Biography
James Pleasant Breeden was one of the fifteen Episcopal clergymen arrested in Jackson, Mississippi, on September 13, 1961, after the group entered the Trailways terminal coffee shop as an interracial party and declined police orders to leave.
The fifteen clergymen were tried in Jackson Municipal Court on September 15, convicted of disorderly conduct, fined $200 apiece, and sentenced to four months in jail; the prosecutions were dismissed on May 21, 1962, and the episode later reached the United States Supreme Court as the civil damages action Pierson v. Ray. How long each priest physically remained jailed after sentencing is not established; the release date is unresolved pending jail records.
