James Youman Eaton (1866 – June 27, 1928) was an American teacher, lawyer, and politician.
James Youman Eaton was born in 1866 in Louisburg, North Carolina to Thomas R. and Annie Burwell Eaton. His parents were former slaves and after emancipation were economically successful, having acquired 700 acres of land by the mid-1870s. Following graduation from the Boydton Academic and Bible Institute, Eaton earned a bachelor of laws degree from Shaw University in 1894 and passed the state bar exam that September. On June 30, 1900, he married Mary Agnes Cooper. They had five children together.
After graduating from law school, Eaton opened a legal practice in Henderson. From 1897 to 1898 he served as a county attorney for Vance County.[1] As a young adult he taught at a school in Townsville and served two years as principal of a school in Buffalo Lithia Springs, Virginia. He was elected as president of the Vance County Colored Teachers' Association at its formation on April 9, 1898.[2] The following year he founded and became principal of the Central Colored Graded School in Henderson.
Eaton was selected to run for a seat in the North Carolina House of Representatives on the Republican ticket in September 1898.[3] He won the seat to represent Vance County in the November election.[4] [5] He served in 1899 and 1900.[6] During the 1899 session, in which he was one of only three black representatives,[7] he served on a subcommittee of the legislature's joint Committee of Institutions for the Insane. He proposed four local bills before the House, two of which passed.
Eaton died on June 27, 1928 from heart issues stemming from an illness. A funeral was held for him in Henderson on July 3[8] and his body was interred in a family plot in Blacknall Cemetery. The Eaton-Johnson Middle School in Henderson was partly named in his honor.