Editing Forsyth County, Georgia (section)

====Marches and demonstrations of the 1980s====
{{Main|1987 Forsyth County protests}}
{{More citations needed section|date=October 2020}}

More ethnically diverse citizens had begun in recent years to migrate to the county, particularly in the affluent southern portion. However, racial tension continued to be a part of the county's image into the early 1990s. On January 17, 1987, [[civil rights]] activists marched in [[Cumming, Georgia|Cumming]], and a counter-demonstration was made by a branch of the [[Ku Klux Klan]], most of whom were not residents of the county, as well as others who objected to the march. According to a story published in ''[[The New York Times]]'' on January 18, four marchers were slightly injured by stones and bottles thrown at them. Eight people from the counter-demonstration, all white, were arrested. The charges included trespassing and carrying concealed weapons.<ref name=":0" />

White Forsyth resident Charles A. Blackburn wanted to have a brotherhood march to celebrate the first annual celebration of national holiday [[Martin Luther King Jr. Day]]. He wanted to dispel the racist image of Forsyth County, where he owned and operated a private school, the Blackburn Learning Center. Blackburn cancelled his plans after he received threatening phone calls. Other whites in nearby counties, as well as State Representative [[Billy McKinney (politician)|Billy McKinney]] of Atlanta and [[Hosea Williams]], who was on the [[Atlanta City Council]], took up the march plans instead.

The following week, January 24, approximately 20,000 participants [[marching|marched]] in Cumming. This occurrence produced no violence, despite the presence of more than 5,000 counter-demonstrators, summoned by the [[Forsyth County Defense League]]. The county and state had mustered about 2,000 peace officers and National Guardsmen. Forsyth County paid $670,000 for police [[overtime]] during the [[political demonstration]]. ([[V. S. Naipaul]]'s interview with Forsyth County Sheriff Wesley Walraven, before the second march, is referred to in his book ''[[A Turn in the South]].'')

The demonstration is thought to have been the largest civil rights demonstration in the U.S. since about 1970. The unexpected turnout of some 5,000 counter-demonstrators, 66 of whom were arrested for "parading without a permit," turned out to be the largest resistance opposed to civil rights since the 1960s. The counter-demonstration was called by the Forsyth County Defense League and the [[Nationalist Movement]], newly organized in Cumming by local plumber Mark Watts.

Marchers came for the second march from all over the country, forming a caravan from Atlanta; National Guard troops were assigned for protection on freeway overpasses along the route. When marchers, including [[John Lewis]], [[Andrew Young]], [[Julian Bond]], [[Coretta Scott King]], [[Joseph Lowery]], [[Sam Nunn]], [[Benjamin Hooks]], [[Gary Hart]] and [[Wyche Fowler]]<ref>Phillips, Patrick. ''Blood at the Root: A Racial Cleansing in America.'' W.W. Norton & Company New York, 2016. p. 225.</ref> arrived, they discovered that most of the Cumming residents had left town for the day. Some had boarded up their windows because they feared violence. Marchers wound slowly through streets lined by hundreds of armed National Guardsmen, many of them black. Forsyth County subsequently charged large fees for parade permits until the practice was overturned in ''[[Forsyth County, Georgia v. The Nationalist Movement]]'' (505 U.S. 123) in the [[Supreme Court of the United States]] on June 19, 1992.