Burnt Out In Birmingham

I was tired of hearing about fire hoses and bombings and attack dogs even before we got to Birmingham the other day.  I was tired of standing at historic sites where children or mothers and fathers had been killed.  I was tired of crying, tired of historical plaques marking the deaths of black people who spoke up too strongly, or said the wrong thing, or became too successful, or tried to vote or use a restroom or a drinking fountain.  Most of all, I was tired of the people I met who said the reports of the abuse were exaggerated, or the woman staying at our Bed and Breakfast in Birmingham who told me it was “about states’ rights.”  Right to do what?  I wanted to ask her, but I was too burnt out.  The guy from San Diego who had moved down here, telling us that living in the south was the “best kept secret” and he loved going to the Civil War re-enactments, or – ha ha – the “War of Northern Aggression,” isn’t that quaint?  Aren’t they charming with their sweet tea?  I felt like I was being served a piece of rotten meat smothered in syrup.  “My family never owned slaves,” this woman told me.  “I never saw anything wrong growing up.”  I asked her if she had grown up with segregation.  She said yes, now that I mentioned it, they did have a gas station with white and colored restrooms and drinking fountains, but “nothing really ever happened that was a problem.”  I couldn’t resist saying, “But if you had white and colored drinking fountains, surely that was a problem, wasn’t it?”  She looked at me blankly.  When she said she hadn’t noticed anything wrong, she meant that she, personally, had not been frightened or  experienced (or even witnessed) any violence herself.  I was going to point out that was because she was white, but never mind. She was already so defensive I knew it wouldn’t do any good. I just wished her a good day and went off to see the 16^th Street Baptist Church, where four little girls were blown up. (As you might expect if you have been learning about the Civil Rights Movement from my blog, the killer was acquitted at his original trial, and not convicted until 2002, after it came out that a bunch of evidence had been suppressed.)

Click here to read some great historical articles about the bombing.

The Church is now across the street from the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, but we arrived early in the morning, before either place opened, and spent some time walking up 6^th Avenue by Kelly Ingram Park.  This is where the marches took place, where "Bull" Connor ordered the dogs and fire hoses so famously shown in the photos and video footage that changed the nation’s opinions.  The great hero of Birmingham’s Civil Rights Movement is Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, who invited Dr. King to Birmingham, who marched across the bridge from Selma to Montgomery, who was beaten up while trying to enroll his children in an all-white school, whose house was bombed, and who never gave up.  “No man can make us hate, and no man can make us afraid,” was my favorite Shuttlesworth saying.  The Birmingham airport is now named after him, and when Clinton was president, this incredible photo was taken at the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where people re-unite and re-enact the crossing every year.  Now THAT’S a historical re-enactment I’d like to attend!

Senator Obama and President Clinton with Reverend Fred

The displays at the institute were really great, and talking to some of the people who worked there was even more fun.  The older security guard (hard to understand, but I’m getting better) told me that his daughter is an 8^th grade teacher at “Reverend Fred’s” school (the school named after him), and that Reverend Fred was his hero.  He’s mine, too, after what I learned in Birmingham and elsewhere.

me and Reverend Fred

Why was Birmingham the “most racially divided” city in the south?  I’ll tell you my theory.  Because it was industrialized.  It had coal mines and steel mills, unlike most places down here.  As you know, the Union won the war for many reasons, but a main reason was its superior manufacturing capability.  Birmingham’s factory and mine owners paid the most rock-bottom wages for the most backbreaking work.  I think the song, “I owe my soul to the company store” was written about Birmingham.  At some point, convicts did the work in the mines.  The mill workers and miners attempted to unionize, and we all know how the man breaks up unions, don’t we?  By sowing the seeds of strife within the group.  And what is the best way to do that?  By sowing the seeds of racism.  Hey, you white workers!  Why would you want to band together with those n---s?  You’re better than they are.  Separate the schools, the churches, the places the workers live.  It was against the law even to play checkers with someone of a different race! If you get them to hate each other, that they never talk about the real oppressor, the bourgeois factory owners.  The same thing happened up in Chicago, if you remember.  It’s still happening now, with all the talk about foreigners stealing American jobs now that NAFTA and the WTO have taken over.  (Yeah, yeah, I know.  Workers of the world unite.  Blah blah blah.)

This divisive propaganda works incredibly well, and it makes sense why Birmingham was the most racially divided city in the South.  Fortunately, after the incredible work of the people who marched, conducted sit-ins and boycotts, things have changed a lot down here.  Thanks to “The Birmingham Pledge,” which the protestors signed, miracles have occurred.   Here is the pledge as used 50 years ago:

I hereby pledge myself — my person and body — to the nonviolent movement. Therefore I will keep the following 10 commandments:

1. Meditate daily on the teachings and life of Jesus.
2. Remember always that the nonviolent movement seeks justice and reconciliation, not victory.
3. Walk and talk in the manner of love, for God is love.
4. Pray daily to be used by God in order that all men and women might be free.
5. Sacrifice personal wishes in order that all men and women might be free.
6. Observe with both friend and foe the ordinary rules of courtesy.
7. Seek to perform regular service for others and for the world.
8. Refain from the violence of fist, tongue, or heart.
9. Strive to be in good spiritual and bodily health.
10. Follow the directions of the movement.

A nice article in the National Catholic Reporter about the legacy of the pledge of nonviolence. 

In 1997 a new Birmingham Pledge was written, a pledge which is inscribed on the city walls:

• ·         I believe that every person has worth as an individual
• ·         I believe that every person is entitled to dignity and respect, regardless of race or color
• ·         I believe that every thought and every act of racial prejudice is harmful; if it is my thought or act, it is harmful to me as well as to others
• ·         Therefore, from this day forward I will strive daily to eliminate racial prejudice from my thoughts and actions
• ·         I will discourage racial prejudice by others at every opportunity
• ·         I will treat all people with dignity and respect; and I will strive daily to honor this pledge, knowing that the world will be a better place because of my efforts.
• Read about the lawyer who wrote the new Birmingham Pledge 

In 2002, President Bush signed a resolution naming the week of September 15^th as Birmingham Pledge Week.  September 15^th is the anniversary of the deaths of the four little girls at the 16^th Street Baptist Church.

The four girls – Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Denise McNair – are memorialized in a beautiful new statue called “Four Spirits” that stands in Kelly Ingram park. 

Can you see the little shoes on the ground?

One girl is reading a book, another feeding the birds.  There’s a bronze pair of shoes lying alongside the bench, part of the statue, that correspond to the shoes of Denise McNair, displayed inside the Civil Rights Institute, along with her Ten Commandments bracelet, a little book she was carrying, and a chunk of brick that was embedded in her skull.  After seeing that, I couldn’t visit the church itself.  We both just  stood there, crying.  "I felt pretty sad that day, walkin' around," recalls Matt.
Here's a nice CNN article about the families today.

We drove to Atlanta, to spend two days on an urban farm with goats, turkeys, chickens, and my sister, Rachel, who flew up from Miami so she could be “part of the story.”  I’ll tell you about that in my next blog.