SEARCH SITE

VIRGINIA LAW PORTAL

SEARCHABLE DATABASES

ACROSS SESSIONS

Developed and maintained by the Division of Legislative Automated Systems.

2024 SESSION

24101620D
HOUSE JOINT RESOLUTION NO. 8
Offered January 10, 2024
Prefiled January 2, 2024
Designating April, in 2024 and in each succeeding year, as Black Women's History Month in Virginia.
----------

Patrons-- Cole, Anthony, Bennett-Parker, Carr, Clark, Convirs-Fowler, Cousins, Feggans, Gardner, Henson, Hernandez, Hope, Keys-Gamarra, Krizek, Laufer, LeVere Bolling, Lopez, Martinez, McClure, McQuinn, Mundon King, Price, Rasoul, Seibold, Sewell, Shin, Simon, Simonds, Thomas, Ward and Watts; Senators: Bagby, Ebbin, Favola, Hashmi and Williams Graves
----------
Referred to Committee on Rules
----------

WHEREAS, for more than 400 years of Virginia's history, Black women have shaped the Commonwealth's history, facing combined racial and gender barriers, often with little recognition; and

WHEREAS, the lives and contributions of Black women in Virginia, both historical and contemporary, should be honored and celebrated in the Commonwealth; and

WHEREAS, Mary Elizabeth Bowser was born into slavery, gained an education, and later served as a spy for the Union in the Confederate White House during the American Civil War; after the war, she worked as a teacher, educating the formerly enslaved in freedman's schools; and

WHEREAS, Rosa Dixon Bowser, born in 1855, was an educator, women's rights activist, and social reformer, who founded the first African American teachers association and co-founded the Virginia State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs and the National Association of Colored Women; and

WHEREAS, Lucy Simms, born into slavery, began teaching as a teenager and continued teaching for 56 years, becoming a dedicated and beloved educator of three generations of Harrisonburg students; and

WHEREAS, Evelyn Thomas Butts, a civil rights activist and Democratic Party leader from Norfolk, successfully fought toward overturning Virginia's poll tax; she conduced voter registration campaigns and helped establish Concerned Citizens for Political Education and by the end of the 1970s was considered one of the most important Black political leaders in her region; and

WHEREAS, Barbara Rose Johns, at the age of 16, led the student strike at the racially segregated R.R. Moton High School in Prince Edward County in 1951, protesting the school's poor conditions, and setting in motion events that would lead to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka case; and

WHEREAS, countless Black women throughout Virginia's history, including, among many others, Elizabeth Keckley, Lucy Goode Brooks, Jennie Serepta Dean, Maggie Lena Walker, Dorothy Irene Height, Virginia Randolph, Virgie M. Binford, and Yvonne Miller, have had a hand in shaping the Commonwealth's history, creating pathways amidst racial and gender barriers for Black women, and for all citizens of the Commonwealth to follow and benefit from; and

WHEREAS, Black women in the Commonwealth continue to face inequities and injustices in the present day and continue to break barriers; now, therefore, be it

RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, the Senate concurring, That the General Assembly designate April, in 2024 and in each succeeding year, as Black Women's History Month in Virginia; and, be it

RESOLVED FURTHER, That the Clerk of the House of Delegates post the designation of this month on the General Assembly's website.