Lillie Carroll Jackson

Maryland Historical Society

Supporters called her "Ma Jackson." Opponents often referred to her as "that NAACP lady." Her daughter Juanita described her as a "freedom fighter." Whatever the label, Lillie Carroll Jackson was a leader of the civil rights movement in Maryland, while serving as the president of the Baltimore branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) from 1935 to 1968.

Lillie Carroll Jackson was born on May 25, 1889, the seventh of eight children of Charles Henry and Amanda Bowen Carroll, and graduated from Baltimore's Colored High School in 1908. Perhaps her commitment to freedom stemmed from her genes. Lillie claimed to be descended from an African chief named "Bohen" on her mother's side and from Charles Carroll of Carrollton, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, on her father's. It seems more likely that Lillie's religious beliefs shaped her views on civil rights. For Lillie, something was either good or evil, either right or wrong. Drinking, smoking, playing cards, and dancing were all to be avoided. Similarly, segregation was a sin against God and had no place in American society. She taught in the segregated Baltimore school system, and married Kieffer Jackson in 1910.

According to family lore, Lillie's commitment to fighting segregation began with a medical crisis in 1918. Prior to emergency surgery for mastoiditis, Lillie prayed to God to spare her life so she might raise her children. In return she vowed a lifetime of service. After the surgery, the doctor told her that he had removed more decayed bone from her head than he thought possible to survive. "Only God saved you," he concluded. Despite her face being permanently disfigured by the surgery, Lillie kept her promise.

As a successful business woman with rental properties, Lillie had the financial independence and time to honor her commitment. She became the first woman to serve on the board of trustees for the Sharp Street Memorial Methodist Episcopal Church. Then she sponsored the City-Wide Young Peoples Forum, an organization co-founded by daughters Virginia and Juanita to give black young people something to do on Friday nights during the Great Depression. It became a grassroots reform movement after two lynchings on the Eastern Shore energized the young people. Lillie's involvement in a don't-buy-where-you-can't-work boycott co-sponsored by the Forum in fall 1933 propelled her into community leadership.

Lillie and the Forum members soon joined forces with the NAACP. Charles Houston, special counsel for the NAACP, told a Forum audience that "we could sue Jim Crow out of Maryland." The first test case came in 1935 with Murray v. Pearson, which desegregated the University of Maryland School of Law. To revive the Baltimore branch of the NAACP, Carl Murphy of the Afro-American newspaper asked Lillie to serve as president. With the support of the churches and the Afro, the branch became one of the largest and strongest in the nation.

Under Lillie Jackson's leadership, the Baltimore NAACP fervently challenged the color line in the city and throughout the state. She worked with Thurgood Marshall and Enolia Pettigen McMillan, president of the Maryland State Colored Teachers' Association, to establish legal precedents used in Maryland and other states to equalize teachers' salaries. The Baltimore NAACP sought jobs for blacks, fought residential segregation, and protested exclusion from public accommodations. Cases brought before the U.S. Supreme Court desegregated the pools in Baltimore and the beach at Sandy Point State Park in 1955 and overturned convictions for trespass against students participating in sit-in demonstrations.

Lillie Jackson retired from the NAACP in 1968 and established her home as a civil rights museum. She died in 1975.