Civil Rights Attorney J. Mason Davis Jr. Passes Away at 90, Leaving a Legacy of Justice
J. Mason Davis Jr., a prominent civil rights attorney in Alabama, has died at the age of 90. Davis was instrumental in the fight against segregation, representing Black students arrested during lunch-counter sit-ins in Huntsville, Alabama. His legal victories contributed significantly to the desegregation of public spaces and schools in the state. Davis, who was one of the first Black lawyers in Birmingham, also taught law at the University of Alabama for 25 years, despite initially being denied admission due to racial segregation. Throughout his career, he championed voting rights, helping others pass literacy tests designed to disenfranchise Black voters until the Voting Rights Act of 1965 abolished such practices. Davis also won a landmark equal-pay case for Black employees at the Marshall Space Flight Center and held leadership roles in various civic organizations.