The University of Akron IdeaExchange@UAkron Akron Law Review Akron Law Journals July 2015 Jack Johnson: Reluctant Hero of the Black Community Denise C. Morgan Please take a moment to share how this work helps you through this survey. Your feedback will be important as we plan further development of our repository. Follow this and additional works at: http://ideaexchange.uakron.edu/akronlawreview Part of the Civil Rights and Discrimination Commons, Criminal Law Commons, and the Law and Race Commons Recommended Citation Morgan, Denise C. (1999) "Jack Johnson: Reluctant Hero of the Black Community," Akron Law Review: Vol. 32 : Iss. 3 , Article 3. Available at: http://ideaexchange.uakron.edu/akronlawreview/vol32/iss3/3 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Akron Law Journals at IdeaExchange@UAkron, the institutional repository of The nivU ersity of Akron in Akron, Ohio, USA. It has been accepted for inclusion in Akron Law Review by an authorized administrator of IdeaExchange@UAkron. For more information, please contact
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[email protected]. Morgan: Jack Johnson: Reluctant Hero JACK JOHNSON: RELUCTANT HERO OF THE BLACK COMMUNITY by Denise C. Morgan* Asserting a strong sense of individuality - by exercising the right to excel at what, to live where, and to love whom one desires - has been a punishable offense for Black Americans for most of United States history.1 Even after the abolition of race-based slavery, Jim Crow laws constrained the ability of Black Americans to act upon their individual desires by