James T. Rapier

James Thomas Rapier (November 13, 1837 – May 31, 1883) was an American lawyer and politician from Alabama during the Reconstruction Era. He served as a United States representative from Alabama, for one term from 1873 until 1875. Born free in Alabama, he went to school in Canada and earned a law degree in Scotland before being admitted to the bar in Tennessee.

Rapier was a nationally prominent figure in the Republican Party, one of seven black men serving in the 43rd Congress. He worked in 1874 for passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which guaranteed equal access to public accommodations until the U.S. Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional in 1883. It was the last federal civil rights law enacted until the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1957. Parts of the law were re-adopted in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and Civil Rights Act of 1968.