Virgil Darnell Hawkins

Virgil Darnell Hawkins (November 11, 1906 – February 11, 1988) was the grandson of an enslaved African American who spent his lifetime seeking to become an attorney so he could fight the injustices he saw inflicted on members of his community.  His dream of joining the legal profession began when as a six-year old, he saw black prisoners mistreated in a courtroom. His dream was thwarted because the law school at the Florida university paid for by his tax dollars did not admit black students.  At age 43, while working at Bethune Cookman College, he joined in the NAACP effort to desegregate the University of Florida after he was denied admission to the University of Florida School of Law on the basis of his race. Despite a clear ruling by the United States Supreme Court in Sweatt v. Painter, (339 U.S. 629, 1950), requiring the admission of black students to the law school at the University of Texas, the Florida Supreme Court unlawfully refused to obey the Sweatt ruling and denied Hawkins’ petition to attend UF. Over the next 9 years, he would go before the Florida Supreme Court an additional four times and won two rulings by the United States Supreme Court requiring his admission to UF, but Florida refused to obey the United States Supreme Court.

After years of illegally refusing to comply with the U.S Supreme Court’s orders, Florida was finally forced to comply when a Federal Court Judge finally signed an order in 1958 that required the University of Florida to admit African Americans to its graduate programs. However, Mr. Hawkins was forced to withdraw his own application in order to convince the Federal Judge to sign this court order.