Joel Buchanan Archive of African American History: http://ufdc.ufl.edu/ohfb
Samuel Proctor Oral History Program
College of Liberal Arts and Sciences
Program Director: Dr. Paul Ortiz 241 Pugh Hall PO Box 115215 Gainesville, FL 32611 (352) 392-7168 https://oral.history.ufl.edu
VIDS 030 Patricia Stephens Due; John Due; Katheryn Russell-Brown; Paul Ortiz; Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons; Dan Harmeling Documentaries, Public Events, Lectures (VIDS) An Evening With the Dues on Feb 16, 2011 1 hour, 39 minutes | 38 pages
For information on terms of use of this interview, please see the SPOHP Creative Commons license at http://ufdc.ufl.edu/AfricanAmericanOralHistory.
VIDS 030 Speakers: Patricia Stephens Due; John Due; Katheryn Russell-Brown; Paul Ortiz; Gwendolyn Zoharah Simmons; Dan Harmeling Event Title: An Evening With the Dues Date: Feb 16, 2011
R: Good evening. Good evening, welcome, and thank you for coming. My name is
Katheryn Russell-Brown. I’m the wearer of at least two hats: tonight, I am the
director of the Center for the Study of Race and Race Relations here at the
University of Florida, and also, Professor of Law at the Levin College of Law here
at the University of Florida. I’m very excited that tonight has finally arrived. We’re
anxiously awaiting and looking forward to the talk this evening by Dr. Patricia
Stephens Due and attorney John Due. The theme for this evening is
“Collaboration: From Inception to Fruition”. Tonight’s Evening with the Dues is
the result of a group effort. In 2007, my mother and I read the book, Freedom in
the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights. In riveting,
powerful detail, the book tells the story of civil rights activism here in Florida and
across the nation. The book was co-written by one of our guests this evening, Dr.
Patricia Stephens Due, along with her daughter, Tananarive Due. Reading this
book planted the seed for tonight’s event. These seeds began to take root last
spring, when we decided that the Race Center should plan an event where we
can hear firsthand testimony on the life, and life lived, in the fight for civil rights.
Tonight’s event sprouted when we joined with the University of Florida’s Samuel
Proctor Oral History Program to put on this event. I sent Dr. Ortiz an email on
April 17th of last year, to ask if his center would be interested in co-sponsoring
this event. His response came back in less than twenty minutes: an enthusiastic
thumbs-up. As luck would have it, Dr. Ortiz already knew this evening’s
speakers, and was able to use his mighty powers of persuasion, and enlist others VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 2 to do the same to get them to say “yes.” From the beginning, both centers wanted to make this a campus and community event. I’m thrilled to say that we exceeded even our own expectations. This event has a total of fourteen co- sponsors: the Bob Graham Center for Public Service; the Office of the Provost; the George A. Smathers Libraries; Center on African Studies; Center for
Women’s Studies and Gender Research; the African-American Studies Program; the Department of Anthropology; the Department of History; the Office of the
Provost—that I mentioned; and the Speech and Debate Team. And our community co-sponsors: the 1199, SCIU, United Healthcare Workers, East
Florida Region: the Alumni of the Northstar Leadership Council; the Gainesville
Women’s Liberation; and the Civic Media Center. A special thank-you to Melissa
Birnbaum, the assistant director of the Race Center, and Tamarra Jenkins, the office manager of the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, and Marna Weston, the African American History Project Coordinator. Before passing the baton to Dr.
Ortiz, I’d like to share a statement made by Nelson Mandela, former South
African president, imprisoned for twenty-seven years for his political activism. He says, “In the heart of any individual, family, community, or society, memory is of fundamental importance. It is the fabric of identity. At the heart of every oppressive tool developed by the Apartheid regime was the determination to control, distort, weaken, even erase, people’s memories. The struggle against
Apartheid can by typified as the pitting of remembering against forgetting.”
Tonight, we toast to remembering our history. Thank you for coming, and we look VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 3
forward to an engaging evening. Take notes, ask questions, and join us in future
events. Dr. Paul Ortiz.
O: Thank you so much, Dr. Russell-Brown. Good evening!
Audience: Good evening.
O: It is a great honor for us at the University of Florida to be able to welcome Dr.
Patricia Stephens Due and attorney John Due. And I’d like us all to give a warm
Gainesville and UF welcome to these two giants. [Applause] As Katheryn
mentioned in the outset, this is really a dream come true for us at the University
of Florida, and certainly at the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program. Patricia
Stephens Due and John Due have made this country a better place to live in.
Their lives of struggle have made it easier for all of us to relate to each other with
greater honesty and candor across divides of race, creed, and color. To call
Patricia Stephens Due and John Due pioneers of the Civil Rights Movement
would be an understatement. Their endeavors in pursuit of justice have made it
easier for women to live lives of dignity, for workers to organize unions, and for
African Americans to claim their rightful place in this republic. The Dues will be
the first to tell you that they were not the first to join the centuries-old Black
freedom struggle. And I think they are going to tell you this evening that they
hope not to be the last. We all know that there is much work to be done. A former
student of mine, who is a first-year law student at Berkeley, wrote me this email
just this morning. She reports: “At Berkeley Law, only five of the two hundred and
seventy first-year students are Black males. And only one is from California. The
numbers do not get much better for Chicano males,” she reports. This disturbing VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 4 correspondence makes the event this evening all the more important. We need role models in creating social movements for equality. The Dues provide us with critical examples to emulate and to learn from. Indeed, the way they have lived their lives, and worked, evoke for us the words of C.L.R. James, when he said,
“Let all true believers in democracy and equality today strengthen ourselves by studying what they did, and how they did it.” So there are many individuals, departments, and community organizations that pulled together resources, time, and energy to make this event possible. Katheryn read us the list. And of course, first of all, I want to thank Katheryn again for sending that email, for having the idea. It’s been such an honor for us at the Oral History Program to be able to work with the Center for the Study of Race and Race Relations, and we want to collaborate more in the future. Katheryn was the originator of the idea for this program. She organized the planning meetings that lasted and went all through the summer, on a bi-weekly basis. There’s a myth that professors don’t do anything in the summer! All right? Katheryn is living testimony to the contrary.
She’s very busy, like most of us are in July. Additionally, we’re very grateful for our support from Bob Graham Center for Public Service. The Graham Center is live-streaming this event, and what this means is that we have a national audience—an international audience—for this event. We’ve had friends call us from Hawaii, from California, from Texas, who are actually watching us right now, thanks to the expertise and support of the Bob Graham Center. So I want to give them a hand. [Applause] In fact, right now, there’s another audience of folks watching us downtown at the Civic Media Center. I also want to acknowledge the VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 5
Civic Media Center, because we know there are many folks who live in downtown Gainesville, their idea of an exciting activity isn’t always to try to park at the UF campus in the evening. [Laughter] So we’re very grateful to our friends at the Civic Media Center for hosting a live-streaming portion. I also want to take this opportunity to thank UF President Bernie Machen, and Provost Joe Glover, whose commitment to African American history has allowed the oral history program to embark upon a three-year research project to gather, preserve, and promote the oral histories of African Americans, Alachua County and beyond. I’d also like to thank the Magnolia Plantation Bed and Breakfast in Gainesville, for providing excellent lodging and accommodations for the Dues. And I just have two quick administrative announcements to make: when you received your program, there’s an insert—there are two pieces of paper. One of them, I’m told, is yellow, one of them is blue. Now, the survey form is on kind of a light blue paper. We’d really appreciate if you would take the time to fill that out. It gives us a sense of what we’re doing well, what we need to improve upon, and we’re giving you a bit of incentive tonight to fill that out. If you fill that out and turn it in to one of our staff or kind volunteers who are kind of standing on the outside—staff and volunteers, raise your hands—you will be entered into a drawing to win a signed copy of Freedom in the Family. So, that’s a little incentive! In addition, if you would like to ask Dr. Patricia Stephens Due or attorney John Due questions this evening, we’ve included question cards on yellow pieces of paper. And as questions occur to you, you can fill out your question card, and if you can pass it to the outside, we’ll have volunteers that will take your question card, and our VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 6
kind moderators—who we’re going to introduce in just a moment—will be
administering that part of the program. Before I introduce our evening’s
moderators, I’ve been asked to make two quick announcements: one regarding
University of Florida’s Black History Month program. Black History Month is
proud to announce the second-annual all-campus intramural Great Gator
Debaters tournament, which will be held Sunday, February 20th. Registration is
open to all UF students. This year’s topic, which I think this audience would be
interested in: “Resolved: the Civil Rights Act of 1964 Should Be Reformed.” It’s a
very interesting debate topic, certainly. For further information, you can contact
the current director, Dominique Martin. Is Dominique here this evening, by the
way? Maybe in the overflow area. The other announcement is that the UF
Speech and Debate Team is hosting the Ford Intercollegiate Forensics
Association, and I think Mr. Marna Weston—if you’re interested in that, you can
talk with Marna about that. Before I turn the evening’s program over to our dear
moderators, Dan Harmeling and Zoharah Simmons, Katheryn and I wanted to
make a joint announcement. Katheryn?
R: We wanted to take just a moment to acknowledge, and give a round of applause,
to those who are present who are civil rights veterans—veterans of the
Movement. So, if you licked envelopes; if you went to meetings; if you organized
meetings; if you rode buses; if you refused to get on a bus; if you—
O: —did all those things and more! [Laughter]
R: All those things and more; went to jail; we would like you to stand up. [Applause] VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 7
O: Now, it’s my great honor to be able to yield the podium to our two moderators this
evening who will be in charge of the program from this point on, but I wanted to
quickly introduce them. Both Dan Harmeling and Zoharah Simmons are longtime
friends of Katheryn and I, and they are also advisors of the Oral History Program;
we really depend on their expertise and guidance. Dan Harmeling—Dan has
known the Dues since around 1963. He remains very good friends with them. He
states—and this is a direct quote—“I am very proud of my arrests during acts of
civil disobedience at a segregated movie theater in Tallahassee in 1963; at a
segregated restaurant in St. Augustine in 1964; at the capitol building in
Montgomery, Alabama, during the Selma-to-Montgomery march in 1965; and at
a supermarket refusing to promote Black employees in Jacksonville in 1966.”
And Dan, I believe there are more, but we’ll stop there.
H: Stop. Stop. [Laughter]
O: Okay. Dan is also a retired schoolteacher, and a member of the math department
faculty at Santa Fe College. In 2010, the Martin Luther King Jr. Commission of
Florida, Inc., presented Dan with a Hall of Fame award memorial tribute, which is
a program to honor those who fight for civil rights. Dan is our first moderator.
Thank you, Dan. Our next moderator is Dr. Zoharah Simmons. Dr. Simmons is
an Assistant Professor in the Department of Religion, and a faculty affiliate at the
African American Studies program. She has a long history in the area of civil
rights, human rights, and peace work. She was on the staff of the American
Friends Service Committee for twenty-three years; the AFSC is a Quaker
peace/justice/human rights and international development organization VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 8
headquartered in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. During her early adult years as a
college student and thereafter, she was active with the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee, or SNCC, and spent seven years working full-time on
voter registration and desegregation activities in Mississippi, Georgia, and
Alabama during the height of the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. Before I
ask Dan and Zoharah to come up here, make sure and turn off your cell phones,
and pagers, and beepers, and all those other things. Thank you so much. Dr.
Simmons, Dan Harmeling, please come up to the podium. Thank you. [Applause]
S: Good evening, everybody.
Audience: Good evening.
S: I believe you were going to introduce John first, and—
H: I’m going to introduce John, and you’re going to introduce Patricia. And I’m not
sure if there should be a coin flip. What do you think, John?
JD: She should speak first. [Laughter]
S: All right.
H: Zoharah’s going to go first.
S: Okay. What a pleasure it is, first of all, to be here tonight, and to thank the
organizers, and all of the sponsors, for this, and to thank all of you for coming
out—my goodness! How wonderful it is to look out and see this beautiful
audience! You know, there is a fraternity of civil rights folks, and often in the
class—a civil rights class that I teach—I say, you know, one of the things that
we’re most proud of is how many times we went to jail, and how long we stayed.
So, one of the wonderful things you’ll hear about Dr. Patricia Stephens Due is her VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 9 long prison sentence! But anyway, I’m really happy to have the honor of introducing her to many of you, and presenting her to others who already know her. She is a lifelong civil rights activist, who took part in the nation’s first jail-in as a college student in 1960, spending forty-nine days in jail rather than pays her fine for sitting at a Woolworth lunch counter. Due has never lost her commitment to the civil rights struggle. And her involvement in community problem-solving spans over four decades. You’ve heard about this wonderful book, Freedom in the Family: A Mother-Daughter Memoir of the Fight for Civil Rights, in which she and her daughter promo from the price of activism, both on their family and on the families of other civil rights activists that they have known. Dr. Due was born in Quincy, Florida—she’s a Florida girl—and spent her childhood in the Florida cities of Miami, Quincy, and Belle Glade. Now, when she was growing up, Florida did not allow so-called “Negroes” to eat with Whites at dimestore counters; also segregated its schools, its swimming pools, its movie theaters, and its restaurants. And really, Blacks had very limited opportunities in employment and in housing. So, as a teenager in Belle Glade, Dr. Due and her sister first defied segregation laws by standing at the White-only window at the Dairy Queen. As college students, when the sisters attended an interracial workshop in 1959, sponsored by CORE—the Congress of Racial Equality—they were swept into what would later become known as the Civil Rights Movement. Dr. Due, and her sister, Priscilla Stephens Kruize, were among five Florida A&M University students who spent forty-nine days in jail, as I mentioned, after taking part in a sit-in in a Tallahassee Woolworth in 1960. Due and the other students’ decision VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 10
to stay in jail, as opposed to having bail, brought her to the attention of Dr. Martin
Luther King, who wrote to her and said, “You have again proven that there is
nothing more majestic and sublime than the determined courage of individuals
willing to suffer and sacrifice for the cause of freedom.” So, you will hear more
from Dr. Due about her activities, I don’t want to take any more time, but we
welcome you here with us today. [Applause]
H: Before Patricia speaks, I’m going to give the introduction to John Due. John’s
daughter, Tananarive Due, writes about her father in the book Freedom in the
Family: “Civil rights was all he wanted to do.” After graduating from Indiana
University in 1958, with a degree in Government and Sociology, and after two
years working as a rehabilitation counselor with the Indiana prison system, John
sensed his destiny. With the exception of two years in the Army, he had spent his
entire life in Indiana. John knew the Civil Rights struggle needed lawyers. And he
had read in 1960 about the two sisters in Tallahassee who served forty-nine days
in jail, the nation’s first jail-in, after refusal to pay a fine for a sit-in at a
Woolworth’s lunch counter. So, he headed south to the Florida A&M Law School,
soon found those two sisters, and on January 5th, 1963, after getting his law
degree and proving his serious commitment to the Movement, John and Patricia
Stephens—the younger of those two sisters—John and Patricia married. On
November 15th, 1963, John officially became a member of the Florida Bar. And
one week later, he arrived in St. Augustine, Florida, taking his first official case:
the defense of Dr. Robert Hayling, a respected dentist, the leader of that city’s
Civil Rights Movement, the “nation’s oldest city,” and the city Martin Luther King VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 11
would later call the most violent he ever experienced in the Civil Rights
Movement. This was November 22nd, 1963, the day President Kennedy was
assassinated. At a Ku Klux Klan rally that Dr. Hayling had gone to observe from a
distance, he and two friends were discovered, dragged to the front of this racist
mob, and severely beaten. Now he was on trial for allegedly beating a couple of
them. John successfully defended Dr. Hayling. On October 29th, 1997—that’s
thirty-four years later—a week after John’s 63rd birthday, an editorial in the Miami
Herald said about him—after he received one of his dozens of awards—quote,
“Florida’s and Dade County’s history record Mr. Due as a courageous and
selfless champion in the struggle for equality. He risked everything—life, family,
and future—to secure the rights enjoyed today by so many.” I am so proud to
introduce my very good friend, John Dorsey Due Jr. [Applause]
PD: Good evening.
Audience: Good evening.
PD: Thank you so much for both our introductions. You know, the footsoldiers were
asked to stand—or, to raise their hands—but I have a few that I know personally,
and a few people that we worked with, that I would like to stand. And one of them
to sit with me during the book signing—but even John was absent. [Laughter]
Betty Wright Blakely, who’s on the cover, and who organized Dunnellon CORE.
[Applause] And of course, Dan, who was so involved in the Movement, and later
on with us—Dan, I know you introduced John, but would you stand? And thank
you. [Applause] We lived in Miami for about thirty-five years raising our girls, and
Miami has come to us this evening. Monica Russo, please stand. [Applause] VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 12
Who represents labor—SCIU 1199. Thank you so much for coming, Monica.
[Applause] As I heard both our introductions, I realized that, although Tananarive
and I wrote this book, it was because of many of you that we were able to make it
happen. When I went on a book tour in 2003, one of the questions was, “What
took you so long?” Well, life. Life did. In addition to our activities, John and I are
fortunate to have three daughters: Tananarive, you’ve heard about. Tananarive
Due is an author and a screenwriter. Johnita Due lives in Atlanta, is a senior
counselor for CNN, and chair of the diversity committee for CNN. Lydia Due
Bryce lives in McKinney, Texas. She’s a Texas lawyer, and she formerly worked
for the United States government. So, we were paying attention. First and
foremost to us, our family was important. I see I’m having to bend over a bit here.
JD: Okay. Let me move the chair a little bit.
PD: He was always a gentleman. [Laughter] Thank you, honey. My name is Patricia
Stephens Due, and I was born in Quincy, Florida. And my parents divorced when
I was four years old. My mother set out for Miami to try to make a living for us.
Now, my biological father wanted to remarry my mother, but unlike a lot of
children a little later on, I said, “Oh, please don’t!” [Laughter] At nine years old,
my mother remarried Marion Murphy Hamilton. That was the best thing that ever
happened to me. He was band director in Belle Glade, and he taught me Civics
and Social Studies. And that was when and where I learned how I had
responsibility to be involved. My mother was a Democratic Committee woman
working in voter registration, in the [19]50s. So, we had all of this energy going in
our family. I look at some of my high school yearbooks now; I see my mother VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 13 sitting in PTA meetings, band parent meetings. I was a trumpet player. People say, “Oh, a trumpet player!” And I was good. [Laughter] Really good. And I realized that you have to be where your children are. It’s important to be involved in the community, but your first little community is your family. So, in 1959—and I do have to drink a lot of water, and I’ll tell you about that later, because I think it’s important for all of you to know—in 1959, we were in Miami, visiting my biological father. And we were approached by a family friend to go to a CORE meeting.
Well, we had never heard of CORE. So he said, if you go, I’ll take you to dinner at Wolfies. That was on Miami Beach at the time, the only restaurant that would serve both Blacks and Whites. Well, that seemed interesting to us, so he bribed us to go to that meeting. But after we went to the CORE meeting and found out how we could make changes—CORE was a non-violent, interracial, direct action group. It was the first I had heard of it, although they were organized in 1942 at the University of Chicago’s campus. My sister and I, Priscilla, were so excited about it that when we got back to FAMU—now, you weren’t there then—when we got back to FAMU, we organized a CORE chapter. And we had tests, the first thing, you had to test; you don’t assume the place is segregated, or did not serve you because they happened not to serve. You always do testing, and then you negotiate to see if you can make a difference. Well, while we were just fairly new,
February 1st, 1960, Greensboro, North Carolina, A&T College, it started. Four students went to the Woolworth’s lunch counter, and were not served. Now, we didn’t have the internet, but we had the grapevine. [Laughter] And we knew right away what had happened. Took us a while; it was February 13th before we had VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 14 our first sit-in in Tallahassee. We went in, we had books to read, there were hecklers there, people made—it was a gun, and oh, “You niggers go to the back!”
See, I don’t sanitize history, myself. They said “niggers.” [Laughter] So, “You niggers go to the back,” and we just sat. And after a time, we left. Our next sit-in was February 20th, 1960. And this time, it was different. And the waitress said,
“Oh my God, here they come again!” She didn’t know what to do with us. We sat for a while, and then we were arrested, and marched off to jail. And they walked us to jail because the jail was a renovated bank vault. And they asked us, “Who did you want to call? You want to call that nigger Reverend C. K. Steele?” Now, two of Reverend Steele’s sons—how many of you have heard of Reverend C. K.
Steele? Well, two of his two older sons were also arrested: Henry Marion Steele, and Charles K. Steele, on that same day. Eight of us went on to jail. Eventually, three got out to start the appeals process. Okay, imagine that you are the courtroom. It’s only the first four seating areas on both sides. White, Colored— that’s what we were called then. Our lawyers came all the way from Miami, and we had a Black—Attorney Graves eventually was one of our lawyers, and he was Negro. But they called him “nigger” in the courtroom. The trial was set for
March 1st. But, all three thousand—and don’t laugh, now—all three thousand
FAMU students, and it was three thousand at that time, said they were not going to class on March 1st, but that they were going downtown to give us moral support. Well, when the authorities heard this, they postponed the trial. And the students continued. Mostly FAMU, but some FSU students, continued to march downtown, continued to sit in, continued to call to negotiate. And after some VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 15 more students had been arrested, we called the city, the county, the state. We called everyone to talk to us: “Let’s discuss this.” No one did. And as we marched a thousand strong from the FAMU campus, crossing the railroad tracks—which was considered the dividing line between so-called “Colored” and White town— all these people who had refused to talk to us were there to meet us. And a police officer said to me, “I want you,” and threw a tear gas bomb directly in my face. Well, for a moment, I could not see. I had never been tear gassed before.
And some young man—and I still don’t know who he is—some young man said,
“Take my hand. I’ve been in the Army. Take this handkerchief, and don’t rub your eyes.” And he led me to a church right down from the FAMU campus. I couldn’t see, but I could hear the screams of the students as the police threw tear gas bomb after tear gas bomb on these students. This was Tallahassee, Florida. This was the “Paradise State.” We weren’t Mississippi, and we weren’t Alabama. We weren’t Georgia, as they like to say. But we were teargassed, we were arrested—again—and this time, the trial date was reset for March 17th. There were eight charges against us. They dropped five and kept three—we don’t even know what all eight were. We were found guilty—of what, I still want to know— but some of us decided we were going to jail. There was only one community person with us: Mrs. Mary Ola Gaines. I believe in calling names, because if you have a name, you could have someone to call on, to tell you the rest of the story.
I didn’t talk to Ms. Gaines for decades; I didn’t even know why she was there.
Eventually, I got around to interviewing her. I said, “Mrs. Gaines, did they call you to let you know that we were going downtown, and asked you to go sit with us?” VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 16
She said, “They called me just to tell me. But no, they didn’t ask me to sit. But I thought of you children”—we were children then, in her eyes—“if you children could go and sit in, and I live here, that’s the least I can do!” Now, when Mrs.
Gaines was arrested, she chose not to go to jail. She said she didn’t do anything wrong! She wasn’t going to jail. But five of us did spend forty-nine days in the
Leon County jail for sitting in at a Woolworth lunch counter. The five included: my sister Priscilla; a sister and brother team, John and Barbara Broxton; William
Larkins, who was incoming president of the Student Government Association.
And I don’t know, looking at the group here, the Whites who participated thought they were free. For two weeks, they were allowed to come in and see us. And then, they were told, “You can’t see them!” So then, they learned that they, too, were not free. So it wasn’t just Blacks who were told what to do. It was all of us.
Then, the ministers started coming, two a day. Jackie Robinson got involved. He sent all of us diaries to keep while we were in jail. Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt got involved; she tried to raise money for those of us in jail and other students in the
South. So, there were a lot of people involved. But most of all, the people in
Tallahassee were involved. Now, we mention that—not only were we, was I, arrested in Tallahassee, I was arrested in Miami, Ocala, St. Petersburg—Florida, now! And I was also arrested in New York in 1964 at the World’s Fair, because they were saying that Florida was a paradise, and we went there to let them know that it wasn’t! [Laughter] So we were just picketing—I think Ferris Bryant was our governor then—and before we knew it, some woman had clanned the orange. Oh, it was hundreds of feet tall! But it wasn’t any of us, though. But they VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 17 arrested all of us. My sister Priscilla had fled to New York. She thought she could move from place to place and avoid all the racism. But there was no avoiding it. I lost my sister, because she—after she was arrested time and time again in New
York for an arraignment, she left the country. And she went to West Africa. And she was gone for decades. There were heavy prices to pay for the involvement of people, both Blacks and Whites, and I hate to mention it, but you have someone right here in Gainesville who paid a very, very heavy price. Dan was involved as a student at the University of Florida here; so was his brother Jim.
But Jim could not take it when he was told one thing by university authorities, and their actions said something else. Jim could not take it, so Jim committed suicide.
We had many students who needed help, who needed attention, in order to survive. But we didn’t have the kind of system that you perhaps have today, Dr.
Ortiz, where you have somebody available to talk with students and to help. And then, you know, Kathy wasn’t just—there was my good friend Judy Benninger,
Judy Benninger Brown, a student here at the University of Florida. And when we—I was suspended, I guess Judy was suspended too, so we decided we would work for CORE in a voter registration project in ten north Florida counties.
And we were back in Quincy: that was the place where they shot at us in the office that we had, which had doubled as our home. And the Ku Klux Klan, the
White Citizens’ Council, came around threatening us all the time. And we could not get any help: city, county, state, or the FBI. No, I take that back: the FBI usually came around a week later. [Laughter] And we were pinned down in a building. Now, I had a neighbor that lived next door, and he happened to be my VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 18
cousin. He said, “They may be nonviolent, but I’m not nonviolent.” So he would
take his shotgun out. He said he had to protect his family. I know we’ve all been
through a lot, but we can’t let up, because the struggle continues. And it’s going
to keep on—Gigi is thirteen now? I certainly want a better life for her than we’ve
had, than you’ve had. An easier life. We want that for all of our children, all of
your children. In order to have this, you have to be involved. John and I live on
about five acres now in Gadsden County, and people ask us, “Why are you
back? Didn’t they treat you badly enough?” And I wonder myself, sometimes:
why are we back? But the red clay is alluring, and the pine trees, and the oak
trees, and the squirrels. And Sassy, the new Great Dane puppy we just got.
[Laughter] Yeah. Thanks for taking care of Sassy for us. Thanks for arranging to
have Sassy taken care of. We couldn’t have come if we hadn’t had a babysitter.
Thank you. [Laughter] But seriously, it was not easy—oh, I’m supposed to have
twenty minutes. Oh, honey! I hope I didn’t take all of yours. [Laughter] Usually, I
don’t know—
U1: Take your time.
PD: I don’t adhere to the time factor. But I think the one thing—someone asked,
“What’s the worst thing that happened to you after you became a mother?” And I
get very emotional, even before with the tear gas—that was, ugh! I’ve had to
wear dark glasses ever since that tear gas. But, the most emotional thing that
ever happened to me was when we moved from Quincy to Miami because we
thought they had a better school system, Monica. What we found—because my
mother worked—we had to take Tananarive, who was three years old but ready VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 19
for school, with us as we tried to find a home school for her. And they would say
“White Only.” And she was only three, so she didn’t understand that. To her, my
mother was White, because she was fair. She even thought I might’ve been a
dark White person! [Laughter] So, to her, it was only a matter of becoming White,
and that was no problem. She got in her little bed, and poured powder all over
her body. And she said, “Mommy, I’m White now. Will I be able to go to school?”
You know, that’s terrible. And we have some of those same kinds of situations;
we fight the same battles, over and over again. You fight for a decent education
for your family, for your community, for your country. You fight so that people can
live in harmony together, no matter what. You fight so that people can have jobs.
And now, here we are in 2011: we have more Black young men in prison than in
college. And of course, Black unemployment has always been high. But in the
last couple of years, White unemployment has been high. So, we’ve taken a
different look at things now. But we’re still fighting for equal jobs—at this point, for
jobs, healthcare. Things people, everybody, should be entitled to. Well, honey?
JD: Yes, darling? [Laughter]
PD: I talk more than my husband. But I’m going to give him an opportunity to say a
few things. But I want all of you—I want to just thank you, for making it possible
to tell this story. And I can’t believe that Jimmy’s grown up—almost grown up,
you know. These young people just grow up so quickly! And—where’s Mike?
Thank you. Mike, you were with us, too, in Gadsden County, and then you went
to St. Augustine. I know Mike told me he doesn’t hear that well, but we all have
little problems now. But you were a footsoldier, too. Thank you. And I’m sure VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 20
there are others. [Applause] So, on behalf of our family: Tananarive Priscilla Due,
Johnita Patricia Due, and Lydia Charlotte Due, we want to thank you for coming,
because they are listening, and they going to say “Mom, mom—why you have to
say all of that?” But I’m glad they do have opportunity, as others do, to hear part
of the story, and I’m going to let John talk so that we can have some questions
later. Thank you. [Applause]
JD: Can you hear me? Will Dr. Ortiz stand up, please? Notice his beard, his pigtail.
You can sit down, now. [Laughter] At the University of Florida! Dr. Nunn, will you
stand, too? We have to also commend you. Not on your haircut. [Laughter] This
is important, because—you can sit down, too—because we have to thank
University of Florida for accommodating this process. Understanding the times
that we are in, here in America, it’s good that the power structure understands
that for its own survival, we have to have the Ortiz and the Nunn’s to help save
society. So thank you for being the sponsors of this event. [Applause] Okay. So,
Dr. Russell-Brown, where are you? There you are. You’re in charge of the
institute. And I’m so happy that you do more than teach African dances. Oh, I
don’t want to—I don’t want to, you know, step on somebody’s feet. Oh, okay. But
what I’m trying to say, is that we are not in a post-racial society. We are still in a
racial society, and we need to begin to move towards one, the human race. I was
in Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1960, when the sit-ins began. Just as Dan said, I had
done a tour in the United States Army, and I didn’t tell them to assign me to
Special Services Psychological Warfare attached to the 82nd Airborne. Just
because I had three years’ college, I was assigned to that unit. And that unit is VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 21
about mental manipulation. About mental conditioning of the enemy, so that you
can condition them to want to do the things you want them to do. And I began to
say, “You know, this is what America does with its own citizens.” And then it hit
me when the sit-ins began. The next day, Mr. Roy Wilkins, the Executive Director
of the NAACP, asked for all branches of the NAACP—Youth Council and
everything else—to support the sit-ins in the South by carrying on picketing in the
stores in the North. And lo and behold, there was a big one-page advertisement
by a group of Black ministers in Indianapolis in the Indianapolis Star condemning
the sit-ins in the South!
[Recording cuts to a song at 55:37]
[Recording inaudible after song until 56:01]
JD: This is in Freedom Time, thank you, Kim. This is a FBI characterization of me
that’s in their files: “A subversive. Prior acts or conduct or statements indicating a
propensity for violence, an antipathy toward good order and government.” Now, I
don’t understand—again, if this was part of my FBI file, why in the world was I
allowed to take the Florida Bar, and pass it? [Laughter] My god, I think I was a
mole, and didn’t even know it! [Laughter] Maybe they just wanted to see who my
associates were and what-have-you. But anyway, that has been my record. And
I’m talking to you young folks as you move forward in your life. I know you have
tremendous bills you have to pay when you graduate. Now, I arranged, when I
was getting ready to go to Indiana University, to go to the local college and stay
with my grandparents for the first two or three years so I wouldn’t have to pay all VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 22
of those bills. And then, later, when I still ran out of money to stay at Indiana
University, that’s when I volunteered, Jim, for the Army. I had no real love—
PD: Dan, Dan.
JD: I mean, Jim—I’m sorry, Dan. [Laughter] I had no love for the, you know, “red,
white, and blue”; I just wanted to have some money to go to school. These are
the kind of decisions you have to make, because you don’t want to sell
yourselves to the company store. Yeah. The same time, there’s opportunity to
make some changes within the power structure. I would like to move on from the
days of the sit-ins and the Freedom Rides, to the kind of institutional racism that
Stokely Carmichael talks about, which is that although there is no alleged intent
to discriminate against you because of race, however, the practices and the
policies of the institution result in a difference, because it’s a business necessity.
It’s not about race, allegedly. And these are the kind of problems that even an
attorney is hard to change, because of the constitutions of the U.S. courts today,
and in the near future. So, you need to find ways to use your knowledge as a
lawyer in other areas. I like to call myself, not as a civil rights lawyer, but a
Freedom Movement lawyer. [Applause] That’s a difference. Because civil rights
is always defined by the power structure as to what “civil rights” are. I hope, if you
are a law student—or if you’re not a law student—read Professor Derrick Bell,
dealing with Critical Race Theory. Critical Race Theory is a proposition that any
rights that Blacks have been able to achieve are, what he call—they are a
“fortuity.” Because they would not happen unless it benefits the power structure! VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 23
Civil rights must benefit the White power structure before Blacks earn any
results. Now, this was proven in Mississippi, wasn’t it, Ms. Simmons?
S: Yes.
JD: Because when Bobby Kennedy was Attorney General for his brother, he had
served as the General Counsel for Senator Eastman’s Intelligence Committee.
So he understood the ways of the CIA of contain and change. Control the people
that you want to put into power. And he assumed that if we can convince the civil
rights organizations to stop the Freedom Rides—which was embarrassing the
country, the sit-ins that were embarrassing the country in its war against
Communism—let’s give them some money to do voter registration! That way,
we’ll get them off the streets! And as Ms. Simmons knows, some of the SNCC
people, like Diane Nash, she’s from Chicago. That’s where Mr. Daly plays the
game. So “No, no, no, we can’t take none of this money!” But Bob Moses, and
Aaron Henry, and all of those others, knew that voter registration raised as much
hell as anything else. You know. And of course, you know the rest of the story:
eventually, it did that. So, where do we go from here? I hope you have a chance
to read that book by Martin Luther King, entitled Where Do We Go From Here?
Because in 1967, he made a speech that nobody in the Movement—many in the
Movement—wanted him to talk about, when he said, “We need to be concerned
about the war in Vietnam. That is an unholy war.” He also talked about poverty.
You see, a lot of Blacks didn’t know—“We don’t have time to talk about poverty,
and Vietnam. We got to stay on message!” Of course, you know his lieutenants
knew that when Dr. King made that statement about Vietnam, he was already VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 24
marked. And the whole family, the King family, realized that’s when he became
marked. And then, of course, he went to Memphis, to support the sanitation
workers. “I am a man. I am somebody.” And we always—every January the 15th,
we celebrate “I Have the Dream” speech. Nobody celebrates the speech he
made in Memphis, Tennessee, when he says, “America is going to hell. America
is going to hell.” And his last speech was, “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop.” In other
words, people, we are in deep doo-doo. [Laughter] We need to understand what
happened with Patricia and the others who decided to take a stand against all
that acculturalization of accommodation to racism, and decided to sacrifice
themselves even if it meant death. You have to do the same for your
grandchildren. It’s not over! So, we’re ready for questions as to where do we go
from here? Thank you. [Applause]
H: Lot of questions! [Laughter]
S: This is a question for Dr. Due from Ashley Sanderson: “Who was the most
influential person in your life at the time of the sit-ins? Who were you looking up
to?”
JD: This question’s for me.
PD: I know you’re Dr. Due, but they didn’t call you Dr. Due tonight. [Laughter]
JD: Oh, that’s right! I keep forgetting. [Laughter]
PD: Okay? They call you “Attorney Due” tonight. So I guess she wants me to answer
that one. That’s okay we get a little mixed up. The two most important—there
were two important persons in my life: my mother and my stepfather, my mother
and stepfather. VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 25
H: Next question, from Bruce Bellamy. This is for either you, John, or you, Patricia.
“In your opinion, what impact did the Rosewood saga play in the Civil Rights
Movement in Florida?” The Rosewood saga.
JD: I think that question can be answered by my wife, but I want to tell you, in a
couple minutes: a similar incident took place in southern Indiana, involving my
grandmother’s grandparents over a struggle over a pig that had ventured into the
property of a German immigrant there in southern Indiana. And there was a big
riot that involved a hundred White folks, but they were defeated by my fore
parents. But the sheriff—different from Rosewood—he provided safe escort,
along with the governor of Indiana, who set aside land for them to resettle thirty
miles further north. And I think the only reason that happened is that my
foreparents’ foreparents, being farmers for the market—and not just assistants—
were of value commercially. And I’m still doing research on that. But my wife can
answer the rest of it, dealing with Rosewood here.
PD: Okay. What happened in Rosewood was hidden for so long. The people involved
didn’t want to talk about it. There have been a few books written about it. But
what was most interesting to me was when they started having the hearings on
Rosewood. I had said, I was at the capital, and I had said “I can’t go. I just can’t
go and listen to what happened.” And then, all of a sudden, I was at the door to
get in. What really surprised me is that everybody was so friendly. The police
officers and everybody at the door to make sure nobody went in with the wrong
attitude. I was so surprised that they could not see my rage, and feel my rage.
So, I don’t know any—as I listened to the testimony, I believe she was about VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 26
eighty-three years old, that’s how much time had expired, I could not believe that
we allowed that to happen in this state. But I know it happens when things
happen and people don’t discuss it. I mentioned earlier that a young woman
named Barbara Broxton was in jail with us for forty-nine days. I tried to interview
her for my book, but she would not talk about her jail time. And I learned that she
had not told her children about it. So I guess people have to process their pain in
different ways. I believe we have to talk about something to get a solution to it.
But Barbara was so active, and when she refused to talk to me, it reminded me
of what had happened at Rosewood—the silence that fell over that whole
community, and the fact that Whites didn’t feel that it was a threat to come out.
Because I know when I went to that door to hear what had happened from one of
the witnesses—and I’m not usually full of rage, but that day I was. I was full of
rage, and I tried to talk myself out of going, because it would be difficult for me.
And it was difficult, but I sat there.
H: Pat, I just wanted to add that when the movie Rosewood came out, I was
teaching high school in Bronson at the time—that’s the largest town near
Rosewood. And when I talked to some of my Black friends, people in their sixties
and fifties, they were not going to see that movie. The pain still lingers. It never
goes away. Never does.
PD: Yeah.
S: This is to both of the Dues, and it’s from Kali Blount: “We know how J. Edgar
Hoover’s COINTELPRO stymied the evolution of the domestic civil rights
movement and the Black Power movement from becoming an international VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 27
human rights movement. Did you personally experience direct effects of
COINTELPRO, and how do you see the building wave for democracy and human
rights in the Arab world as being parallel or kindred to the civil rights movement in
the U.S.?” And he thanks you for your service.
PD: Okay, you want to talk first?
JD: Yeah.
PD: Oh, okay.
JD: I think the role of the FBI in the COINTELPRO program was part of the insanity
America was in beginning with the Russian revolution of 1917 that lasted until
1988. I think we need to understand: you can’t just blame the FBI and John
Edgar Hoover. This is what the system does. I had a case involving a child in
high school, where the information against him was when he was in the first
grade, and he was involved in a situation on the bus that was put into the
Management Information System that was used against him later when he was in
high school. So, the system maintains—not just the FBI—the system, the power
structure, maintains a management information system on your behavior which
can be used against you later in life. There’s a big move right now in St.
Augustine to remove the so-called “arrest records” of the participants in the Civil
Rights Movement, erase them from the records in St. John’s County. But Dr.
Nunn will let you know that the judge always has the FBI record. That doesn’t
remove the arrest from the FBI records! And if you say you have never been
arrested, you have what? Told a lie. So don’t think it’s just John Edgar Hoover, VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 28
and he’s dead. It’s always going to be an information system while you here at
the university.
PD: Well, a little closer to home, I guess, we each have a four-hundred page FBI
record. Separate. Well, one advantage of John’s record was that I found out
where he was at certain times, that the FBI knew more about his whereabouts—
[Laughter] No, seriously! They knew more about his whereabouts than I did. And
then, of course, by the time we could get those records, they had scratched out
so much—
JD: They blackened it out.
PD: —yes, so that they would say, “Somebody says you love money, and you did
anything for money,” but then they don’t say who that was. But, in terms of the
recent situation in Egypt, and I think someone asked a similar question earlier
today, I know things have been going on a long time, and actually I don’t think we
can compare the situations. Because we’re still fighting for freedom. And it took
them, what? Some people in Egypt have been fighting, too, but basically, the big
push took less than a month. So, it’s a little different. You have the internet, and
you have different objectives, too. It’s not—when we say we all want freedom,
this may mean different things to different people. Someone asked a question
about the freedom songs, and how do you feel when people all over the world,
perhaps, sing [sings] “We shall overcome”— Well, we know that those songs get
your attention, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that you mean the same thing. I
don’t believe that, and whenever I hear the songs, I’m hoping that the people
singing them really know what it means to us. When I say to us, I mean those of VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 29
us here in the United States. Because we’re still singing [sings] “We shall
overcome.” We have got to stop reinventing history. You know, we think we
have—you open up the schools, you open up the political arena to some degree;
then you find out that it’s happening all over again. So evidently, it just never
stops. But I think it’s difficult to compare not only countries but continents, in
terms of what and how people do things. But then again, if we had had internet
systems, what do you think would have happened, honey?
JD: Probably wouldn’t be here tonight.
PD: Where would you be?
JD: Not too far here in another county. State prison.
H: Okay, should we go to the next question?
PD: Yes, please.
H: Next question from Deanna Dawkins. This is for Patricia. “In your book, you
describe the experience of going to court for trying to buy food at Woolworth’s.
You mentioned that your sentence gave you the choice of paying three hundred
dollars, or going to jail for sixty days. You chose jail. Did anyone try and talk you
out of it?”
PD: Yes. My parents. [Laughter] Yes, although they were the ones who taught me
about my right to be involved, and my responsibility, it was different. By this time,
my father was a high school principal, and they put pressure on him to get us out
of jail. There were two of us, and all the publicity, the state didn’t like. And it was
difficult for him, it was difficult for my mother, because she was born in Quincy,
and she had heard about the lynchings and the way people were treated in this VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 30
part, or in that part of the state. So, she didn’t want her children in jail, either. I
don’t think any of the parents wanted their children in jail. But we told them we
had to do it, and we would. And if they had, then we wouldn’t be in that position
then.
S: We have such wonderful questions, and we’re really trying to see, can we
combine some of them, because we don’t have the kind of time. We could really
be here until quite late. But questions to either or both: “Nowadays, thousands”—
and no name, by the way, was given on this one—“Nowadays, thousands of
undocumented immigrants struggle and fight for equality and opportunities. They
really work hard for these. Is it safe and appropriate to say that the immigration
reform movement is the modern-day civil rights movement? Why or why not?”
JD: When I saw Dr. Ortiz, I asked him whether or not they found General Gomez
lately, who took a few dollars from the United States Army to sell, what? Mexico,
Arizona, New Mexico, and southern California. And then they put him on the boat
to Spain. So really, we on Mexican territory—or Indian territory, since I’m part
Cherokee. Y’all need to go back to Europe! [Laughter] I really think that
immigrants were welcome before the Civil War, particularly from Ireland and
Germany and what-have-you. But all of the sudden, been treated like
nonpersons, when they’re doing the work. Some of you may think they’re taking
jobs from other people, Black people. I don’t necessarily think that. I think it is
another—not civil rights, by the way. It’s a freedom movement where we need to
think about being one people. VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 31
H: Next question, for either of you—or both. This is from Pierce Butler. “Your views
on Barack Obama.” [Laughter]
JD: Okay. He can dance.
PD: Well, after leaving the inauguration in 2009, I realized how much time and energy
I had put into his election. We lived in Gadsden County; I think we had about
fifteen signs along our fence line. And still, we had the signs on our cars, which I
usually never did. You know, I think what people don’t understand is that it takes
time to go into any kind of office and do the best that you can do. And I also think
before the election, everybody, a lot of people said, “Oh, he’s not Black! He’s
half-White!” But now, I think they’re saying, “Oh he’s Black!” [Laughter] And it’s a
shock! “How can we have a Black president? Did I do this? What’s wrong with
me?” Well, I never understood it when I heard that he was not Black. Because
he’s about as dark as I am. I think we should be proud of ourselves for electing a
man who is intelligent, who is passionate; we don’t have to agree with everything.
I don’t agree with everything with him. I mean, sometimes education, and the
education issues, I disagree. And I certainly disagree if he’s talking about
entitlement, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and all of these things. And I’m
just hoping he can—I hate to say “play the game,” but you know, sometimes
politics is a game. You have to be—you do have to give and take. And I think
he’s doing a good job, myself. But we’ll wait and see what happens with the
budget, and see what the final budget will be. And I’m just hoping it will be in the
interest of the neediest people: children, senior citizens, people who are ill and
who need healthcare. I like the man. [Laughter] VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 32
S: I think this is a great question; hopefully, we have quite a few of our students still
here. “How can young people move the Movement forward today?” And that’s
from Gainesville Women’s Liberation.
PD: Now, which one did you want to—
JD: Did you want both?
S: No, I’m saying, “How can young people”—right, I’m sorry. It’s for Patricia. “How
can young people move the”—
JD: I want to talk on this! [Laughter]
S: —“Movement forward today?”
JD: Can I also talk on that?
PD: Just a little bit.
JD: Just a little bit.
H: Okay.
JD: Basically, the youth that do not necessarily have to follow the example that we
did—but as you go into the system, you need to be the best you can be, so that
you’ll be able to impress the managers of the system that they can do the right
thing. I learned this when I was in elementary school. I had the opportunity to
participate on the radio show: “Why should we hire the handicapped?” And I
thought—doing research, first time I’d done research—it would be the moral
thing, the religious thing, what-have-you. And I found that it is good business to
hire the handicapped! They’re more dedicated, they’re involved; history has
shown they are the best workers. And therefore, I think young people need to
understand it’s more about just wages, hours, and working conditions. 1199, I’m VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 33
talking to you, now! It’s about managing the business. My wife has been to
several rehab centers. And the doctors don’t know what they’re doing! It’s the
people there on the floor that had to be concerned about the health of the people
that they working with. So, you young people need to learn the business of what
you get into, so you can help your employer to do the right thing.
PD: Excuse me. What was the question, again? [Laughter]
S: How can young people move forward with a movement today?
PD: Oh, all right. He’s talking about my being in rehab, and— [Laughter]
JD: I was talking 1199, honey.
PD: [Laughter] Okay. Well, I just think, young people have to start where they feel
comfortable. And people all the time, “How can I do what you did?” You don’t
have to do what we did! It’s important to help your peers. If you’re good in math,
help tutor someone. Just start where you can feel comfortable. You know you
should register, you should vote. And you know what else? And this is a little off
the point. But I want to say it: you should document what happens in your family.
You should find out who your parents are, who your grandparents are. I
interviewed my mother any number of times, and I still have questions. And that’s
one way we can find out: what are we going to do? What are we going to bring to
the table? How are we going to make a difference? Now, in terms of that rehab, I
had mentioned earlier about my drinking all of this water. All of you, first of all,
should take care of yourselves. I guess I’m the first one to say I was so busy
saving the world, I didn’t try to save myself. Well, because you get so busy, you
don’t take care of yourself. Now, for men and women, have your thyroids VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 34
checked. It’s really important. And I know you may be like me when someone
mentioned thyroid—I said, “Thyroid? Where is the thyroid?” I was pretty dumb!
But I found out. Found out that I have thyroid cancer, which punctured my lungs,
fractured my back, and cracked my bones. And, you know, for a while, I couldn’t
walk. And the rehab wasn’t for alcohol or drugs—it was— [Laughter] Oh, you
know how it is! Although I guess, you know, you could assume whatever you
wanted to. But, after my surgery a year ago, January 6, I could not walk because
of the damage. And thyroid is a slow-growing cancer. Thyroid cancer is slow-
growing. And wherever it goes into your body, it remains thyroid cancer. So, I’ve
been given radio iodine treatments. I’ve had two. Don’t worry, I’m not—nothing’ll
happen to you. Now, I’m safe. But I would like to leave that little health message
with you. Check your thyroid, men and women. And it runs in families.
H: Thank you. That’s going to do it for the questions. What we’re going to do now is,
Dr. Simmons and I are just going to sort of make an observation, kind of a wrap-
up of what we’ve heard tonight from the Dues, and from of course the audience. I
was stimulated by a question I didn’t get to ask, so I’ll just read it, and I’ll
comment on it. It says, “What do you think the students here today can do to
continue the work you have done?” Well, immediately, I thought, “Wait a minute:
it’s not just students, its faculty.” And when I was a student here at the University
of Florida in the [19]60s, the most powerful coalition we had was when the faculty
and the students worked together. The students risked maybe their student
status; the faculty members risked their faculty status. Some of them were fired.
But this powerful combination I saw in action a couple years ago, and it was VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 35
Justice for Kofi. And I remember being in Turlington Plaza when this took place.
And I saw the students gather. And the students were looking around, and
another student got up, and another student got up. But there were faculty
members there, and they took the stage. And once that powerful combination
took place, that’s when we all realized, we had something going for us we
weren’t going to waste. And we went down to University Avenue, and we
marched down to the Alumni Association, and we spoke directly, and demanded
of the Board of Trustees that they do something about this situation, and it was
effective. So, my wrap-up would be, we’ve got a powerful combination when the
faculty and the students unite and see a common cause. It’s not just the
students, it’s not just the faculty: it’s the fact that they can work together in a very
powerful way. [Applause]
S: Well, I think that most of us in this room know, and it was said by one of you
earlier, that we’re not in a post-racial society, as some of us had hoped, and
maybe wished, was the case after the election of Barack Hussein Obama. But
even worse than us not being in a post-racial society, in my view, we are seeing
a retrenchment of many of the things that the Dues, and the civil rights, and
peace, and women’s activists, and all of the people who have worked for so
many years to make democracy a reality in America. One of the things that—you
were mentioning how people are brainwashed, and often I’ve learned from my
students and others that people really don’t know how democracy came to
America. It really did not come with the Declaration of Independence, or the
Constitution. It came from people like us in this room expanding democracy to VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 36
include people who were never thought of when the Constitution was penned, or
the Declaration of Independence was written. It certainly didn’t include women. It
did not include any people of color; African Americans were slaves, et cetera. We
fought to make America what it is. And I believe that we are in a period of
retrenchment where these things that we fought for are being eroded, and we
need a movement. We have to have a people’s movement, or we will lose what
we have gained over two-three hundred years of struggle. I— [Applause] I
regularly read Bob Herbert, and I recommend him to you, a columnist in the New
York Times. And he wrote an article on February 11th titled, “When Democracy
Weakens.” And he talks about how he sees our democracy weakening. And he
was reflecting on what was going on in the Middle East, particularly Tunisia and
Egypt, and how these students, and old people, young people, women—these
people put their bodies on the line. Three hundred were killed. It was not that
easy, and a lot of work had gone on before. So, I think, as we wrap up and look
at this movement, this most recent movement for civil rights, for human rights, for
women’s rights, for people’s rights, across the board that we have heard and
talked about tonight: we must build a movement, people, in this country, today.
And many of us in this room are engaged in movements. We need to unite these
movements in the kind of struggle that we had during the [19]60s and [19]70s. Of
course, it will be different. But it has— [break in recording from 1:36:08-
1:36:10]—that’s the only way we get anywhere. [Applause]
JD: No peace, no justice! No peace, no justice!
Audience: No peace— VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 37
JD: —no justice!
Audience: No peace—
JD: —no justice!
[Chant continues]
O: All right, before we leave—we’re almost finished with the program, I think if you’ll
just stay for one moment, we do want to make a special presentation, and real
quickly, also, please remember to fill out the surveys and win an opportunity, a
possibility of winning a signed copy of Freedom in the Family. And also, the
question cards. We realize there was wonderful turnout tonight, most of the
questions were not raised. However, we’re going to work to compile these
questions and actually map them on the oral history program website, so that we
can continue to build momentum, and do the work that Dr. Simmons has
encouraged us to do. Right now, we do have a special presentation for our
honored guests. And I’ll let Dr. Russell-Brown—
R: On behalf of the Center for the Study of Race Relations—excuse me, on behalf
of the Center for the Study of Race and Race Relations, and the Samuel Proctor
Oral History Program, we’d like to present this plaque to Dr. Due and Attorney
Due, and I’d like to read it to you as we present it to them. It says, “Presented to
Dr. Patricia Stephens Due and Attorney John Due for their outstanding and
lifelong fight for justice. University of Florida Center for the Study of Race and
Race Relations, and Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, February 16th, 2011.”
Please join me in— [Applause] VIDS 030; Evening with the Dues; Page 38
O: Thank you again so much for joining us. Please continue these conversations
about movement building across generations. I also really want to thank the
Dues—they actually spoke earlier with a very substantial group of University of
Florida students. Any time we can get them here, we’d love to have them—hint,
hint. Thank you again to Dan Harmeling and Zoharah Simmons for being
wonderful moderators. [Applause] And a final thank you to our co-sponsors.
Again, please turn in your surveys. The program will be posted on the Bob
Graham Center website, and our archive so you can continue sharing it. Thank
you so much.
[End of recording]
Transcribed by: Ryan Morini, November 24, 2015
Audit-edited by: Samantha Crisanti, January 9, 2019
Final edit by: Ryan Morini, March 3, 2019