Nelson, John P. (John Pettit)
Dates
- Existence: 1921 - 2006
Biographical Statement
John P. Nelson, Jr., was a New Orleans attorney who worked on various landmark civil rights cases, including Lombard v. Louisiana, a sit-in case of the early 1960's in New Orleans. He was the first Caucasian attorney in the South, not affiliated with any civil rights organization, to represent African American defendants at the United States Supreme Court level. Nelson was also one of the organizers of the Save Our Schools group in Louisiana, which organized resistance to the efforts to close public schools in order to prevent integration.
One of five children born to John Pettit Nelson of St. Louis, Missouri, and Stella Foret of LaFouche Parish, Louisiana, in 1921; Nelson, a native of Gulfport, Mississippi, grew up in New Orleans and attended Louisiana State University for three years, then receiving his B.S. and L.L.B. degrees from Loyola University. While a junior at Louisiana State University, he volunteered for active service in the United States Army in 1940. Entering as a private, he was discharged with a rank of captain. His active service was done in the South Pacific and the Philippines during World War II, where he won the Silver Star, the Bronze Star, and the Purple Heart.
Nelson was admitted to practice law in the state of Louisiana in 1950 and joined the law firm of Dodd, Hirsch and Barker. In 1954 he became the Assistant District Attorney for Orleans Parish, a position which he left in 1958 to become a senior partner in the law firm of Nelson, Ormond and Nelson. In a landmark civil rights case, Nelson represented the defendant's in the case of Lombard v. Louisiana (subsequently Louisiana v. Goldfinch, et al.), a sit-in case that occurred in Orleans Parish where demonstrators had been sentenced in state court to ten-year jail terms for "criminal anarchy." Nelson handled the matter through all of Louisiana's courts and argued before the United States Supreme Court with the ultimate decision in favor of the defendants. This was the first time a White attorney in the South, unaffiliated with any civil rights organization, had represented an African American in a civil rights case before that court. Nelson also handled the suit to integrate Tulane University, initially losing the suit after getting an earlier favorable judgment, when a second judge rendered a negative decision but prompting Tulane to voluntarily desegregate.
Nelson served as counsel for St. Augustine High School of New Orleans, a de facto racially segregated Black school, in its efforts to integrate interscholastic athletic activities overseen by the Louisiana High School Athletic Association. He also represented the Houma Indians of Terrebonne Parish, where a tri-racial pattern of segregation existed and was successful in obtaining a federal court injunction and plan for integration of the schools.
In 1960, Nelson was one of the organizers of the Save Our Schools movement in Louisiana, which organized resistance to the efforts to close public schools in order to prevent integration. SOS carried on a widespread program of education and a "car-lift" for children wishing to attend boycotted schools. With two other SOS attorneys Nelson submitted an amicus brief in the St. Helena School closing case, heard before the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana. He was also a trustee of the Back to School Fund that assisted parents who lost employment because they sent their children to integrated schools. Nelson won a favorable suit brought against the New Orleans Athletic Club by Thomas P. Perkins, Jr., a young African American Harvard student from New Orleans, who when home from university, was denied entrance and use of the facilities even though Perkins was a member of the Harvard Club of Boston, which had a reciprocal agreement with the athletic club.
Nelson was a founding member of the National Catholic Conference for Interracial Justice, and later served as its vice chairman on its legal committee. He also served as a member of the board of directors of the Louisiana Council on Human Relations and a member of the Louisiana Advisory Committee to the United States Civil Rights Commission.