BLACK SOCIAL HISTORY : AFRO-CANADAIN " VIOLA DAVIS DESMOND " WAS GRANTED A POSTHUMOUS PARDON THE FIRST IN CANADA HISTORY : GOES INTO THE " HALL OF BLACK GENIUS "

                    BLACK                 SOCIAL                HISTORY                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               Viola Davis Desmond  July 6, 1914 – February 7, 1965  was an Black Nova Scotian who was granted a posthumous pardon, the first to be granted in Canada. The government of Nova Scotia also apologized for convicting her for tax evasion, when, in fact, she was resisting a "whites only" discrimination policy in a movie theatre in 1946. Desmond's story was one of the most publicized incidents of racial discrimination in Canadian history. Desmond acted nine years before the famed incident by civil-rights activist Rosa Parks, with whom Desmond is often compared. 

Born and raised in Halifax, Viola Desmond trained as a teacher but soon joined her husband Jack Desmond in a combined barbershop and hairdressing salon, a beauty parlour on Gottingen Street. While expanding her business across the province, Viola went to New Glasgow in 1946.]

On November 8, 1946, Viola Desmond refused to sit in the balcony designated exclusively for blacks in the Roseland Theatre in New Glasgow but, instead, she took her seat on the ground floor where only white people were allowed to sit. Desmond was forcibly removed from the theatre and arrested.

The Trials]

Desmond was eventually found guilty of not paying the one-cent difference in tax on the balcony ticket from the main floor theatre ticket. She was fined $20 ($251.30 in 2010) and court costs ($6). She paid the fine but decided to fight the charge in court.

During subsequent trials the government insisted on arguing that this was a case of tax evasion. Retail sales tax was calculated based on the price of the theatre ticket. Since the theatre would only agree to sell the Black woman a cheaper balcony ticket, but she had insisted upon sitting in the more expensive main floor seat, she was one cent short on tax. For her crime of so-called tax evasion, she was removed from the theatre, thrown in jail overnight, tried without counsel, convicted and fined. During the trial, no one admitted that Viola Desmond was Black, and that the theatre maintained a racist seating policy. The trial proceeded as if it related to race-neutral tax evasion. All efforts to have the conviction overturned at higher levels of court failed.

Her lawyer returned her fee which she used to set up a fund that was eventually used to support activities of the Nova Scotia Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NSAACP), which supported her through her trials.

Afterward]

Desmond had previously bought her own beauty parlour and beauty college in Halifax. After the trial, Desmond closed her business and then moved to Montreal where she could enroll in a business college. She eventually settled in New York where she died on February 7, 1965 at the age of 50.

While the case received little attention outside of Nova Scotia, it has since gained notoriety as one of many cases fought for civil rights in the mid-20th century.

In 2000, Desmond and other Canadian civil rights activists were the subject of a National Film Board of Canada documentary Journey to Justice.

On April 14, 2010, the Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia, Mayann Francis, on the advice of her premier, invoked the Royal Prerogative and granted Desmond a posthumous pardon, the first such to be granted in Canada.The government of Nova Scotia also apologised.