DECATUR, Ga. – On this day 60 years ago, a black man driving a white woman was pulled over in a traffic stop that would change the course of American history.
The incident was unknown to most at the time and has been largely forgotten. The man was Martin Luther King Jr., and his citation on May 4, 1960, led to him being sentenced, illegally, to a chain gang.
Georgia’s segregationist politicians sought to silence King before he could mobilize great masses of people. But it backfired as the mistreatment rocked the 1960 presidential race, prompting blacks to vote Democrat and help end Jim Crow laws in the Deep South.