie Tucker) and one Black person (Voncille Brown
Thomas)—reappointed themselves as the town council.

Mr. Braxton and his council members were sworn into office and filed
an oath of office with the county probate judge’s office on November
2, Capital B reported
[[link removed]].

But, the codefendants claim in court filings, Mr. Braxton “lost the
mayorship by operation of law” because he refused to attend meetings
of the former council members, who then appointed Mr. Stokes to
replace him as mayor.

Ten days after Mr. Braxton was sworn in, the city attorney’s office
executed an oath of office for Mr. Stokes and his council.

Mr. Braxton alleges in his suit that Mr. Stokes locked him out of Town
Hall, and but for a few boxes Mr. Braxton managed to recover, all
official town records allegedly were removed or destroyed.

The People’s Bank of Greensboro and the city clerk barred Mr.
Braxton from accessing the town’s financial records and bank
accounts, and the post office refused to give him the town’s mail.
The bank and post office are defendants in Mr. Braxton’s lawsuit.

Capital B reports that Mr. Braxton has been targeted for other
harassment—drones have followed him to his home and a white man
almost ran him off the road—and his white colleagues in the
volunteer fire department have failed to back him up during
emergencies involving Black residents.

And when LaQuenna Lewis began helping Mr. Braxton, the founder of
Selma nonprofit Love Is What Love Does received handwritten threats
with swastikas and racial epithets. “One of the letters had a
drawing of her and Braxton being lynched,” Capital B reports
[[link removed]].

But, like the many formerly enslaved Black people in the Newbern area
who exercised their freedom by recording their surname as Braxton
[[link removed]] in
the first census after the Civil War, Mr. Braxton says he’s not
giving up his right to political participation even when threatened
with violence.

While his federal lawsuit works its way through the courts, Mr.
Braxton is running for mayor again in 2025.

Related Resources

* He Became the First Black Mayor of Newbern, Alabama. A White
Minority Locked Him Out of Town Hall.
[[link removed]]

* A Black Man Was Elected Mayor in Rural Alabama, but the White Town
Leaders Won’t Let Him Serve
[[link removed]]

* A Fight for Rights and Control in a Black Belt Town Without
Elections
[[link removed]]

* He Became the First Black Mayor in a Rural Alabama Town—and Then
White Leaders Revolted!
[[link removed]]

_[THE EQUAL JUSTICE INITIATIVE [[link removed]] is committed to
ending mass incarceration and excessive punishment in the United
States, to challenging racial and economic injustice, and to
protecting basic human rights for the most vulnerable people in
American society._

_Founded in 1989 by Bryan Stevenson
[[link removed]], a widely acclaimed public interest
lawyer and bestselling author of Just Mercy, EJI is a private,
501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that provides legal representation to
people who have been illegally convicted, unfairly sentenced, or
abused in state jails and prisons. We challenge the death penalty and
excessive punishment and we provide re-entry assistance to formerly
incarcerated people._

_EJI works with communities that have been marginalized by poverty and
discouraged by unequal treatment. We are committed to changing the
narrative about race in America. EJI produces groundbreaking reports,
an award-winning calendar, and short films that explore our nation’s
history of racial injustice. And in 2018, we opened the Legacy
Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration
[[link removed]] and the National Memorial
for Peace and Justice [[link removed]] as
part of our national effort to create new spaces, markers, and
memorials that address the legacy of slavery, lynching, and racial
segregation, which shapes many issues today._

_EJI provides research and recommendations to assist advocates and
policymakers in the critically important work of criminal justice
reform. We publish reports, discussion guides, and other educational
materials, and our staff conduct educational tours and presentations
for thousands of students, teachers, faith leaders, professional
associations, community groups, and international visitors every
year.]_

* Patrick Braxton
[[link removed]]
* Newbern
[[link removed]]
* Black Belt
[[link removed]]
* Alabama
[[link removed]]
* South
[[link removed]]
* elections
[[link removed]]
* Constitution
[[link removed]]
* right to vote
[[link removed]]
* the right to vote
[[link removed]]
* voter suppression
[[link removed]]
* slavery
[[link removed]]
* Black majority
[[link removed]]
* civil rights movement
[[link removed]]
* Racism
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]

Manage subscription
[[link removed]]

Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]