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 124 Daniel Fogel, Israel Si Dresner, Richard Levy, Hanan Clyde Sills, Allen Secher, Jerrold Goldstein, Carol Rovinski, Paul Ortiz Documentaries, Public Events, Lectures (VIDS) Justice, Justice 1964 on June 17, 2014 2 hour 2 minutes | 46 pages
For information on terms of use of this interview, please see the SPOHP Creative Commons license at http://ufdc.ufl.edu/AfricanAmericanOralHistory.
VIDS 124 Speakers: Daniel Fogel, Israel Si Dresner, Richard Levy, Hanan Clyde Sills, Allen Secher, Jerrold Goldstein, Carol Rovinski, Paul Ortiz Event Title: Justice, Justice 1964 Date: June 17, 2014
CR: All right, does anyone know how to use this? I’m serious. Does—is this on?
Audience: Yes.
CR: Okay, hello! [Laughter] Aloha! Oh, I have to talk into it. Okay, very good. Thank
you all for being here. We’ve been working— [Interrupted by discussion in
audience] Get closer to—woo, okay, there we go! All right. Ooh! I can’t—I don’t
like this! Okay. Thank you. Obviously, I’ve never done anything like this before. Is
the volume okay now? Okay, welcome. It’s been about ten months since we’ve
been working on this project, and it is just thrilling to have these rabbis here, and
all of you here with us. I’m not going to take a lot of time because I want most of
the time to be hearing what the rabbis have to say. So, my name is Carol
Rovinski and I have the distinct— [Interrupted by applause] [Laughter] I have a
good fan club, I think! I have the distinct honor of being the chairman of the
Justice, Justice sub-committee of the St. Augustine Jewish Historical Society,
known as SAJHS. This has turned out to be one of the most difficult, but also one
of the most stirring experiences of my life, since I’ve had the privilege of
engaging with some of the most dedicated, spiritual, and committed people that
one could imagine. The rabbis, of course, have many—I don’t know what I said
there. Excuse me! I hope nobody’s taping that. Okay. Cancel! First, a bit about
St. Augustine Jewish Historical. The organization was the inspiration of Rabbi
Merril Shapiro. He is the president of his— [Interrupted by applause] I was going
to say, “Please stand,” but Merril, you might as well stand now. [Applause] He’s
the president of SAJHS. SAJHS was formed upon two major principles. One, to VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 2 investigate the possibility and plausibility that the first Jews in what would become the United States of America came ashore here in St. Augustine in 1565 with Pedro Menendez. Secondly, to promote greater understanding and knowledge of the Jewish history in St. Augustine within a broad context. We were incorporated in February 2012, and became a 501(c)(3) a year later. Merril also brought to us, amongst other teachings, the historical facts of these rabbis’ involvement in the Civil Rights Movement here in St. Augustine, which led to the largest mass arrest of rabbis in the history of the United States. So, in June last year, SAJHS read the letter “Why We Went on the Bayfront,” across the street from where they were arrested, which is now the Hilton. After the reading,
Sandra Parks from the Stetson Kennedy Foundation envisioned the possibility that we could bring the rabbis back this year, to commemorate the 50th anniversary of their arrest. Sandra, would you please stand? [Applause] Thus, the creation of the Justice, Justice 1964 Committee. We reached out, and wherever they could, the rabbis responded. We chose the name Justice, Justice
1964 from the passage from Deuteronomy that says, “Justice, and only justice, shall you pursue.” And I’m sure that Rabbi Merril could speak to you for a good thirty minutes on the subject. And he does a wonderful job. He really does.
There’s a quote from Helen Keller that says, “The world has moved along, not only by the mighty shoves of its heroes, but also by the aggregate of the tiny pushes of each honest worker. Fifty years ago, these rabbis may have been one of those honest workers. But today, here in St. Augustine, they are our heroes.
Let’s give them a rousing hand. [Applause] That’s going to be a hard act for them VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 3
to follow, isn’t it? After these two standing ovations, they’re—you can go home
now! [Laughter] Okay. I take great pleasure in briefly introducing our honored
guests. Would you just raise your hand when I say your name? Rabbi Israel Si
Dresner. [Applause] And, actually, I think we’ll hold the applause, because I want
them to talk. I want you to hear them. So let—Rabbi Dresner, a freedom rider,
and a friend of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., through his actions became known as
the most arrested rabbi in America. [Laughter] Rabbi Daniel Fogel—would you
just raise your hand, rabbi? Thank you—is a social leader who’s been active
across the nation for over fifty years. Through his appreciation of Tikkun Olam.
And will one of you tell us what Tikkun Olam is, please?
ID: The perfection of the world.
CR: The perfection of the world. Now, earlier today, I asked each of them, and they
each told me something different. So I was just curious what was going to come
out tonight. Okay. Now. Rabbi Jerrold Goldstein is a leader at heart whose many
passions lend a helping hand to all who are near him. Okay. [Applause] Rabbi
Richard N. Levy—and I forgot to ask him why the “N” is there—is a recipient of
the 1994 Covenant Award, a prestigious honor given to those who exemplify
outstanding zeal as a Jewish educator. Rabbi Allen Secher remains—
[applause]—remains an active member of his community, and a pioneer in the
use of multimedia techniques in sermonic expression. And finally, Rabbi Hanan
T. Clyde Sills—has been an activist—you’re supposed to raise your hand.
[Laughter] Okay—throughout his life. Rabbi Sills has positively impacted
countless individuals and communities worldwide. We also have in our presence VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 4
today, and through our events today and tomorrow, a man who shared the stage
with these rabbis back in June of 1964. Mr. J.T. Johnson, would you please
stand? [Applause] Mr. Johnson is an Albany native, and was twenty-six years old
when he jumped in the pool with others in June of 1964. [Applause] Throughout
his continued association with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference,
known as SCLC, Mr. Johnson proved invaluable to the Civil Rights Movement.
And because Mr. Johnson has been invited to somewhere else also, he’s going
to take his leave now. But we will be seeing him tomorrow at our other events.
Thank you. Thank you. [Applause] Okay, so here is our agenda for the evening:
first, we’re going to view a video taken of Rabbi Joseph Herzog on March 29th
this year. He passed away less than three weeks after we got the interview. His
daughter called me a few days later, and she said, “Carol, Dad died.” I said, “Oh,
my!” And she said, “But I want you to know that he died happy knowing that the
story will be remembered.” Unfortunately, Rachel couldn’t be with us tonight, but
she’s already seen the video. She’s the only one who has seen the video that
you’re about to see. Secondly, Rabbi Joshua Leaf will conduct a mini memorial
service for all of the rabbis who have passed. And are there yarmulkes? I thought
that there—are there? Yes, there are. If somebody would like to, when you say
the Jewish prayer for kaddish, if somebody would like to have a yarmulke. You
don’t need to, though, this is not a church. But if someone would feel the need to,
that’s fine. Oh, I’m sorry. Would you like to stand up for a moment, or you’ll wait
‘til your turn?
U1: I can wait. VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 5
CR: Okay. And like most rabbis, he does know how to project his voice. I will
introduce Dr. Paul Ortiz, who is going to conduct the panel discussion—and I’ll
introduce him in a moment—and then we will suspend the panel discussion at
8:25 for a few moments, to just put before you our entire event that we’re having,
and then, if there are people who do need to leave, they can. And then, other
people who want to stay and ask questions, we’re going to have a question and
answer session. There’s one thing that’s not on this piece of paper that I need to
say to you: somehow, the box that had the papers for—we have a small mini-
grant from Florida Humanities Council, and we have a box—if anybody sees a
blue box anywhere, there are evaluation sheets that in order to qualify for our
grant. So, what I’m going to ask, and I will remind you again at 8:25, is, assuming
nobody finds the box before then, if each of you would be so kind as to email
[email protected], I will email you that form, and then you can
email it back. That’s all I can figure I can do, and I really hope that at least a lot of
you will do that, because we need to—that was a precious grant that we got.
Okay. All right. So, now, we’re ready for the video. Do we turn down the lights, or
not?
[Recording cuts out briefly, and then the video plays]
[Loud applause after conclusion of the video]
CR: Oh, Stuart Bicknell, where are you hiding? And where is Joe? Is Joe here?
Stuart is the one who went with me over to Sarasota to get the footage, and his
buddy Joe—he’s not here? Okay, and his buddy Joe did the editing of this. VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 6
Thank you. [Applause] And this is Rabbi Joshua Leaf, and he is from the largest
and the oldest Reform synagogue in Jacksonville. And he can tell you more.
JL: He could tell you more, but he’d rather hear from his colleagues. And so, I’ve
been asked to offer just a few words in remembrance of Rabbi Herzog and the
others of my colleagues, and all of our friends and pioneers, who reminded us
that it is our sacred duty to free all those who are still bound in chains. And that
we are not free, as we say every year at Passover, until all people share equally
in freedom. And so, in memory of all those who have gone before us, we offer
the words of the 23rd Psalm: “They who walked through the shadow, we get to
walk in the light. The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie
down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my
soul. He guideth me in straight paths for his namesake. Yea, though I walk
through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil, for thou art with
me. Thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me. Thou prepares the table before me in
the presence of mine enemies. Thou has anointed my head with oil; my cup
runneth over. Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life,
and I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” There is a prayer that we in the
Jewish community say when we remember anyone who has passed away. And
so, I’ll invite you to rise if you are able, as I recite the words of El Maleh
Rachamim, “God Full of Compassion,” as we pray for Rabbi Herzog, and all
others who have perished in this struggle, to rest in peace.
[Recites the El Maleh Rachamim prayer until 19:27] VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 7
Merciful God, eternal spirit of the universe, grant perfect rest in your sheltering
presence to all rabbis who have scoured out for us the pathway to justice, and
have since entered eternity. Oh, God of mercy, let them find refuge forever in
your presence beneath the shadow of your wings, and let their souls be bound
up in the bond of everlasting life. The Lord is their inheritance, may they rest in
peace, and let us all say “Amen.” We’ll conclude with the words of Kaddish
Yatom, the Mourners’ Kaddish, in which we praise God for how wonderful our
lives are, and hope that we can make the most of all of the gifts that we have
been given.
[Recites Kaddish Yatom from 20:13-21:08]
May the Source of Peace grant peace to all of us who mourn the passing of
Rabbi Herzog, and all who gave their lives then and since in the struggle for
freedom and equality. And may God comfort all the bereaved among us, and
inspire us to carry on their work in our own lives. And let us all say, “Amen.”
Thank you very much.
CR: I think a miracle has happened here; a rabbi has actually kept a schedule!
[Laughter] I’ve never heard of that before. I failed to recognize Jonathan—would
you stand up, please? Jonathan Rubenstein is the son of one of the rabbis who
have passed.
[Applause]
As I said before, Rachel Wasserman would have wanted to be here. She’s the
daughter of Rabbi Herzog. And tomorrow, Lisa Borowitz will be here. Rabbi
Borowitz is still alive, but he was not able to make it, and Lisa will be here to VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 8
represent him. Joshua also has, I think, eleven other people of his family that are
here. Oh, Jonathan—see, it didn’t get in the script. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank
you. [Applause] And now, I’d like to introduce Dr. Paul Ortiz. He is the director of
the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program at the University of Gainesville. This
program has been terrifically supportive of the Justice Committee’s efforts to
record the story of these heroic men for posterity. Dr. Ortiz.
PO: Thank you so much, Carol. And I think—if we wouldn’t mind giving another round
of applause to the wonderful work of Carol and the St. Augustine Jewish
Historical Society. [Applause] It is a great honor for me to be here today. I am just
so humbled. The Samuel Proctor Oral History Program is humbled to be able to
play a small role in documenting this remarkable event. This morning, we spent
time with four of the rabbis, extensive oral history interviews. We are videotaping
the program this evening. All of these materials, because this is the University of
Florida—we love Gainesville, by the way, I don’t mind hearing “University of
Gainesville,” that’s fun—but we’re a public university. So all the material that we
collect is fully public, and including the program tonight will be accessible. We will
put it on our YouTube channel, and I will leave information with Carol on how to
access that. It will take us two or three months to mix it and everything. But this
whole program will be available online. The Proctor family, by the way, our
founder of the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, Sam Proctor, was a leader
of the Jewish community in Jacksonville and in Gainesville. Dr. Proctor not only
founded the oral history program at the University of Florida, he also co-founded
the Jewish Studies Center at UF. Mark Proctor and Allen, his sons, are very VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 9
prominent in Florida law. The Proctor family sends its greetings, its respect, its
love to us this evening. Sam is looking at us and smiling. I know he’s very happy
that we’re involved in this wonderful collaboration. Tonight, we’re going to do an
Order of Ceremony which I will introduce in just a moment in order to get us into
our time, and allow us to have a vibrant Q&A. And what I’m going to ask folks to
do, is the rabbis are each going to speak for five minutes each down the line.
And Elaine, our wonderful colleague from the University of Florida, is going to be
a timekeeper. And when each rabbi has one minute remaining, she’s going to put
up the one minute sign. And when they have no time remaining, she’s going to
do the— [Makes a “cutting off” motion]. [Laughter] And this way, we’ll get through
the program, and then it’ll leave plenty of time to ask questions afterward. So I’ll
ask you to hold your questions. Is that okay, Carol?
CR: Yes, that’s okay and Stephanie is so wonderful from Flagler College. This is not
the appropriate form but I’m going to have some people just pass them out. If you
will fill them in. Thank you. If you will fill them in as if it was that and hand them in
and at least we’ll have them.
PO: Yeah. Please fill out these forms for the Florida Humanities Council, our dear
friend Pat Putnam and others. It’s very important that we fill out the questionnaire
form. I wanted to start us off with just a few opening thoughts as a historian. For
a year or more, St. Augustine, Florida, was one of the most important cities, not
only in the United States of America, but on the North American continent. It was
one of the most important cities of the entire Americas. It was most of the most
important cities in the entire world. If you look at media coverage of the St. VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 10
Augustine Movement, 1963-1964, the activities that these gentlemen participated in, the prior activism of the African American community and its supporters, St.
Augustine was at the center of world history. French publications. Italian publications. Coverage in the African continent. Coverage in Latin America. We have found articles from Argentina, from Brazil, from Russia, from China, from
Ghana. This city was at the centerpiece of the greatest questions of the day that have already been raised. The struggle for justice. The struggle for equality, for human rights, for dignity. And above all, the question of how do we relate to each other as individuals, as groups, as families, with our own distinctive histories and heritages of suffering, of survival, of pain, of transcendence? Of getting together?
Right? And so this city, St. Augustine, was a city that literally was on the map in world events, and again, the activism, the dedication, the spirit. Dr. Hayling. The activism of people like Reverend Matthews and others. This city, St. Augustine, has so much to be proud for. And I just want to begin by just acknowledging, wow. Thank you, St. Augustine. [Faint Applause] So, what we’re going to do again with our order of ceremony, is we’re going to ask each rabbi, beginning with Rabbi Fogel, to speak for five minutes. And I’ve asked them to—and they can speak on whatever they want to speak about—but I’ve asked them to think about a few questions. One is, what does it mean to be here after fifty years?
Another question could be, what was your state of mind when you went into St.
Augustine for the first time? And then also, what is it about your heritage, your background, your religious tradition, that led you to this kind of action in solidarity with the Movement? And then, also, the question that Dr. King left us with in his VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 11
magnificent final book, Chaos or Community, right? The question is, where do we
go from here? Why is this event that we’ve spent so much time talking about for
the past day, and we’ll continue to talk about it tomorrow, we’ll continue to think
about it—why is it important for us now? Where we are now. Again, where do we
go from here, is the question. So, again, we’ll ask you to hold your questions until
the end. When you do come up, we have a microphone right here. Maybe, in
fact, we can have someone volunteer to even walk around with a microphone
when we get to that point. So, we’ll spend about the first thirty minutes with the
rabbis, and then we’ll transition to Q&A. And I wonder if we could start with Rabbi
Fogel, and we’ll just go down the line.
DF: As one of my professors once said, “Your questions are better than my answers.”
And that is true with any important subject which presents itself as to our
situation now. I’m sorry that because of my Parkinson’s, I have problems with
breathing. But I’d rather have all these problems, and find a way to meet them
with honesty and with clarity. So, I think that one of the things that I most
remember about the fact is that not everybody responded in the same way. But
when you are asked a question as was developed by your peers, then your
questions are better than your answers. So I think that you have to remember,
it’s not only the person who makes the act, but it’s the person who lies behind
and then supports the action. And therefore, we must practice the element of
Tikkun Olam, of building a better tomorrow, or we will wind up as we are in this
past generation. We’ve seen the best and the worst. The Holocaust and the state
of Israel. And we have completed the session with love and with trust. Think of VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 12
the persons who are left behind, who are asked to define who is a hero. And a
hero is a person who supports an action, but can undertake the action
themselves. What you need to learn is to take the next step, and the next step
that brought you here today. Where do you go from here? That is a question that
I ask. [Applause]
ID: Thank you, Rabbi Fogel. Rabbi Fogel has a bad case of Parkinson’s, and that he
schlepped all the way down here is reason to applaud. I want to thank Carol
Rovinski, I want to thank—and all the crew who worked with her, I don’t know all
of their names. And I want to thank all of you for coming. I received a letter from
Dr. King in June of 1964. He dictated the letter from jail here in St. Augustine. He
dictated it to his secretary who came to visit him through the bars. And she sent
the letter on to me. Dr. King and I knew each other already, because I had been
arrested several times before—[Laughter, some applause]—going back to, I was
arrested in Tallahassee in 1961 in a Freedom Ride. So, I’ve had experience in
the state of Florida. [Laughter] And Dr. King asked me to bring a whole batch of
rabbis down to be arrested in St. Augustine, which was the center of the
Movement at that time. Every summer, Dr. King centered the movement at a
different place, and in [19]62 it was in Albany, Georgia, [19]63 it was in
Birmingham, Alabama, and [19]64 it was in St. Augustine, Florida. And in [19]65,
it was in Selma, Alabama. And Dr. King said that this was the most brutal place
he’d ever been in. And he’d gone through, from the Montgomery Bus Boycott,
[19]55, [19]56, he’d been through dozens and dozens kind of experiences. I
immediately called the then-executive secretary of the SCLC—the Southern VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 13
Christian Leadership Conference, which Dr. King was the president of—Andrew
Young. And I said, “Andy, you’re in luck! The Rabbinic Conference of all the reformed rabbis, the Central Conference of American Rabbis”—the CCAR, I want you to know that of the seventeen of us who were arrested, two of them later became presidents of the CCAR, Rabbi Gene Litman and Rabbi Richard Levy.
So, we had some important guys with us. In any event, I said, “I’ll be in luck, because the convention is in four days, and it’s in my state, it’s in New Jersey.
It’s in Atlantic City.” This was before the casinos, there were no casinos there.
And, four days later, we were able to recruit the seventeen of us—sixteen rabbis and the then-director of the Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism, Al
Vorspan, and we came down and were duly arrested at what was then called
Monson’s, I think, Hotel or something. Yeah. Motel. And we took—some of us, at least—the background was, St. Augustine was about to celebrate the next year, in 1965, its quadricentennial. It was the four hundredth anniversary of the founding of St. Augustine in 1565. When I was a kid, I was raised in New York.
We did not learn about St. Augustine. We learned about Jamestown, 1607, we learned about Plymouth Rock, 1620, but we didn’t learn about a place that didn’t speak English because it spoke Spanish. And, so I had to learn about it through the Civil Rights Movement. And St. Augustine was then requesting money from the Congress of the United States to help celebrate the quadricentennial. Seven years ago, when Jamestown celebrated its quadricentennial, it got twenty-eight million dollars from the U.S. Congress! I mean, they didn’t know that in [19]64.
But they were trying to get money. Dr. King was opposing them getting a penny VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 14 unless they stopped being brutal and integrated, kind of thing. So, I duly went to the convention—and Andy said, “How should I handle this?” And I said, “Send a telegram to the Central Conference of American Rabbis”—I don’t remember the name of the hotel in Atlantic City—“and make it ‘Attn: Rabbi Israel S. Dresner.’” I saw to it that the telegram—Andy sent the telegram, Andrew Young—and it was then read to the plenum of the conference. And seventeen of us got on a plane and came down here. That’s the background as such. Since I probably don’t have very much time left, I don’t know who’s going to be standing up…
[Laughter] Let me conclude with an anecdote that Dr. King used to tell in the last two and a half years of his life. After the Civil Rights Act was passed—two days, by the way—we were arrested on June 18, 1964. The longest filibuster in
American history was going on at that time. It had gone on for weeks and weeks and weeks. In those days, you had to talk. It wasn’t, now you push a button and the filibuster is over. But there were twenty-one Southern senators—twenty
Southern Democrats, one Republican—who were participating in the filibuster, and it was going on and on and on. And two days after we got arrested, the filibuster was broken. In those days, you needed two-thirds, not three-fifths of the
Senate. You needed sixty-seven votes. And they broke the filibuster on June
20th. We were arrested June 18th. The vote was 71 to 29. What happened was,
President Johnson—twenty-five Republicans had been abstaining on the cloture votes, and without the twenty-five there was no way to get sixty-seven votes, obviously. The minority leader at that time was a Senator from Illinois, Everett
Dirksen, and Johnson must have—he couldn’t have threatened him, in my VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 15
opinion, he must have bribed him. [Laughter] You know, he must have promised
the Republicans a hundred and fifty new post offices, and twenty new highways,
forty new bridges, or whatever. And Dirksen delivered twenty-one Republican
votes to break the filibuster. But we took credit for breaking the filibuster,
because we were arrested two days before. [Laughter] [Applause] Let me
conclude with the anecdote that Dr. King told. [Laughter] The Civil Rights Act was
passed on July 2nd, 1964. But the Voting Rights Act wasn’t passed until the next
year. After the Voting Rights Act was passed, the first election that Blacks could
vote in was November, 1965. And Dr. King told the story, always—in his last two
and half years, I heard him tell it three or four times—of an elderly, unlettered
Black in Alabama who voted for the first time in November 1965, and as he left
the polling booth, he was greeted by a journalist who asked him what it felt like.
And his response was the following, as Dr. King would quote it: “I ain’t what I
ought to be. I ain’t what I want to be. I ain’t what I’m going to be. But thank God, I
ain’t what I was!” [Applause] We’re still not what we ought to be. We’ve made a
lot of progress, and I’m proud of this country for the progress, and I’m proud of
St. Augustine for the progress, and Florida. We’re not what we still want to be.
We’re not what hopefully we’re going to be. But thank God, we’re not what we
were. [Applause]
PO: As Rabbi Levy gets started his comments, please double-check your cell phones,
if anyone still has pagers? I don’t know. But check all your electronic devices,
and make sure they’re turned on the off switch. Thank you very much. Rabbi
Levy? VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 16
RL: Thank you. So, what does it mean to be here? When Stuart was driving me in
last night, and I saw the sign saying, “St. Augustine,” I was stunned. Because I
never thought I would come back here. This had been three incredible days in
my life when I was a kid. I had been ordained only two weeks before I was in jail.
And as my mother put it, “First he’s ordained, and two weeks later, he’s in jail!”
[Laughter] So, coming back is a reminder that there aren’t a lot of things in one’s
life that happen and don’t continue—an afterlife, in some way. As has been
noted, some of my colleagues have undergone great struggles, physical
struggles, in being here. And that fifty years after we were here the first time, it
meant so much to them, and your invitation meant so much to them, that they
came here as much of a struggle as it has been. And being here has also been,
to me, a reminder of age. This is the oldest city in America. We were here the
first time for three days. You’ve been around for, then, four hundred years. The
Jewish people has been around for some five thousand years. Some of us are in
our eighties, some are in our nineties. The old blessing, “May you live to a
hundred and twenty,” is now very doable. But, as it is, it’s a reminder of what is
age about? How do we use our years? Do we take singular events, like our being
here fifty years ago, and build them into our lives so that being in this beautiful jail
is something that does affect our lives? Clearly, my colleagues have
particularly—that’s been the case. Why did I go? I’d been involved in civil rights
activity as a rabbinic student in Cincinnati for most of my years there, and I’d
spent my last year as a student rabbi in Jasper, Alabama, which was a suburb of
Birmingham. I arrived two weeks after the Baptist church was bombed. It was the VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 17 year that Kennedy was assassinated. And while there, I not only got to know my own congregants, but people in the Black community as well, which I visited each time I was there thanks to someone who worked at the hotel where I was staying.
And I had many conversations with the principal of the high school, which wasn’t called a high school, but a “training school.” And in fact, we arranged for him to come speak to the youth group, except that their parents manipulated it that he didn’t come. And that was a very sober reminder to me of all the fears on everybody’s part. That is what being in this part of the country meant. So, when the telegram came, I didn’t have anything to do for another month. There was no reason why I shouldn’t go! And it was in some ways the culmination of what I’d been doing for a while. And to be back here is—seeing all that has happened here for the good, and as you have all noted, things that still need to be done.
The fact that there’s still a question about whether the slave market was a slave market or a general market; that’s an uncomfortable question to me as a visitor, having marched by it fifty years ago. That the gentleman who was the head of the Ku Klux Klan, and sneered at us when we entered the jail that was run by the
Klan—that his children are still here, and run shops, makes me wonder, has there been any sort of attempt at conversation with them? Has there been an attempt at reconciliation? We’re delighted at the presence of Temple Bet Yam.
I’m sorry that the other synagogue isn’t here. Because we received a visit from someone from that synagogue who did not speak very positively about our being here. And that there are still some issues between the two synagogues fills me, at least, with some sadness. Even as I think it is incredible—when I first heard VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 18 that there was something called the St. Augustine Jewish Historical Society…that was just a miracle! [Laughter] And now that I see the miracle in the flesh, and have met some of you, and have been guided around town by some of you, I was right: it’s a miracle. So, where do we go from here? There’s a book out, it’s been out for a while, called The New Jim Crow, by Michelle Alexander, who claims that while segregation in schools is long gone, that because of the War on
Drugs, young Black men are being incarcerated at rates far beyond what Whites their age are. And that the penalties for drugs used among young Blacks are much stiffer than those for Whites their same age. That’s a very important book, in that we came down to fight Jim Crow fifty years ago, and there’s just another kind of Jim Crow now, is something that needs to be worked on. But a Voting
Rights Act was passed shortly after we were here. And yet, in this very state, there are forces trying to suppress voter registration. It’s horrible! How can that happen? Fifty years, and obviously less afterward, voter suppression is another sin that we all need to fight against. There are issues of immigration—[Applause]
There are issues of immigration. Undocumented immigrants—and people will say, “Oh, our grandparents came here legally!” Yeah, they did because this country needed their labor. So are we going to say that, because now the labor of people who come here looking for a better life isn’t needed, that that makes them worse than what happened before? No. As Jews, we are all immigrants.
And our documents were probably all suspect. So this is another area that certainly needs to be worked on. And finally, gun violence. We were oppressed even in the short time we were here by the Ku Klux Klan. African Americans all VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 19
over, and Jews, and Catholics, were oppressed by the Ku Klux Klan. This whole
country is being threatened by the NRA. We defeated the Klan; are we going to
let the notion that everybody should possess a gun, even if it threatens one’s life
at school, in one’s home, or in one’s shopping center, are we going to let that
stay? So, there’s a lot to be done. You all know that very well. We know that. And
I hope, despite our age, we can still—with you—keep fighting those causes.
Thank you for having me. [Applause]
AS: [To HS] Five minutes. Five minutes. [Laughter]
HS: [Singing] Give me five minutes more / Only five minutes more / Let me stay, let
me stay…All right, how are we doing? Wow. Thank you—I’ve got a loud voice.
Thank you, Carol. Thank you, all of you. This is an amazing event, an amazing
moment in my life, and to gather with you, and to my colleagues who were there,
it’s a gevalt. It’s just, mm! Rob—where are you? My brother from Eugene, who
came with us, who put on an event in Eugene to raise the money because we
didn’t have the money to come and to do this, and there was an event that
happened in Eugene that would have made everyone here come to tears. Not
because it was bad, but because it was awesome. That the people who came to
play, came because of what this means. They understood. So the musicians
gathered—some of the finest musicians I’ve ever encountered—and Rob put it
together. There were hours and hours of rehearsals, and the ecstasy of this, I’ve
never experienced anything like that before. And in the end, we gathered enough
money to come. Patty, my companion; Rob, who’s doing some filming of this
now; and myself. And an African-American woman who decided to come, and VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 20
she said to me that when she was growing up, she hadn’t experienced prejudice
in where she lived in America. Rob, do you remember where that was?
RS: Arizona.
HS: Arizona. She just hadn’t experienced it. But later on she came to be with family in
another place, and she got the full bore. And when she heard this was
happening, she came, and she said something to us at a moment—she plays
drums, she sings—but this particular moment, which to me was the highlight of
the night, she said—besides the dancing, the hundred and fifty people who
showed up, she said, “I’ve never sung this song before publicly, but I want to do
that tonight.” And she sang it four times through. And the song—I thought I was
weeping, not out of sadness, but out of ecstasy. I’d never heard Amazing Grace
sung four times like that. The voice was beyond anything I’ve ever heard. And
she sang with her whole neshama, her whole soul, giving herself because she
believed in the importance of what we were doing. So, I honor—and Rob, her full
name?
RS: Darlene Jackson.
HS: Darlene Jackson. So, you’re with us tonight, Darlene. I want to move on, so I
don’t get to be hanan and on and on and on. [Laughter] In college in the
McCarthy era, when I grew up, I started at pharmacy school, but that was a
family thing. I didn’t want to end up with that, so I switched from tissues to issues,
and I became a history major. And when I was a history major, I had a wonderful
time, singing and dancing, and doing this and that and the next thing. I
encountered Jewish self-hatred. That was a very interesting thing. So, that sort of VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 21 piqued my interest. Why would Jews hate themselves? But, we took the challenge, and I decided to join Hillel, and I became Hillel president, and I decided, “I’ll get my fraternity brothers.” And I joined this fraternity because it was my last year of college there. And I decided—whoops! [Laughter] Who did that to warn me? How did you arrange to do that? So, it was my last year of college, and
I was thinking, “What do I want to do with my life?” And some of you know who
Letty Cottin Pogrebin is. Her husband was my fraternity brother. He grew up as a socialist, he grew up with social justice. And he was a model for me in so many ways of how I wanted to live my life. And his wife—and my partner’s warning me already, “Stop talking so long!”—my—not now. [Laughter] Where was I? Letty
Cottin Pogrebin’s husband, Bert Pogrebin, was my fraternity brother. And I honored him because he grew up in family that honored social justice. He lived in
Roosevelt, New Jersey. I recently saw him on television with his wife, Letty Cottin
Pogrebin, and his wife talking, that at some point he realized the great danger of sexism and the way we’ve treated women in our culture. And it’s not okay! So,
Bert once again became, through the television set, became the model for me, although I’ve been involved in that before. Okay, let me move on. The other influence that was very important—so, feminism, now, and my daughter who defines herself as genderqueer, who works with orphans in their life, I’m so proud of who she is, in the way she lives her life. And she didn’t want to be in an open relationship, she wanted to be in a relationship, and she’s found that person in her life. And she and Rabbi Yitzhak Husbands-Hankin from Eugene, who also is an extraordinary rabbi, she and my daughter went out to the fields with the VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 22 farmworkers, and spoke before the people in Oregon that were the government of Oregon, to say, “You can’t do this to the farmworkers and have the poison in the field! It ain’t okay anymore! Why do you do that?” And my daughter, and
Rabbi Yits’s daughter—two rabbis in Eugene—went out into the fields and spoke before the legislature in Eugene to say, “This is not okay.” And things got changed. So, we all have this challenge. I grew up in the McCarthy era. My professor from pharmacy school, before I switched from tissues to issues, what happened to that professor? A Jewish man who spoke before the board of
Rutgers University and said, “Yes I had been a socialist in the—But, I no longer am. But I refuse to testify for that McCarthy person. No way!” And he got thrown out of Rutgers. And I went on strike with the other students. We went to Rutgers, and we had tomatoes and eggs thrown at us. And called “Commie.” And this is what was happening in the 1950s. So, things had to be changed. So, then came
ROTC. And we were required for ROTC, we had to take loyalty oaths because of
McCarthy! We had to take loyalty oaths. Who’s going to take a loyalty oath? My roommate decided not to. From him, I learned a lot. He decided, “I’m going to march with the ROTC,” but they said, “You can’t march, because you can’t have a uniform unless you take the loyalty oath!” So how do you do that, how do you deal with that?” So Jerry said, “I’ll march about half a block away from the ROTC.
I’ll be there for every march, and I won’t miss any, I promise you! Even if I have the flu, I’ll be there to march with ROTC. But I won’t sign the loyalty oath.” And they said, “You can’t, because we can’t issue you a uniform.” He said, “I’ll march a half a block behind you, and I’ll wear whatever I wear.” So they finally said, VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 23
“Okay, we believe you.” And so he did. And he dressed in red clothing. [Laughter]
And there was the ROTC, and they’re doing their [sings, imitating marching music]. And I was a Navy chaplain, I served in Marines, so I’m not against the
Service. But he did what he had to do with a sense of humor, and he got it changed. What I did is I went to the president of the university, and I said,
“They’re trying to keep me from graduating because I refuse to sign, I don’t want to take the loyalty oath.” But I compromised myself on that loyalty oath. And I never will forgive myself for that. But what I did, they said, “You still have to take another year of ROTC.” I said, “That’s not what the other guy in the RO”—and I finally went to the president of the university, and I said, “This ain’t working.” So he said, “I’ll tell you what: if you take a summer course, and take it in whatever you want to take it, I’ll give you credit for the ROTC. And what I took it in made a change in my life. The man who was the man who brought Jackie Robinson into baseball—a Texas man, actually; most people don’t even know who he was. I came to love that man in the six week course I took. He offered me a job—and this was an existential choice in my life. Do I become this man’s assistant, or do I go on with my search of my Jewish roots? And I remember walking the campus, and making the choice: if I turn right, I’m going to be doing this, if I turn left, I’m going to be doing this. And my choice was, “I’ve got to find out more about my
Jewish roots. I’ve got to do this. But it has to do with social justice.” Rabbi
Borowitz was the most important teacher I ever had in my life. And, Rabbi
Borowitz is my inspiration. And he talks about the beauty of the Reform
Movement. What is the beauty of the Reform Movement, in that way? It was that VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 24
we are Jews, but we must embrace—as the conservative rabbi here does as
well; times are changing—we must embrace the unity of all beings. My God is
not a god on a throne. My God exists. We all have an opportunity as cells of God,
being in consciousness, to find out who we really are. And that’s what brought us
all to St. Augustine. [Applause]
AS: Carol, I warned you! [Laughter] Never tell a rabbi “Five minutes,” Carol.
HS: Was it more than five minutes? [Laughter]
AS: We don’t know how to say our name in five minutes, Carol! [Laughter]
U1: You guys aren’t alone! [Laughter]
AS: So, here I was in Atlantic City. The telegram was red. And it took me maybe eight
seconds to say, “Of course.” Now, I was with Si Dresner and B.T. Rubenstein in
Albany, Georgia. So I already had the experience. But, that isn’t why I went. I
went because I should’ve! It’s as simple as that! I’m a Jewish guy. What do Jews
do? Jews show up. [Laughter] My parents taught me so much more than bagels
and lox! They taught me that when there is evil, you fight it. When there is
something wrong in this world, you do it. Dick Levy here was just brilliant. I can’t
top that! Cause he said for all of us, “What do Jews do? They do!” So, I have a
question to ask all of you: what would you do? Not what would we do. We aren’t
heroes. We just did. But it’s now fifty years later; what would you do? Would you
be on that walk with us, from the church—that scary, miserable, awful walk? I
can’t tell you how frightened—I lost my hair on that walk! [Laughter] Holding a
young Black girl’s hand and walking for a couple of hours, the scariest two hours
of my lifetime? Because we were told there had been shooting, and that the VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 25
National Guard, we had no idea. Most of them, we were sure, were
segregationists, and would shoot us if they got a chance. But we did it. And so,
now, fifty years later, with we Alta cockers here. I mean, six old farts who have
come back here to save validation. To really say, “Was there something in our
life that we did, that we are so proud of?” And yes, we are. Every single one of
the six of us. Saying, “We did that!” But it’s so proper for me to turn. I grew up in
anti-Semitism, so I knew what that life was like. But if there’s anything I can say
to you tonight to carry away from here, is that if something like this were to raise
its ugly head, and Si Dresner read a telegram to us, would you join us? Would
you be there with us? Because I imagine two-thirds of you here are Jewish! And
the other third, would you join us? Because, what would Jews do? What would
Jesus do? Would you join us? So if I have a message—and I am so proud to be
here. I—geez. I love it! I just love it. I’m so proud to be here. But next time, join
me, will ya? [Applause]
JG: My buddy Secher here—is this on? Okay, can’t hear it. Okay. I’d learned
something about life last Friday noon when I had lunch up in Connecticut on the
way here with Eugene Borowitz. Borowitz was in the cell with us. Borowitz is one
of the philosophers, theologians, of the Reform Jewish Movement. And an
impressive teacher he was at the Hebrew Union College Jewish Institute of
Religion. He’s now in his nineties, and he wanted to be here very badly, but he
said age had caught up with him. He couldn’t come. But he wanted to tell me a
story. He told me a story about Secher. He told me that when Si read his letter to
the assembled body of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, Borowitz VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 26 was up in his room preparing another presentation. And he never heard you read the telegram. A little later, he came downstairs, and he bumped into his student, his former student, Alan Secher, who says to him, “Gene, we’re going to St.
Augustine! You’re doing it too, aren’t you?” And Borowitz says, “I didn’t know anything about it.” But Secher is the one who made the call on his teacher of
Jewish principles and theology in the seminary: “You’ve got to go with us.” The major person who produced this draft of the statement, “Why We Went,” was
Gene Borowitz. He was the editor, the theme that wove together all the statements that we had made in conversation and he said, wrote on little pieces of paper, everybody in this cell answering the question, “Why did you go?” I don’t remember what I told him. I don’t remember the piece of paper I wrote. And all those pieces of paper are carefully filed in a box somewhere in the bottom of the
American Jewish Archives, and can’t be located. [Laughter] So, why did I go? I’ll tell you: I went because when I was sixteen, I went to the Jewish Youth
Conference in Asilomar, California. I was a high-schooler. And my rabbi had suggested it would be a nice thing if I went with a few of my fellow confirmation class students to go to this Jewish youth conference. Kids from all up and down the Pacific Coast—I’m from Los Angeles—and opening night, or at least the first
Friday night, Rabbi Ed Zeren of Hollywood Temple Israel, he got up in front of all of us—several hundred teenagers. He stands in front of us, and I remember him always. He said, “I am the Statue of Liberty.” And he proceeded to talk about liberty as if he were the Statue of Liberty, standing in New York Harbor. And he wove together what it meant to be a Jew, and what it meant to be an American. VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 27
What it meant to carry two traditions of liberty within your religious cultural framework. That commitment not only to the freedom for Jews that we experienced at the exodus from Egypt a long time ago, but the freedom that all human beings were entitled to. The ability to find fulfillment of ourself, to find the maximum—what should we say—abilities. Concerns. Values. That lie within every human person. That became something part of me. I knew Thomas
Jefferson, I knew Moses, and I knew the Statue of Liberty. And I combined those two forces in me to do what I could do to improve this world. I chose to do it as a rabbi. I chose to make a difference. But I didn’t do much. I talked a really good game. I’d learned that in synagogue, we talk good games. Our prayers are noble and inspiring. And I was inspired. And then I went to the first Central Conference of American Rabbis to which I was entitled to go in June of [19]64. And I went there, and the first thing that happens is, this rabbi over here gets up and reads a telegram from Martin Luther King: “Come walk with us in St. Augustine.” That was the call that I heard, and I answered positively. Now, it is a mystery to me exactly why anybody ever says yes to anything! [Laughter] It’s not something laughable; it’s mystical. When is it right? When will you actually walk your talk?
When will you take action to say what you think you believe? When do you turn your golden dreams into boots on the ground, doing something? I was really swept away, and I—first thing I did is I went to my senior rabbi, the experienced rabbi that was my mentor in St. Paul, Minnesota at Mt. Zion Temple. And I said,
“Rabbi Martin, I think I’d like to go with the delegation down to Florida.” “Why would you want to do that?” I mean, he was another good talker. “Why would VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 28 you—you can’t do anything about all that. That’s much more complicated—you think one little demonstration’s going to make any difference?” I said, “I’ve got to do it. I really want to do it.” “Well, okay. If you really want to do it, go ahead and do it.” I mean, that was the kind of encouragement I got from the boss! [Laughter]
Well, I went. And that really made a difference to me in my life. It was the first big demonstration I was ever part of. It was not the last one. Since then, I’ve picketed, and I’ve marched, and I have gone to Washington, and I’ve been part of a whole lot of different things. I have a final story to tell you: it was about, I think maybe fifteen years ago that that synagogue in St. Paul, Mt. Zion, celebrated its hundred fiftieth anniversary as a synagogue in the Minnesota territories. It’s a big deal. And they invited me and each one of the former rabbis of the synagogue through the years to come back for a weekend. I came back, and I talked about the most important thing that had happened to me during those four years that I was one of their rabbis. And I talked about my experience in St. Augustine. And my fears that the temple board and the temple president would not look with favor on what I had done—rabbis in dignified synagogues on
Summit Avenue in St. Paul, Minnesota don’t go getting arrested. But you know, they had welcomed me back. They were proud of me. They caught on that I was showing them not just the words, but the acts of somebody who believed in
Judaism, and the dreams and the ideals of Judaism. Now, that was a nice experience. But what really got to me was after the service where I gave my big sermon again about why we went, a gentleman who’s a representative of St.
Paul, Minnesota in the Minnesota state legislature came up to me. “Remember VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 29
me, I’m Richard Cohen?” And I did sort of remember, he’d been in the
confirmation class the year that I was arrested. He’s taken a great interest, as a
Jewish legislator, in the passage of social justice legislation. He always would get
actively involved on those kind of bills. And whenever a reporter or anyone would
ask him “Why are you so engaged in these social justice-seeking acts of the
legislature?” And he says, “I always tell them, it’s because my rabbi went to jail in
St. Augustine.” [Applause]
PO: As we transition into question and answer, let’s give our rabbis another round of
applause, please. Thank you. [Applause] A few brief announcements as we
begin to think about questions, as questions percolate, and we have a
microphone here. And maybe if we could get a volunteer to maybe kind of move
around with the microphone. If you have a question, if you can raise your hand.
But again, just to echo what Carol said, please fill out the forms going around.
The evaluation forms will help us with Florida Humanities. They were kind
enough to give us a grant to support the event, and that’s a requirement. Also,
the letter that was right here—this is the manuscript form. There’s also a
typescript form. The title, the formal title, “Why We Went: A Joint Letter from the
Rabbis Arrested in St. Augustine.” This is a magnificent document in American
history. I’ve been teaching American history for over two decades now. This is a
freedom document for the twenty-first century. It is equal to the greatest
documents about the meaning of freedom in this country’s history, and it’s
something going forward. Whatever faith tradition you come from, whatever
political tradition you come from, this letter is an essential reading for you—for VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 30
your congregation, for your synagogue. Please circulate it. And again, there are
typescript copies of this, and I’m sure Carol can tell you how to get ahold of one.
Rabbi Levy referred to a very important book: Michelle Alexander, The New Jim
Crow. This is one of the most important books for our own time. It starts by
talking about slavery, the Jim Crow era, and it also echoes what the rabbis have
been talking about: where do we go from here? Let’s talk about it. And so, again,
Michelle Alexander, The New Jim Crow. I want to encourage people to not let
this be the last activity that we participate in, and that we do. To let this activity
and these eloquent words inspire us to do more: to learn more about our
histories, to learn more about the Jewish social justice traditions, to learn more
about African American history, about these wonderful overlapping histories.
Again, the event is being taped by the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program at
the University of Florida, and it will be online. It’ll take us a few months to mix it
and everything, but again, you can talk with Carol, or you can Google the Samuel
Proctor or UF Oral History Program, and the entire event will be available via a
YouTube video. So now we’re moving to our questions. Please try to be concise.
In your question, avoid speechifying. This is a really a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity to talk to these gentlemen. Let’s take advantage of it. And so I will try
to facilitate the questions as much as possible—sir, and you have the floor!
A1: Rabbi Johnson—oh, is this on? I’m Rabbi Johnson Rubenstein, my family and I
are very, very honored to be here. And I have two brief comments. One is that
this is the fiftieth yart site of Andrew Goodman, James Chaney, and Michael
Schwerner, which just took place a week or so after the death of those three Civil VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 31
Rights—young Civil Rights workers. And it impressed upon me—because as a
fifteen-year-old, I wasn’t aware of the connection of all these events—what those
who stayed behind, as Rabbi Fogel said, were going through when these
seventeen people went to St. Augustine, one of the most brutal places in the
South. And I understand it when you say you’re not heroes, and my dad,
Alvishon B.T., would say the same thing. But he was a hero to my mother, and
she was a hero to him. And those people, I’m sure those of you who were
partnered at the time, would not have been able to go without the support of
those people in your family who stayed and had to live through two or three very,
very anxious days, because they were very aware of what the mood was here,
and what the context was here. Thank you. [Applause]
A2: My name is Wayne Gunthorpe. I’m particularly interested in what you, as rabbis
who participated in St. Augustine back in 1964, what your relationship was with
Rabbi Leon Jick. Rabbi Leon Jick had a monumental effect on my life, following
my experience at Dachau, Germany. So, I would appreciate if you could tell me a
little bit about his involvement with you during this period of time. Thank you.
ID: I knew Leon very well. I knew him from a labor Zionist youth movement called
Habonim. And Leon had an influence on my life, in that when I was—in 1951, I
went to Israel to work on a kibbutz for a year. Leon had gone in 1948 or [19]49 to
Israel, and worked on a kibbutz. We both came back—I was drafted into the
American army, I wasn’t a rabbi in those days, and the war in Korea was going
on, and I had to come back and serve two years, not as a chaplain but as a buck
private [Laughter]—and Leon came back and preceded me in rabbinical school. VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 32
He was a very remarkable guy, and I remember him with great fondness. He was
a man of idealism, and—in those days, by the way, not all Jews were Zionists.
And that was certainly true in the Reform movement, not all Jews were Zionists
at that time. And Leon was a guy who inspired others, and he did that in his
sermons, and he did that throughout his life. So I have only wonderful memories
of him.
RL: Just a brief addition. Some of us prayed at Morning Service this morning. And we
used a selection from a book of his, I don’t remember the exact title—something
like Finding the Way—where he mentioned his experience in St. Augustine. And
thumbing through the book, I just found it a beautiful, very moving book.
Tomorrow, if you’d like, I can get you the exact title of it.
AS: Let me just add that B.T. Rubenstein’s son talked about the two young Jews and
the young African American who were murdered just a week before we were in
St. Augustine—it was that week after.
HS: Three days after.
AS: A few days after we were in St. Augustine. Their names were Andrew Goodman,
who was about twenty years old; Michael Schwerner, who was I think twenty-
three; and James Chaney, the African American. If you remember, the Klan
buried their bodies, and their bodies weren’t found for about seven weeks kind of
thing. It was found in Neshoba County, Mississippi, in Philadelphia, Mississippi.
Ronald Reagan, by the way, chose to begin his 1980 campaign in Philadelphia,
Mississippi. I don’t know if you remember that. But, the widow—Michael was
already married. He was the only one, he was twenty-three. He had been VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 33
married about seven, eight months before to Rita, and his wife married a boy
from my congregation, Bob Bender, who I officiated his bar mitzvah and his
confirmation. So, they live in Seattle, Washington. They’re both lawyers today.
They’re still alive. I saw them several years ago when I was in Seattle.
A3: Hello, my name is Gail Compton, and I’m visiting St. Augustine now from the
People’s Republic of Vermont. [Laughter] I was raised by that lady over there,
who took us to marches for fun—family fun, we used to do things like that, so…
It’s always been a really important part of my life, and I’m also very active in
politics. And Burlington is very easy because everyone agrees with you.
[Laughter] I’m finding that younger people—and I also notice by looking around
this room, there aren’t that many of them—are not participating the way we did.
It’s not important to them, or they don’t feel it the same way we do. Now, maybe
it’s just a Burlington thing. But again, there aren’t that many young people in this
room. What would you do? What do I say? How do I get them involved?
A4: Good question.
RL: I would suggest you do what your mother did, and take them along. So, take
other people along to marches. And maybe to get together with some parents
who you know, and encourage that kind of behavior. Other comments?
JG: Does this one work? If this one works, it will be fine. I had occasion to speak with
a group of people—principally, I would say, the twenty-to-forty-year-olds, a group
called Bend the Arc in Los Angeles. And they knew I was coming here, they’d
ask me to talk about my experience in St. Augustine, and what this was going to
be like. They didn’t know the story. They really don’t know the story at all. It VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 34
was—for me to say I was with King in St. Augustine was as much as if I had said
I was with George Washington at Valley Forge. It was just—it was out of their
realm of experience. They were really moved! They stayed to the end. It was a
long program. And they kept me on with questions—they really are interested in
that. They’re committed to voting rights. And I said, “That’s what you’ve got to do.
That’s really important.” We’re not—as Richard indicated, we haven’t got voting
rights really operating in this country enough. We give lip service to it. But then,
there are all kinds of ways in which you can un-encourage people to vote—one
of which is to buy elections, but anyway… There’s a lot of—there are—I don’t
give up on young America. I think you have to tell them the stories, you have to
give them the opportunities to grasp that this is your family, or religious, or civic
tradition.
ID: Every generation criticizes the next generation. Those who went before me
criticized my generation, et cetera, et cetera. I have found many, many young,
idealistic Jews, many young idealistic Americans of all faiths, and don’t give up
on them. I agree with what Jerry just said. And remember, we were not typical,
either, in our generation. I don’t know how many rabbis there were at that
convention in Atlantic City. There must have been three, four hundred, right?
Seventeen went. So— [Laughter]. I was arguing with Alan Secher earlier. He
said, “Only seventeen went.” I said, “That’s good! Seventeen went!” You know.
[Laughter and Applause]
A5: Hi, I’m Phyllis Greenfield from Temple Bet Yam. And my question is, when you
went back home, when you were released from jail and you went back home, VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 35
how did your congregants behave? What did they think? And was there anything
at that point you could do to get them interested in joining you in social action?
AS: I want to tell an Albany, Georgia story. We’ll digress for a moment. But it’s typical
because at the time, in St. Augustine, I was rabbi in Mexico City. And I didn’t—
when we were jailed, I listed my home as Butler, Pennsylvania, because I didn’t
want any of the crackers here saying, “Look, they brought in outside agitators!”
[Laughter] Okay? But, when I wanted to take my youth group on a demonstration
in Long Island, the president of the congregation told me I could not. Why could I
not? He said, “It’s not my job.” I said, “Well, what’s my job?” He said, “Your job is
to teach them.” “Okay. Teach them what?” He said, “Your job is to teach them
Judaism.” “Oh. Now I understand.” He said, “No, no, no, no. That’s not what I
meant.” I said, “All right, what did you mean?” He said, “Your job is to teach them
the difference between right and wrong.” So, it was okay in that instance that I
was down in Georgia, but not in my backyard. And that was awful! I didn’t last
very long in that congregation! [Laughter] So, that’s a bit of an answer. But, I
didn’t have any trouble coming back from St. Augustine. That was Mexico. They
didn’t care. Because in Mexico, when you demonstrate, they shoot you!
[Laughter]
ID: I was arrested four summers in a row. I spend my summer vacation—the one
thing you can’t do in the Reform rabbinate is miss a bar or bat mitzvah. If you
miss one of those, you’re a dead duck the next time your contract is up, because
that family will absolutely destroy you. So, I couldn’t go other than in the
summers. Every time I came back, a former president of the congregation, a VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 36
great man, dead now unfortunately—I delivered the eulogy at his funeral—he
commanded a P.T. boat, by the way, like Kennedy in the Pacific during World
War II. Chick Danziger. Used to introduce a resolution at the board to commend
Rabbi Dresner for living up to the highest ideals and teachings of prophetic
Judaism. I would have to leave the board meeting. And the first time that
happened was in 1961, when I was arrested. And ten minutes went—I thought it
would go, you know, boom-boom-boom. And a half hour went by. After forty-five
minutes, I went home. And he called me about an hour and a quarter after. He
said, “The resolution passed, but it wasn’t unanimous.” [Laughter] The second
summer, exactly the same thing happened. This time, I went home right away. I
mean it passed four times, but never unanimously. And I’ll conclude with the old
Jewish joke about the immigrant rabbi, 1910, on Rivington Street on the Lower
East Side. We pronounce it “Rington Street.” And he gets sick and he goes to the
hospital. The president of the board of trustees was an immigrant visiting there.
He says, [in an accent] “Rabbi, I want you should know that the Board of
Trustees wants you to get well; they passed a resolution that you should have a
full recovery. The vote was seven to five, with two abstentions.” [Laughter]
JG: I wonder if I can—you know, each of us, when we left St. Augustine, got out on
bail. We were charged with three offenses. With trespassing, we were on the
parking lot of the motor inn, you know? And the second was disturbing the peace
or some variation thereof. And the third one was conspiracy. Well, you know,
they were right: we did have a conspiracy. We really were conspiring to break the
law, a law which had no business being enforced. Never even should have VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 37 passed. That required me taking a Black man from Alabama with me into the restaurant. Anyway, we had to put up three hundred dollars—each one of us—for each of the three accounts. That was nine hundred dollars that had to be paid out in bail. That’s fifty years ago. Think of what nine hundred dollars—more like nine thousand dollars, probably. Maybe more than that. But the point of my saying this—I could make up a lot of points out of it, but—I want to say this. I got home, I left here, and I went back to Los Angeles. I was on vacation, and I didn’t go back to St. Paul, I went back to home in Los Angeles. My family and friends all gathered that Sunday. They wanted to hear my story. They came to my mother who, my mother and father ran a home, and they loved to entertain people. And everybody came, there must have been, I don’t know, fifty people who came for this reunion with the community I grew up in. They heard the story, they heard it was nine hundred dollars in bail, and before the party was over that afternoon, they’d all chipped in money. They were not Civil-Rightsnics, they were not people—they were regular, middle class, White Jews. And somehow, my having done this was a step for them. It was a modeling of them that you’ve got to do something about what you believe in, and it captivated them. It was maybe the best sermon I ever give, to be in jail and talk about it. Because it said something—not about what I—well, it said something about what I believed in, but what I would do about what I believed. And that was amplified when I got back to St. Paul. And I told you the story of Ted Cohen who carried that legacy with him into the Minnesota legislature. Sometimes, bravery pays off. I think I was rewarded amply with tremendous response to what I had done. [Applause] VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 38
A6: I’m Warren Clark. I live in Lincolnville here in St. Augustine. I’m a new resident
there, but I’ve had a chance to meet some of the people that were living there
when you all were there. And so I was wondering if you would tell us stories
about how you were received in St. Augustine, but particularly by the people that
you were marching with—that lived here. The people that were St. Augustine
residents at the time. What was your experience with them? One of you
mentioned what happened with the restaurant, and getting the food, and being
called, “This is one of our rabbis.” So would you tell us some stories about the
people of St. Augustine that you were living or staying with, and walking with?
HS: Alan and I spent the night at Israel Featcher’s house.
AS: That was his name?
HS: That was his name.
AS: Israel…?
HS: Israel Featcher, F-E-A-T-C-H-E-R. In the African American community—
AS: Did he have a family?
HS: He was single at the time, and we shared a bed. That’s how I remember!
AS: We did? [Laughter]
HS: We did! [Laughter]
JG: You don’t remember! [Laughter]
HS: I think he gave up his bed for us. But he epitomized, for me, being a very
courageous man. He spent time with us, he talked, and he worked on the
railroad. And I just felt so inspired in his presence. He was a humble man, but he
had a sense of his own self-worth, that he hadn’t been beaten down by the VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 39
system. And that’s what touched me the most; that he had—and I think, probably
would, if I don’t remember, but it wouldn’t at all shock me to realize—that he had
strong church background, and that he knew that he was a child of God. And as
such, respected himself, and respected other human beings.
ID: The Bible tells us that Moses was a very humble man, ish anav. Most rabbis are
not humble. [Laughter] Most of us didn’t go into the rabbinate—we probably went
into the rabbinate because we wanted a—but let me say, you’ve lionized us, and
we really appreciate it, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart. But the real
heroes were not the people who came down here for a couple of days—namely,
us. The real heroes were the people who fought the battle day and night, week
after week, month after month, year after year—[Applause].
There was a dentist in this town with a name like “Hayling.” I don’t—was that the
name? Yeah, okay. He was utterly—he still lives in Florida, but I think in Broward
County now, or in Ft. Lauderdale or somewhere. He was an incredible guy. I
mean, he risked his life every day. Dr. King brought with him several of the
people in SCLC. There was a Reverend Shuttlesworth, who died only a few
years ago. He was—the beaches in St. Augustine are beautiful. But they were all
segregated. And he tried to integrate the beach, and they almost killed him. They
almost—after beating the heck out of him, they tried to drown him, kind of thing.
He lived to be, by the way, eighty-nine years old. He died, like, two years ago.
Those were the real heroes. And Dr. King was in jail, I believe, at least three
times—twice I know of in St. Augustine. So that, with all due respect, and I thank VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 40
all of you who came, and all of you who have made heroes out of us, but
remember who the real heroes were.
U2: Amen.
U3: Yeah. [Applause]
RL: Another word about our reception: we came here, and were ushered into St.
Paul’s church? The AME church to such a rousing welcome of “Hoorays” and
“Hallelujahs,” and I mean, we had been in Black churches, but we had never
been the object of that enthusiasm. And I think we knew that it wasn’t for us. That
it was for the God who had sent us. And that was just stirring for us all. And then,
C.T. Vivian, I believe, another of Dr. King’s lieutenants—
ID: He’s still alive.
RL: Yes, I know. Went up and down the aisles of that church, haranguing people to
agree to get arrested the next day. And he had done his homework. He knew
about the background of every person whom he approached. And as we sat
there and watched that, knowing that the people who agreed to be arrested could
lose their jobs, could be physically assaulted. And with each new person who
said, “Yes, I will go,” as Si said, those were the heroes. That time in the church,
and watching that organizing of people to be arrested. And then, as my
colleagues have mentioned, we were taken into the homes of people in that
church, and with such hospitality and warmth and welcome, that the next
morning when we went outside, and we’d see Blacks walking in the street, and
Whites walking in the street, my instinctive feeling was to be frightened of the
Whites, and to feel at ease with Blacks who were in the community. And to my VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 41
shame, I don’t know that I had ever felt that before. And so, if you ask about how
we were received, we were received in a life-changing manner. So, thank you,
fifty years after that. [Applause]
ID: As you’ve noticed, all of us have gone over our time period, and Dr. Ortiz is about
to end this session. Let me just describe one thing that occurred in St. Paul’s
church, that I think all of you will remember. The only one that Dr. King knew
among the seventeen was me. He had already spoken to my congregation. We’d
been arrested, and I’d been arrested in Albany, Georgia. And Dr. King asked me
to come up to the altar, I guess it’s called—we call it the bimah in the
synagogue—to speak. And I had spoken in quite a few Black churches, and I’d
learned the sort of question-and-answer technique if you remember, and I was
using it, and it was hot as hell. And everybody in the congregation was waving a
fan, if you remember.
RL: It was like a funeral home.
ID: And—right—and we were schvitzing, we were sweating—and I went on and on,
by the way. And finally, one of my colleagues—I don’t know which one, it may
have been one of the guys up here—said in Yiddish, said, “Genug!” Which
means, “Enough!” You know. And so, I finished up.
AS: We all said it. [Laughter]
ID: So that, we thank you for tolerating us tonight.[Applause]
ID: I don’t know if you remember that.
RL: I remember the—
ID: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Somebody said, “Genug!” VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 42
PO: We have time for just two more questions, Carol has informed us. And after we
finish the Q&A, Carol wants to make some announcements. So, please don’t
leave, but we’re coming towards the conclusion of the program. But Carol wants
to make some remarks. And she also asked us to recognize, we’ve been talking
about this wonderful African Methodist Episcopal church, St. Paul’s, and I
understand that Reverend Ron Rawls is with us. If we could acknowledge; he’s
the head of—[Applause] Thank you, Reverend Rawls, for being with us this
evening. We have time for just two more questions.
A7: Hi. My name is Andrea Rubenstein. I’m one of the luckiest people in the world,
because I was B.T.’s daughter-in-law. And I’m also very lucky to be on the board
of Bend the Arc, which Rabbi Goldstein just mentioned. That raises both a
comment and a question: Bend the Arc is organizing Jewish people all over the
country to refight the Voting Rights Act, which was destroyed by the Supreme
Court. And it reminds us that some things haven’t changed in fifty years.
Although we have a lot of wonderful people fighting—still fighting for Civil Rights
in the Jewish community, we also have a piece of the Jewish community that are
not very interested, and in fact are hostile to what we’re doing. And so, I
wondered how the rabbis handled opposition in your own communities and
congregations when you came back from St. Augustine.
RL: You know, the—part of the issue, and I think my colleagues discussed how they
had handled that opposition fifty years ago; there’s still opposition. And our
experience that one needs, as rabbis, to base one’s call to social justice firmly in
Jewish tradition. One needs to integrate it with the holiday, with the weekly Torah VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 43
portion, with rituals, to indicate that this is not—as Gene Litman charged his
congregation in 1963—“politics.” This is, as Jerry had mentioned, an extension of
what we are to do as Jews, and what Christians are to do as Christians.
HS: And Buddhists as Buddhists.
RL: Correct. One gets wounded. We have all been subject of some of my colleagues’
attempts to remove them, board votes that were very close; and that goes with
the territory. And I think that one can’t embark upon any cause that is worthwhile
and is controversial, without figuring out what you will do when people criticize
you. Or when they don’t want to talk to you. It’s important to build allies, to have
allies, to have friends. It’s important to pray. It’s important to sing. But it’s also
important to know that if everybody was with us, there wouldn’t be an issue!
[Laughter] And that wouldn’t be any fun!
A8: Hi, Moses Silverman, St. Augustine Jewish Historical Society. So, you were
talking about changes in St. Augustine. In the past year since we started, you
know, working together to put this program together, we really have to thank
Flagler College. They had an amazing Civil Rights program this year. We got to
meet people like Andrew Young, Leonard Pitts; we got to meet C.T. Vivian, J.T.
Johnson; working with AME church, we’ve got to thank Ron Rawls. We actually
walked with him for the Martin Luther King march on Martin Luther King Day,
without fear of being hit or killed or anything. So, St. Augustine has changed. And
we also have to thank the 450 committee, because they also put on the First
American Lecture series, which was all about the history of Civil Rights in St.
Augustine. And they have that wonderful program at the V.I.C., which I think VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 44
you’ll see tomorrow, and your letters in the museum there. And one last little
message for you: when we met Andrew Young, Rabbi Dresner, and we talked to
him after he spoke with Mike Butler from Flagler College, we told him about our
event, and he says, “That Dresner guy.” He goes, “Every time I talk to him, every
time I see him, he has to always remind me: ‘Andy, I was arrested before you
were.’” [Laughter][Applause]
PO: Okay, it’s fitting now that we’ll bring Carol back to the podium for some
announcements. Carol.
CR: Thank you, Dr. Ortiz. This was wonderful! I thought Dr. Ortiz was going to get to
say a lot more! But he shakes a good head, doesn’t he? And I want to thank him.
[Applause]
CR: All right. Some people talk about thanking all their sponsors in a certain order.
I’ve never done this before, and I decided yesterday when I was making up the
list that I was going to do it sort of in chronological order. So, the chronological
order was, back in August, Sandra Parks helped me write my first grant. We did
a mini-grant to Florida Humanities Council, and we got that grant. The Stetson
Kennedy Foundation with Sandra Parks, and she knew how to do it, and she
helped me. Flagler College has been a supporter of St. Augustine Jewish’s
struggle since our inception three years ago. For this event, they have been more
than generous. Thanks to Dr. Hebert, who I’ve never met. We almost met him,
because we were supposed to have this event in the Solarium. But, it turns out
he’s got an event in the Solarium tonight. So, okay. Anyway. Stephanie Snyder,
who worked with us from Flagler College, worked tirelessly, including going and VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 45 getting some forms, okay? So that we could hand something out tonight. We had many changes. And Stephanie, are you still here? I don’t think so. I think she had to go clean up. She had two other events tonight. She deserves a lot of credit. St.
Paul AME Church is next. They’ve pointed out Reverend Rawls. He’s already standing. From the onset—[Applause]—from the onset, Pastor Rawls has been assisting and contributing to the Justice, Justice Committee in so many capacities. He’s a true friend of St. Augustine Jewish Historical and the Justice
Committee. Thank you. The illumination, lighting and grip, and Joe Smith, I can’t say enough. Did the video. And by the way, he is doing—he’s working on his own documentary for the civil rights in St. Augustine. So, I don’t know when that’s going to happen, but I’m sure that you all will see a beautiful product that he’s going to produce. The University of Florida, Samuel Proctor Oral History
Program, Dr. Paul Ortiz, and Deborah Hendrix—there she is, she’s standing!
She’s standing up—okay, Deborah. [Applause] They’ve been committed to our project since August. And Rain Dance—where’d you go? There you are. You’re sitting down. You want to stand a moment? Okay, we have Nathan Lang here.
Rain Dance Productions. [Applause] Nathan hopes to make a spectacular educational document of the story behind the letter of “Why We Went Here.” He has already prepared a little bit of documentary work. He’s already had videos with Al Vorspan, who was not able to be with the other. He’s the only one who was not a rabbi. And he has had a chance to do an oral history with Rabbi
Borowitz. And maybe tomorrow—I’m not sure if this is going to be at noon, or, twelve-thirty lunch or six-thirty. I think six-thirty. If you come to St. Paul AME VIDS 124; Justice Justice 1964; Page 46
Church, which is going to be our finale event. So, tomorrow, we have a lunch at
twelve-thirty—that’s sold out, I’m sorry to say. If you don’t have tickets, I’m sorry.
At four o’clock, we’re going to be at the St. Augustine Visitors’ Information
Center. At four o’clock, these rabbis will be reading the letter that is written. What
you see here. And it will be followed by a news conference, okay? And that
brings me to the 450th of St. Augustine. Dana St. Clair, who is not here tonight,
but he will be at lunch tomorrow, and he will be there, I’m sure, at four o’clock
tomorrow, and his team, opened up doors for us that we couldn’t have dreamed
of, including the following: Old Town Trolley, who’s driving the rabbis around; The
St. Augustine Visitors’ Center, who is just making all this possible for us
tomorrow at four o’clock. And a very special thanks to Corey Talbot, who’s in that
office, who I believe I will owe her for the balance of my life. Then, and only last
because that was the chronological order, Rabbi Fred Raskind, I just want to say,
that, on behalf of Temple Bet Yam, he asked that I express his disappointment in
not being able to welcome all of you here. But, his congregants have made up for
his absence. Would the volunteers from Temple Bet Yam please stand?
[Applause] Thank you, and I hope we’ll see you all at events tomorrow.
[Applause]
[End of recording]
Transcribed by: Ryan Morini, June 12, 2015
Audit-edited by: Samantha Crisanti January 16, 2019
Final edit by: Ryan Morini, March 3, 2019