Fred Gray has long been part of the civil rights movement. When he was only 24, he helped defend Rosa Parks After she refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery bus, it sparked the bus boycott and the start of the civil rights movement. He is also known for his work with leaving school after Brown v Board of Education in 1954 and for the Gomillion v. Lightfoot Judgment ruling gerrymandering unconstitutional as a means of disenfranchising African Americans.
mayor Steven L. Reed of Montgomery now wants to find ways to commemorate the 65th anniversary of the city’s bus boycott, and he wants one of them to rename the street Gray grew up on. Gray grew up in Montgomery and, when he was 6, moved to Jeff Davis Avenue, a street named after the President of the Confederation. As a boy he lost the meaning of the name. “I never thought about who Jeff Davis I probably didn’t know about him until I was in high school, ”he explained in one New York Times article. But as a young man he was determined to “destroy everything that was separate”.
Mayor Reed’s call to change the street name has one caveat. A legal governor Kay Ivey The law, signed in 2017, prohibits changing the road. The Alabama Memorial Preservation Act says no architecturally significant building, memorial building, memorial street or memorial The building is on public land and has been on this property for 40 or more years. It can be relocated, removed, changed, renamed, or otherwise disrupted. “People between the ages of 20 and 40 are only allowed to be disturbed certain circumstances.
In 2019 The law was found to be unconstitutional the right to freedom of expression and the The Alabama Supreme Court ruled that it could not be enforced. The penalty for violating the law was set at a fine of $ 25,000. Cities have paid the $ 25,000 fine and have taken down statues at a record pace since the controversial assassination of statues George Floyd in May. Mayor of Birmingham Randall Woodfin ordered the removal of a monument At Linn Park, the fine was less costly than the ongoing unrest. A confederate memorial in Huntsville was also removed in October and was reassembled in the Confederate funeral department of a city cemetery.
Attorney General of Alabama Steve Marshall is committed to upholding the Alabama Memorial Preservation Act, specify in a video“I urge my Alabamians to take note of these voices and to spend their tax dollars to break any law of this state. It is now a question of when not, whether the same leaders will toss another law aside – only guided by the political winds of the moment. “
Despite threats of a $ 25,000 fine, Mayor Reed is pushing the plan forward. He wants Gray to be there to see the name change. “I don’t think you should wait for people to die before you give them their flowers.” Reed explained. At the age of 90, the name change would help cement Graues name in history and honor his life’s work.
“This is about honoring those people who deserve to be honored,” Reed said said in an interview. “And maybe to confront some of those who were honored earlier that should never have been.”
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