“Stepping Up” Rev. Kristin Maier Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Northfield March 1, 2015

In 1965, Jimmie Lee Jackson was a twenty-six year old Army veteran, already a deacon in his church, and the father of a young child. For a long time, many Americans have never heard of Jimmie Lee Jackson, yet this young man’s sacrifice launched one of the most important turning points of the Civil Rights Movement. His death would galvanize two African American communities in Alabama and bring a challenge to the feet of the newly merged Unitarian Universalist Association.

Jimmie Lee Jackson, his mother Viola Jackson, and his eighty-two year old grandfather, Cager Lee, had all been active in the effort to register black voters in Marion, a small town just one county over from Selma. Only 5% of eligible black voters were registered in their county. They themselves had tried to register five times.1

On February 18th, all three had attended a rally at the Zion United Methodist church in Marion. An activist had just been jailed for organizing a rally of school children. The plan was for the group of a few hundred people to march the half block to the jail, sing a couple of songs and pray.

When the group stepped out of the church, they found the street already lined with 50 or so law enforcement and a number of hostile white onlookers. The line calmly moved forward. The leader at the front knelt to pray and was promptly hit over the head. The street lights were suddenly cut off and the officers advanced on the marchers. They were flat-out attacked. Some of the protestors fled to the yard behind the church; the officers followed. Eighty-two year old, frail, slight, Cager Lee was hit in the head, knocked to the ground and kicked.

Journalists were present, but no photographs exist of that night because hostile whites sprayed their cameras with black paint. A white television reporter, Richard Valerian was struck on head with an axe handle. A white man walked up to him and asked if he needed a doctor. Stunned, Valerian reached back to feel his head and said, “Yeah, I

1 Bill Moyers, “Remembering Jimmie Lee Jackson, the First Martyr of the Selma Struggle,” Moyers and Company, February 20, 2015, http://billmoyers.com/2015/02/20/jimmie-lee-jackson-first-martyr-selma-struggle/, (2/26/2015). 1 © 2015, Kristin Maier think I do, I’m bleeding.” The man thrust his face forward and said, “Well we don’t have doctors for people like you.”2

At one point, Jimmie Lee Jackson, with his grandfather, headed to a nearby café to try to find his mother and sister to get out of there. A group of state troopers entered the café, began turning over tables and indiscriminately beating the patrons, including Viola Jackson.

While coming to her defense, Jimmie Lee Jackson was shot in the stomach. He then fled the café and was chased and beaten with batons. Eventually, he was brought to a hospital that treated African Americans; it was not equipped to perform surgery. He was transferred to a hospital in Selma where he lived eight days before dying of a massive infection.

His death was reported in papers across the country, to little reaction.3 There was one white Lutheran pastor in Birmingham who organized a very small of “Concerned White Citizens of Alabama” and asked the Unitarian minister in Huntsville to do the same. That Saturday 72 very brave white citizens and many brave black citizens marched past 500 angry, jeering whites to the steps of the Dallas County Courthouse. It was the first time white Alabamans were demonstrating for the rights of Black Alabamans. Of those 72 white marchers, 36 were Unitarian Universalists from Alabama congregations.

Though little attention was paid nationally, the Black communities in Marion and Selma were deeply affected by Jimmie Lee Jackson’s death. Their first instinct was to carry his body all the way to the state capitol in Montgomery. Instead, they planned a march, “the march,” from Selma to Montgomery. He was the first Martyr of the marches in Selma, but tragically he would not be the last.

The evening of March 7th people across the nation watched the television footage of the 600 unarmed marchers who were brutally beaten on the Edmond Pettus bridge. Men and women, old and young were attacked by state troopers wielding billy clubs and tear gas, some on horseback.

2 Transcript, “Bridge to Selma,” Eyes on the Prize, created 8.23.06, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/eyesontheprize/about/pt_106.htmlm (12/26/2015). 3 See Feb 27th Boston Globe, Washington Post. 2 © 2015, Kristin Maier

When Dr. King learned what had happened, he crafted the telegram sent to clergy across the nation.4 Like every faith group, the Unitarian Universalists, were being asked to show up in Selma, to put their own bodies on the line. Across the country, several hundred clergy and countless lay members of this newly merged religious body were asking each other – could they go? Would they go?

A thirty eight year old Unitarian Universalist minister, James Reeb, and his wife Maria had seen the coverage on the news. When he was told of King’s call, they talked it over. He felt he had to go. Marie and James had marched together in Washington in 1963, but this felt different. She wanted him to stay, but ultimately supported his decision of conscience. That night, after having dinner with his family and reading to his children before bed, he got on a plane to Alabama.

Looking at James Reeb’s life up to that point, it isn’t a surprise he chose to go. After graduating from high school, he was already committed to the (then) Presbyterian ministry. Thus, he could have avoided military service, but enlisted anyway at the tail end of World War II. Afterwards, he came here, to Northfield, [he’s was an Ole!] and graduated from St. Olaf with honors in 1950.

After seminary, he was ordained as a Presbyterian minister, but when he found his theology had shifted toward humanism, he honored his own integrity and transferred to the Unitarian ministry. He became the assistant minister at All Souls in Washington, DC. It was a good position for a young minister, but after five years James Reeb found really wanted to be working directly on the problems of the inner-city, especially for the Black community that seemed to bear the brunt of the problems.

So James and Marie Reeb left Washington, DC and took a significant pay cut so James could become an organizer in Boston for the American Friends Service Committee. Because he insisted that he could not make a difference for poor African Americans while living in a wealthy white community, the whole family moved to the neighborhood where he worked.

Answering Dr. King’s was a natural next step. Of course, he wasn’t alone. 2,500 people answered King’s call and assembled to march. Our religious movement sent 60 UU ministers - about 10% of the full-fledged parish clergy – and an unknown number of lay UUs, all on one day’s notice.

Those 2,500 marchers did not cross that bridge, however. King and the other organizers did not want to break the federal injunction and believed they would be ambushed. Without telling any of the marchers, they stopped at the line of troopers, knelt to pray and then turned back.

The surprised clergy were asked to stay another day or two, while the organizers worked on a court order to allow them to march with protection. James Reeb waivered. He planned to go home, but at the last minute grabbed his suitcase and decided to stay.

He and two other Unitarian ministers, Clark Olsen and Orloff Miller asked about a place to get dinner. “Do you want a place of your own?” they were asked.5 No, they replied and were directed to Walker’s café, a diner filled with black and white marchers.

They ate and then took turns calling home to tell their wives they were staying. They then headed back to the protest headquarters at Brown Chapel. Instead of going the way they came, they turned right and took the more direct route back, a route that carried them past a white café and store.

James walked on the left closest to the curb; Orloff Miller was in the middle and Clark Olsen was farthest from the street. Four or five local whites came out of a variety store and yelled racial epithets at them. The ministers quickened their pace, but the men pursued them. Clark Olsen looked up just in time to see one of the men swing a club at James Reeb’s head. All three men were on the ground being beaten and kicked. Orloff Miller shouted for help and it ended as quickly as it began.

The nightmare was only beginning though. James Reeb was conscious, but not talking coherently. They found someone to take them to the Black hospital, believing the white hospital in town would not admit him. The Black hospital was not equipped to do surgery so they called for an ambulance to take him 65 miles to Birmingham. They had to stop first to get a check for $150, because the hospital wouldn’t treat him without it. On the way they had a flat tire, had to change ambulances, and were surrounded at one point by a group of white men banging on the windows of the ambulance. They finally got to the hospital. They did operate, but James Reeb’s life could not be saved. Two days later, with his wife present, he was taken off life support.

5 The Martyrs: Sixteen Who Gave Their Lives for Racial Justice by Jack Mendelsohn, © 1966 by Jack Mendelsohn, available online at: http://www.uua.org/sites/live- new.uua.org/files/documents/reebjames/good_mans_death.pdf, (2/26/2015). 4 © 2015, Kristin Maier

James Reeb’s death shocked the nation. Prayer vigils, marches and memorial services were held across the country with thousands attending, including high level politicians. President Johnson himself arranged for Marie and James’ father to fly back to Boston after his death.

At one point, Dr. King met with the head of Social Witness from the UUA. He asked, “What are the Unitarians going to do? We would understand when you have suffered like this if the UUs wanted to pack up and go home.” They assured him no one would be bailing out.6

In fact, after Reeb’s death, many more responded. UUs traveled from all corners of the country, as did people from all faiths. They drove in caravans and chartered buses, by plane and train. And they did so knowing there was still significant risk. Trains and buses traveling to Alabama were being shot at.7 Many who couldn’t go attended or organized sympathy marches. Of course, all UUs were not sympathetic. There was at least one out-spoken segregationist UU minister in Memphis who publically blamed Dr. King for contributing to Reeb’s death. 8

Being UU or being theologically liberal does not magically make a person not prejudiced. There are many ways in which UUs were late to the party of racial justice. They had struggled for years to turn rhetoric of freedom into action. For decades they had turned away talented and eager African Americans who wanted to serve as Unitarian or Universalist ministers. Unitarians and Universalists were not, for the most part, forerunners of abolition, though there were exceptions. And our religious movement still had many painful lessons ahead of them about racial justice and inclusion. But in the 1960s, Unitarian Universalists were starting to get clearer about racial justice and when they were called to Selma, they stepped up. A least 177, maybe as many as 250 ministers, and hundreds of lay people journeyed to Selma and Montgomery. Historian Mark Morrison-Reid estimates that if you count those involved in other parallel efforts, probably half of all UU ministers were somehow involved in the struggle.9

One UU, Viola Liuzzo, a thirty-nine year old house wife and student in Detroit, found herself deeply moved by what was happening in Selma. After attending a memorial for James Reeb at her Detroit congregation and a sympathy march at Wayne State

University, she decided she would drive to Selma herself. She told her husband, “It’s everybody’s fight”10 and there were "too many people who just stand around talking."11 She kissed her five children good bye and started the three day drive south.

Heading to Selma was the kind of thing that was in character for Viola Liuzzo. She was active in local efforts to reform education and address economic disparity. She was arrested twice, on purpose, to bring publicity to the causes. She had only been a UU for a year or so but she heartily embraced Unitarian Universalism, especially the social justice work.12

One of her daughters, Mary Ashley said, “Even as young children we knew that our mom was different than the other moms we knew. She was spontaneous. She was playful. She was not regimented into the housewife routine.13 Her daughter recalled,

She was magical. Our holidays were magical. Our birthdays were magical. She’d take us kids out in the summer during the day and we’d all get home just in time to all straighten out the house before dad got home because mom said the house will be here a long time after I will and we can do better things with our time.14

Now, the better thing she could do with her time was to go to Selma. “She called us every night,” said her daughter Sally. “I learned how to [write in cursive] and she was so excited. She told me to write my name and put it on her dresser and she'd see it when she got home."15

When Viola Liuzzo arrived in Selma, she asked to be put to work. For five days she volunteered welcoming and registering new arrivals. On Sunday March 21st, she was one of the 3,000 people who marched over the Pettus Bridge on the first leg of the 54 mile march to Montgomery. Only about 300 were allowed to march the whole distance – that was the deal that was made with the federalized troops protecting them. While the small group marched and camped, Viola continued to volunteer, shuttling people by car, providing first aid at the campsites.16 The last leg of the march, she joined the now 25,000 people who marched through Montgomery singing freedom songs. There is a

10 http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2013/08/12/209595935/killed-for-taking-part-in-everybody-s-fight 11 http://uudb.org/articles/violaliuzzo.html 12 http://uudb.org/articles/violaliuzzo.html 13 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy2CO7Nuxok 14 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy2CO7Nuxok 15 http://www.npr.org/blogs/codeswitch/2013/08/12/209595935/killed-for-taking-part-in-everybody-s-fight 16 http://uudb.org/articles/violaliuzzo.html 6 © 2015, Kristin Maier photo of her, walking determinedly, in a conservative dress, purse on her arm, and shoes in hand.

That night, she and a young African American volunteer, Leroy Moton, shuttled a group of integrated marchers back to Selma. A car full of whites drove into her rear bumper at one point. Later, two cars boxed her in so she had to slam on the breaks. Those in her car remembered that she didn’t seem scared she just kept singing freedom songs.

On the way to drop Leroy Moton back in Montgomery, a car of white men spotted them when they stopped for gas. They followed her for 20 miles and at one point she tried to outrun them. One of the men in the car later said she was belting out “We Shall Overcome” as she drove. Leroy Moton said she was singing “before I'll be a slave I'll be buried in my grave.” 17 That’s when the car pulled up beside her and opened fire, killing her instantly.

President Johnson was deeply moved by her death. He called her husband the next day and said, “I don’t think she died in vain because this is going to be a battle, all out as far as I’m concerned.”18 Then, less than 24 hours after her death, President Johnson personally announced the news that four Klu Klux Klan members had been arrested by the FBI.

It turned out that one of the four men in the car was an FBI informant who had received permission to “work” during the march, despite having been involved in the beatings of Freedom Riders and possibly even the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church.19 In a meeting with President Johnson, J. Edgar Hoover, described Liuzzo’s husband as a Teamster organizer with a “shady background.” He said Liuzzo and Moton had stopped for romantic tryst. Johnson wisely ignored this, so Hoover had his FBI staff leak the lies to Klan informants. Articles soon said she drove South to meet Black men for sex. She was called a drug addict, unstable. People harassed her grieving family, including her first grade daughter.

The Ladies Home Journal published a poll in July of 1965 that asked if Viola Liuzzo had been a good mother. 55% said no. James Reeb left small children at home; there was no

17 http://wshu.org/post/conn-man-remembers-murder-changed-course-civil-rights-movement 18 http://uudb.org/articles/violaliuzzo.html 19 Mary Stanton, “Viola Gregg Liuzzo,” Encyclopedia of Alabama, January 7, 2013, http://www.encyclopediaofalabama.org/article/h-1377, (2/26/2015). 7 © 2015, Kristin Maier poll about whether he was a good father. This was all, of course, terribly painful for her family.

Three very brave, very dedicated people stood up against hatred and oppression and lost their lives in 1965. Though all heroes are not treated the same, they were all three heroes, nonetheless.

What made them heroes was not that they lost their lives. As Clark Olsen said, it was “Chances, happenstances” that he was alive and James Reeb was not – the difference of who was standing where on the sidewalk.

In truth, any of the clergy or lay people who answered King’s call could have been clubbed down on the streets of Selma. In truth, any of the marchers on that February evening in Marion could have been shot by that State Trooper. In truth, any of the many volunteers and marchers on the road after the final leg of the final march could have been assassinated.

They were heroes, not because they were killed, but because they took the chance, just like the hundreds, and thousands, that stepped up by the end. Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb and Viola Liuzzo were incredibly brave and so were others who escaped by happenstance.

Yes, UUs stepped up, but they linked arms with people of every faith – Christians and Jews and Muslims and atheists. They stood together, people of different races, of different classes and they sang and they steeled themselves for anything. And they did overcome. Not everything was solved – but real change was made in the world. Jimmie Lee Jackson’s grandfather voted for the first time at age 83. And standing arm in arm, those who were there said the biggest changes happened in themselves, in their own hearts. Their own prejudices toward people of other faiths, toward people of other ethnicities or races, began to melt away.

If Jimmie Lee Jackson, James Reeb, and Viola Liuzzo could step-up, alongside the thousands who took the same kinds of risks, how might we step up today? What efforts might we make today? Their stories are inspiring, and we need to let ourselves be inspired. For it takes courage to speak out. It takes courage to step up, even in little ways.

Today, voting rights are still being challenged. We heard the call from our Standing on the Side of Love speaker last week. Much of our work to dismantle racism still lies before us. Cleary we still have a collective problem with how our nation sees African Americans and people of other races. I don’t think our marching is done yet.

As we look to the work that still lies before us, it will help us to remember – we need not do that worm on our own. There is a wide community of people of every faith, of every ethnicity and race, who care about justice, who care enough to find some way to act, however big, however small.

May it be so.