During my college career I have been blessed with the opportunity to write for the Louisville Political Review and serve in various internships and positions in the local, state, and federal governments. LPR’s Black History Month series is always an exciting chance for me to combine these experiences and explore the inspirational legacies of African American leaders in government. Whether it’s Louisville Alderwoman Louise Reynolds or U.S. Senator Hiram Revels, the lives of our transformational African American leaders deserve to be remembered and taught not only during Black History Month, but the whole year in our teaching of American history. Kentucky State Representative Charles Anderson, Jr. is a historic Black leader in the Commonwealth. Anderson was the first African American elected to serve as a Kentucky State Legislator, but his accomplishments are even greater than breaking the state government’s color barrier.
Charles Anderson, Jr. was born and raised in Louisville in 1907. His father was a respected doctor and his mother a well-known schoolteacher, giving him more advantages than most, but he was still a Black man in a Jim Crow-era Kentucky. Anderson first went to Kentucky State College (now Kentucky State University), but later sought to achieve an out-of-state education at Wilberforce University, the nation’s oldest historically black private college. He then went on to pursue a legal education at Howard University School of Law, which is the oldest and most prestigious historically black law school in America. After graduating law school, Anderson returned to his hometown to become a prominent attorney with his own law practice.
Not long after his return to Louisville, Anderson was recruited in 1935 to run as the Republican candidate for a Kentucky State House district representing Louisville. At the time, the Republican Party was facing a political crisis in their growing loss of the historically reliable Black voter block to the Democratic Party.
Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt was by no means a civil rights hero, but many African Americans appreciated his occasional support for greater Black resources and came to associate the improved post-depression economic conditions with FDR and his New Deal programs. Anderson challenged this national trend and won a competitive race in a crowded field of candidates. This victory not only made him the first Black member of the Kentucky General Assembly, but also the first Black legislator in the South since Reconstruction.
Upon his swearing in at the beginning of the Kentucky General Assembly session in 1936, Anderson recognized his dual roles of serving the people of Louisville while also serving the Black community as a watchdog against discriminatory legislation and practices. Anderson was a crusader against segregation and racial discrimination, but he was also a pragmatist that recognized the politics and racial tolerance of Kentucky at the time. This allowed him to make several substantial legislative accomplishments during his tenure in office.
Anderson was able to successfully guide the passage of his legislation requiring the state to appropriate funds to financially assist Black post-secondary education students in their out-of-state studies. The “Anderson-Mayer State Aid Act” was a landmark bill for Black people in Kentucky that initially provided $5,000 in scholarship per student, but in Anderson’s second term he was able to increase this to $7,500.
While Anderson desired an end to segregation outright, he managed to win near unanimous support in the Kentucky General Assembly with his proposal to desegregate nursing schools and hospital training programs. At the time, many Kentucky communities were struggling due to a nurse shortage and civil rights advocates believed that such a desegregation proposal wouldn’t receive harsh backlash.
Anderson also managed to convince the Kentucky General Assembly to pass his bill requiring every county in the state to provide Black students with a high school education or the financial resources to obtain one by covering transportation expenses and up to $100 in tuition. This helped address the lack of colored high schools in rural areas across the state.
Following his service as a Kentucky State Representative, Anderson became the assistant commonwealth’s attorney for the 30th Judicial District, representing Jefferson County. He later served two terms as the president of the National Bar Association, which was an organization of Black lawyers dedicated to serving as the legal advocates for Black people in the courts and other forums. The National Bar Association exists to this day, and their Louisville affiliate chapter, “The Charles W. Anderson, Jr. Bar Association,” is named in honor of the historic lawyer and legislator. In the 1950s, President Dwight D. Eisenhower appointed Anderson as an alternate delegate to the United Nations.
Anderson tragically lost his life in a car-train accident on June 19, 1960. However, his legacy lived on, as his accomplishments as the first Black legislator in the South since Reconstruction inspired other Black leaders to run for office in Kentucky and the rest of the South. Throughout his career in the Kentucky House, Anderson was the only Black legislator in both the House and the Senate. Just a few years after his retirement more Black legislators took office in Kentucky, with the first Black senator and Black female legislator being Georgia Davis Powers. Anderson remains as an inspiration to the legislators who came after him and the Commonwealth of Kentucky as a whole.
DISCLAIMER: Most of the sources for this article are not hyperlinked, because there were no accessible virtual replications of Charles W. Anderson, Jr.’s file in the Peggy King Legislative Reference Library. The library is located in the Annex Building across from the Kentucky Capitol Building in Frankfort and is open to the public Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Library staff can be reached by calling 502-564-8100.
Louisville Political Review 