NCSB Journal Spring 2026

Mary’s father, Irving Carlyle, had a plat form far beyond the halls of Reynolds High or the local PTA. He was set to deliver the keynote speech at the 1954 Democratic Party state convention on May 20, just three days following the Supreme Court’s decision. A former legislator, successful corporate lawyer, and former president of both the Chamber of Commerce and the North Carolina Bar Association (1944–45), he was, on paper, what you might expect from the business-ori ented, governing Democratic elite. His pre pared remarks were described in the newspa per as “typical fighting party talk,” celebrating the Democratic Party’s accomplishments and “laying into the Republicans, particularly into the present administration and Sen. Joseph McCarthy.” 4 At the last minute, he also inserted into his speech the following words about the Brown decision: “The Supreme Court of the United States has spoken. As good citizens, we have no other course except to obey the law as laid down by the Court. To do otherwise would cost us our respect for law and order, and if we lost that in these critical times, we will have lost that quality which is the source of our strength as a state and as a nation.” The same newspaper article noted that his 45 minute speech was interrupted 28 times with applause. His remarks on complying with the Court’s directive to end segregation “drew the biggest hand of all, and many of the Democrats rose to applaud him.” 5 Wallace Carroll, former editor and publisher of the Winston-Salem Journal & Sentinel , remarked that the applause was for his courage, not an endorsement of the underlying message. 6 Consistent with that interpretation, neither the governing Democratic Party nor the State Bar heeded his counsel. The State Bar hosted discussions on the integration question at its state conventions in 1955 and 1956 from leading members, speeches that were later printed in TheNorth Carolina Bar , the predecessor to the State Bar Journal . 7 None of the state’s 40 or 50 Black lawyers were included in these debates. Irving Carlyle’s participation in those debates in 1956 reflected his dogged insistence that lawyers shared a unique responsibility to lead the way in complying with Brown and inte grating public schools. For his public com mitment to equal justice under the law, he received threats, harassing letters, and phone calls—one in particular that Mary Irving Campbell recalls included the rhetorical ques

tion, “Who do you think your daughter’s going to marry?”—and was guaranteed that he would be passed over for consideration by Governor Umstead for an appointment to the then-vacant US Senate seat. 8 It should not be forgotten that this level of harassment was far less extreme than what was endured by Black civil rights leaders, who were some times targeted for criminal prosecution, sub jected to economic reprisals, or victimized by white vigilante violence, such as the bomb ings of the homes of Julius Chambers, Reginald Hawkins (a parent in a number of school desegregation cases), and brothers Fred (a city council member) and Kelly Alexander Sr. (president of the State Conference of Branches of the NAACP) in Charlotte in 1965. 9 White Democratic lawyers had promi nent roles in state governance at the time and would largely dictate the state’s strategy for delaying integration without open defiance of the Supreme Court. Their strategy proved a public relations coup for the “progressive” business elite who governed the state, embel lishing the moderate veneer that was central to the economic development strategy cham pioned by Governor Umstead and his succes sor, Luther Hodges. The Research Triangle Park was conceived and planned at the same time as North Carolina was navigating its response to the integration decision, and investments in public education were instru mental to efforts to shift away from an econ omy dominated by agriculture and low skilled textile and furniture manufacturing. The legal strategy was also informed by the governor, by the Attorney General’s Office, lawyers at the UNC Institute of Government, and an advisory committee led by attorney (and former Speaker of the House) Thomas Pearsall of Rocky Mount. Their positions were well reflected in debates before the State Bar. The range of viable options was set by the same Democratic white power structure that had governed Jim Crow North Carolina for more than half a century. The overriding goal of these white men, who shaped the state’s response to Brown , was the preservation of public schools as they were then operated—on a segregated basis—for as long as possible. Visionaries like Carlyle, who believed lawyers had a key role in helping their fellow white citizens accept civil rights for all, did not ultimately shape the decision about how to respond to Brown . African American attorneys were ignored

entirely. Conrad Pearson, who organized the Legal Redress Committee of the State Conference of Branches of the NAACP with lawyers like William G. Marsh Jr., Floyd McKissick Sr. of Durham, Charles Bell and Thomas Wyche of Charlotte, Ruben Daile of Asheville, and J. Kenneth Lee of Greensboro—lawyers who represented those brave families who fought for their full civil rights—were not consulted about how to comply with Brown . 10 Instead, the real debate was between those who wanted to overtly defy the Supreme Court to maintain segregation at all costs and those who wanted to move as slowly as possible. Lawyers Shape North Carolina’s Response to Brown The policy debate in the 1950s, as reflect ed in the speeches to the State Bar, was between rigid segregationists who fully embraced white supremacy, like Carlyle’s close family friend from Wake Forest, Assistant Attorney General I. Beverly Lake Sr., and those members of the Bar who con cluded that maintaining segregation by delay ing compliance with the Supreme Court’s mandate was necessary in order to preserve white support for the public schools. 11 This view was represented in the 1956 State Bar debates by Col. William Joyner, a member of the Pearsall Committee, which ultimately charted the course followed by the state in the first decade following the Brown decision. Governor Umstead, a Trinity College (Duke University) law-trained attorney and former district attorney, sought briefing from the UNC Institute of Government immedi ately after hearing news of the high court’s decision. While Governor Umstead’s col leagues in the South would go on to make headlines publicly decrying the Court’s deci sion and calling for outright defiance, Gov. Umstead followed a quieter course, saying that he was “terribly disappointed” by the rul ing, reserving further comment until he could read and study the opinion. 12 Ten days after the decision, Gov. Umstead issued a fuller statement of his dis appointment with the Supreme Court. In a move that would warm the hearts of original ists, he started with the observation that when Governor William Holden submitted the Fourteenth Amendment for ratification to the NC General Assembly in 1868, he assured state leaders that adopting the amendment would not bar North Carolina

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THE NORTH CAROLINA STATE BAR JOURNAL