The 2023 revision of the Virginia Studies Curriculum now includes Samuel Wilbert Tucker as a famous Virginian whom all Virginia 4th graders need to know. He organized the 1939 sit-in at the Alexandria Library to challenge their segregation-era policy of only allowing white people to use the public library. He coached the protesters in how to behave and what to wear and then defended them in court when they were charged with disorderly conduct. Tucker argued, and the librarian and police officer who arrested them agreed, that the protesters were quiet, properly dressed for the library and were only disorderly because they were Black. It took another 80 years before the charges of disorderly conduct were finally dismissed for the five young African American men who wanted to read in the public library.
Tucker continued to challenge segregation by arguing hundreds of cases to desegregate public schools throughout his career as an NAACP attorney including before the U.S. Supreme Court.
This is the only biography of Samuel Wilbert Tucker, a brilliant legal strategist and trailblazer for civil rights.