Charles Evers Biography Quotes 34 Report mistakes

Early Life and Education
James Charles Evers was born on September 11, 1922, in Decatur, Mississippi, into a family that would become synonymous with the modern civil rights struggle. Growing up under Jim Crow, he and his younger brother, Medgar Evers, experienced the constraints and daily humiliations of segregation, lessons that shaped both brothers' determination to challenge the racial order. After attending local segregated schools, he studied at Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Alcorn State University), an institution that nurtured generations of Black professionals and activists in Mississippi.

Military Service and Early Organizing
Evers served in the United States Army during World War II, part of the generation of Black veterans whose service abroad sharpened their commitment to equality at home. Following the war he worked in business, including running clubs and small enterprises, and he became active in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). He spent time in Chicago pursuing entrepreneurial ventures and radio work as a disc jockey, experiences that honed his public voice and gave him a feel for political messaging and mass communication.

Taking Up the Mantle After Medgar Evers
The assassination of Medgar Evers in Jackson on June 12, 1963 marked a turning point in Charles Evers's life. Medgar's widow, Myrlie Evers (later Myrlie Evers-Williams), and national NAACP leaders such as Roy Wilkins worked to sustain momentum in Mississippi at a time of grief and fury. Charles returned to Mississippi and became the NAACP's field director for the state, channeling loss into organization. He traveled constantly, building local branches, registering voters, and pressing for desegregation in schools, public accommodations, and workplaces. He collaborated with Mississippi leaders like Aaron Henry and worked alongside national figures such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Fannie Lou Hamer in campaigns that blended community boycotts, legal pressure, and voter mobilization.

The murder of his brother remained a central reference point. Early prosecutions of Byron De La Beckwith in the 1960s resulted in hung juries under District Attorney Bill Waller, who later became governor. Decades later, Charles Evers supported the renewed push that led to Beckwith's 1994 conviction under prosecutor Bobby DeLaughter, a measure of delayed accountability that resonated deeply with the Evers family and the movement.

Mayor of Fayette and Local Governance
In 1969, Charles Evers was elected mayor of Fayette, Mississippi, widely recognized as the first Black mayor of a biracial Mississippi town since Reconstruction. The victory was emblematic of the power of newly enfranchised voters and the fruits of sustained grassroots organizing. As mayor, he integrated the city's institutions, professionalized the police force, and insisted on dignified treatment for Black residents in every municipal interaction. He also pushed for Black economic empowerment, encouraging citizens to use their growing political influence to win equal access to jobs, contracts, and services.

His leadership style was forceful, sometimes polarizing, but it proved effective at reordering local power relations. Evers believed in leveraging public office to deliver tangible improvements, and he was blunt in confronting discrimination by merchants and officials. He understood that political rights without economic leverage would be incomplete, a conviction that guided his approach to city government.

Boycotts, Free Speech, and Movement Strategy
Beyond Fayette, Evers became a key strategist in selective-buying campaigns that targeted businesses maintaining segregated practices. His role in the Claiborne County boycott, centered on Port Gibson and surrounding towns, culminated in the Supreme Court case NAACP v. Claiborne Hardware Co. (1982). The Court's landmark ruling affirmed that nonviolent political boycotts are protected by the First Amendment. Evers's speeches, community meetings, and organizing were scrutinized in the litigation; the decision validated the strategy that he, Myrlie Evers-Williams, Aaron Henry, and other NAACP leaders had long championed: disciplined, collective economic pressure as a constitutionally protected tool for change.

Statewide Campaigns and National Profile
Evers carried his message into statewide politics. In 1971 he ran for governor of Mississippi as an independent, forcing a broad conversation about race, poverty, and governance in a state just beginning to absorb the Voting Rights Act's implications. He campaigned in small towns and rural precincts long ignored by statewide candidates, confronting both the Democratic establishment and the emerging Republican presence personified by figures such as Gil Carmichael. In 1978 he ran for the United States Senate as an independent against Thad Cochran and the Democratic nominee, an election that highlighted the complexities of party realignment in the South.

Never easily categorized, Evers crossed party lines. At different moments he endorsed Republican presidential candidates, including Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, and late in life publicly supported Donald Trump, choices that reflected his pragmatic, sometimes contrarian reading of power and policy rather than orthodox party loyalty. His independence won him admirers and critics across the political spectrum.

Business, Media, and Public Voice
Parallel to politics, Evers sustained a career in business and in broadcasting. He returned frequently to radio, hosting call-in programs that made him a daily presence in Mississippi households. The medium suited his direct style, allowing him to press officials, cheer on young organizers, and mentor callers who sought help navigating public institutions. He also published a memoir, Have No Fear, recounting movement battles, personal missteps, and the lessons he drew from victories and painful losses.

Later Years and Legacy
Charles Evers remained a visible public figure into his nineties, attending commemorations, advising younger activists, and speaking about voting rights, policing, and economic equity. He took pride in the growth of Black political representation across Mississippi and in the institutions that memorialize the era he helped shape, including the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum. Even as debates over tactics evolved, he insisted that political power must be paired with economic leverage and community discipline, the principles that had guided boycotts and municipal reforms in places like Fayette and Claiborne County.

Evers died on July 22, 2020, at age 97. He left behind a record that spanned battlefield service, storefront organizing, city hall governance, and the courthouse drama of civil rights jurisprudence. His relationships with figures such as Medgar and Myrlie Evers-Williams, Roy Wilkins, Aaron Henry, Martin Luther King Jr., Bill Waller, Bobby DeLaughter, Thad Cochran, and many unnamed local leaders reveal the breadth of his engagement, from family grief to institutional change. His legacy endures in the elected offices once closed to Black Mississippians, in the jurisprudence that protects political boycotts, and in the stubborn insistence that dignity requires both the ballot and the dollar.

Our collection contains 34 quotes who is written by Charles, under the main topics: Ethics & Morality - Justice - Freedom - Faith - Equality.

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