On June 21st, 1964, one black and two white student activists were killed in Philadelphia, Mississippi. Only three weeks later, three lawyers from Spokane, Washington, two white and one black departed for Mississippi during the historic 1964 Summer of Freedom.

Sponsored by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, the 1964 Freedom Summer was set up as a voter registration drive amidst the tension of civil rights activism which had grown in frequency across the South. James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner were the names of the student activists who were killed before the northwestern lawyer's arrival, at first described by authorities as only missing. Carl Maxey, appointed in 1963 as the Chairman of the Washington State Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights by President John F. Kennedy went with his colleagues, Samuel Fancher & Thomas F. Lynch to help assist protestors and activists who required legal representation.

Maxey called Mississippi “the tail end of America” and said his work was “conducted in the most hostile environment imaginable”. He noted that “hundreds of angry Ku Klux Klan members, including the man later convicted of killing Medgar Evers, surrounded the courthouse.” Maxey helped to represent some of the 111 arrested protestors, including Stokely Carmichael and 13 freedom summer volunteers. During the three weeks he spent in Mississippi, Maxey met the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. Despite the turmoil and danger, Maxey would later recall the time as “one of the finest summers I've ever had. And I feel it was a reflection of America. It was the first time both black and white worked hand-in-hand in a humanitarian concern—the right to vote and the right to live.”

Spokane followed Maxey’s lead the following year, black and white working hand-in-hand. In 1965, Gonzaga students, mostly white (though including African Americans such as Sam Minnix and his sister Verda, pictured) marched in front of Spokane’s courthouse to show support for those marching from Selma on March 21st.

There were two Spokanites there in the march for Montgomery as well, Mike Kobluk and Chad Mitchell, after being invited by acclaimed musician Harry Belafonte. Although such displays highlighted the solidarity between the two regions in their respective fights for civil rights, the march by Gonzaga students would be the last form of public civil rights protesting in Spokane during the 1960s.

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In October 1963, in downtown Spokane an exchange student at Gonzaga University from Liberia went into a barbershop to ask for a haircut. In a few minutes, Jangba Johnson experienced what it meant to be a second-class citizen in the United States of America.

Jangba Johnson was humiliated by the barbershop owner John W. Wheeler for refusing to service the young Black man saying that he did not cut “colored hair”. Johnson complained to his fellow students at Gonzaga about his mistreatment. Some students, mostly whites asked Wheeler to promise that such an incident would never happen again. When Wheeler refused the students picketed Wheeler’s barbershop, a protest that was reported in the national news media. They also went into Spokane’s local NAACP office and filed a complaint against Weeler’s barbershop, on the grounds of racial discrimination in what would turn out to be Spokane's most defining civil rights case of the 1960s.

The lawyer who took the case was Carl Maxey, Spokane's leading civil rights attorney who broke down several barriers for people of color in the city. Maxey took Johnson’s case pro bono and filed a complaint on his behalf to the Washington State Board Against Discrimination, arguing that it was illegal for a business that serves the public to refuse service based on race.

The case quickly divided the city and attracted national attention to Spokane. On one side was Carl Maxey representing the student Jangba Johnson and the other was Michael J. Hemovich representing the barbershop owner John Wheeler. Hemovich and Maxey traded blows against each other. Maxey argued that since a “barber’s license is a privilege and not a right. A barber cannot, under the law arbitrarily refuse service to a customer based on their race.” Hemovich argued that forcing Wheeler “to perform a personal service constituted to what amount as involuntary servitude.” Each side gave as good as they go in front of a packed audience.

It took the Board of Discrimination three minutes to give out a judgment on the case. They ruled against John Wheeler, ordering him to serve all races in his barbershop. Wheeler appealed to the State’s Supreme Court and lost. Rather than serve African Americans in his barbershop, Wheeler decided to close shop and retire.

This case was just another win for Maxey, for the city and people of Spokane it was something else. Spokane was a city with a small African American population, and the case of Jangba Johnson and John Wheeler brought the topic of both segregation and racism to the front of discussions in the city.

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Carl Maxey was an NCAA Boxing legend, whose most important fights were outside the ring. He was the first black man to graduate from Gonzaga Law School in 1951 and fought for African American's civil rights during the 1960s and 70s.

One of Carl Maxey's earliest memories of fighting was against racism during his childhood. Maxey was adopted and then orphaned and ended up at the Spokane Children's Home in 1933. Maxey remembered that when the orphans took a trip to Camp Cowles, he was not allowed to "swim with the rest of the kids. " He also recalled having to wash dishes for the other children.

Though a gifted scholar and athlete, Maxey always had to overcome the barrier of racial discrimination. In 1941, he attempted to walk on the football team at Eastern Washington College of Education (now EWU) but was forced to quit after multiple assaults and racist bullying. His attempt to join Gonzaga's football team in 1942 also failed. But this was most likely due to the hiatus of Gonzaga's football team, because of the United States entrance to WWII.

Maxey did return to Gonzaga 5 years later for his law degree. At that time law students were eligible to be athletes. Maxey joined Gonzaga's boxing team and went undefeated during his 4-year career at Gonzaga.

In 1951 Maxey became the first African American man to graduate from Gonzaga Law School. He never stepped foot in a ring again, fighting instead for civil rights. An example of this was the "Haircut Uproar" in 1963. Jangaba Johnson, an exchange student from Liberia, was denied a haircut from John M. Wheeler’s downtown Spokane barbershop on the account of his skin color. Maxey filed an official complaint with the Washington State Board Against Discrimination.

Maxey won the case against the barbershop--and many others. Maxey opened the Maxey Law Office in 1980 under the three principles: integrity, equality, and justice. His work inspired his two sons, Bill and Bevan Maxey, to become lawyers and take over the law office in 1997.

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