A group of teenagers and young adults held a week-long sit-in beginning Monday, July 22, 1963 to protest Mayor Gordon S. Clinton's lack of Black appointees to the Municipal Human Rights Commission. The sit-ins spent each day in the Council Chambers, moving to the foyer in the evenings once Chambers were closed. Although the police made several attempts to reason with the group, they were eventually forced by the City Council to physically remove the protestors. 23 were arrested in all: nine adults, ages 19 to 22, were booked for loitering, resisting arrest and disturbing the peace, and 14 youths, ages 11 to 16, were booked as delinquent juveniles loitering and resisting arrest.

Handwritten on sleeve: NEGROES, Seattle, Sit-in at Municipal Building.
Date photograph was published in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer: July 26, 1963.

Caption information source: P-I exhibit and research files.