The Fight to Maintain the Political, Ideological, and Moral Integrity of the International BDS Movement and Its Support of the Human and Civil Rights of the Palestinian People vs. the Nefarious Legislative campaign by the GOP in Congress To Thwart and Defeat the Movement

https://truthout.org/…/republicans-are-using-shameless-tac…/

Op-Ed
Politics & Elections

Republicans Are Using Shameless Tactics to Split Democrats Over BDS
by Brant Rosen
January 31, 2019
Truthout

PHOTO: A provision added to the new Senate bill by Sen. Marco Rubio seeks to stifle support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel. Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

With the Senate’s imminent passage of the grandiosely titled Strengthening America’s Security in the Middle East Act of 2019, it’s now official: Israel/Palestine will be a major political wedge issue in the 116th Congress and the 2020 election season. And it’s not going to be pretty.

This new Senate bill is essentially a package of previous bills that appears on the surface to be boilerplate Middle East legislation. But with the addition of a provision by Sen. Marco Rubio that seeks to stifle support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel, this legislation is nothing short of a Republican line drawn in the sand.

BDS — the movement mobilized in response to a Palestinian civil society call for economic activism in support of Palestinian human rights — has long been a flash point for advocacy on the issue of Israel/Palestine. Over the past several years, there have been attempts on a state and federal level to fight BDS on a legislative level. While this new Senate bill does not criminalize BDS outright, it does encourage the passage of state laws that would require government contractors to certify they don’t participate in boycotts. More than two dozen states have passed such legislation in the past four years — laws that clearly violate the First Amendment right of free speech, as the ACLU and myriad other legal experts have pointed out.

In fact, the legality of these laws has already been successfully challenged in court. In Arizona, a US District judge issued an injunction blocking enforcement of its anti-BDS laws. Last December, a lawsuit was filed in federal court on behalf of a speech pathologist in Austin, Texas, after she was told that she could no longer work in the school district for refusing to sign an oath vowing that she “does not” and “will not” engage in a boycott of Israel.
Of course, the patently unconstitutional nature of these laws is immaterial to Senate lawmakers, who know full well that this legislation will have precious little impact on the “strength of America’s security in the Middle East.” Rather, the bill is a clear attempt by Republicans to divide Democrats over the politically fraught issue of Israel/Palestine, with BDS as the ultimate litmus test.

This Senate legislation is also a clear salvo at the new House of Representatives, which now includes the first US politicians to publicly support BDS: Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, a Somali refugee; Rashida Tlaib of Michigan, a Palestinian-American; and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York. Not surprisingly, Omar and Tlaib, both Muslim, have already been cynically singled out by GOP politicians for accusations of anti-Semitism.

Republicans have made no secret of their intention to use divisions over BDS as fodder for their divide-and-conquer tactics. Norm Coleman, the national chairman of the Republican Jewish Coalition and a former senator from Minnesota, openly stated to The New York Times, “I don’t see much hope for changing where Tlaib and Omar are, but there is a battle in the Democratic Party…. It is a message to Jews who still care about Israel, to say, ‘You’ll be much more comfortable in the Republican Party.’”

Republicans have made no secret of their intention to use divisions over BDS as fodder for their divide-and-conquer tactics.

After yesterday’s vote, however, it’s far from certain that the GOP’s strategy will succeed. It’s worth noting that every potential 2020 presidential candidate — Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Sherrod Brown, Kirsten Gillibrand, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders — voted against the bill. Moreover, during Tuesday’s Senate debate, Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland delivered a long and passionate denunciation of the bill. Liberal Zionist organizations, such as J Street and the rabbinical organization T’ruah, have issued statements condemning the legislation on free speech grounds. While these politicians and organizations still use clearly Zionist talking points and take pains to mention that they personally oppose BDS, their refusal to take the Republican bait is noteworthy.

In yet another sign of the increasing divide, a new group calling itself Democratic Majority for Israel has now incorporated in Washington, DC. According to its flashy new website, the group plans to “maintain and strengthen support for Israel among Democratic leaders including presidential and congressional candidates as well as with the grassroots of progressive movements.”

Suspiciously, however, while it proudly touts its “progressive policy agenda,” the new organization declines to identify any particular policy regarding Israel/Palestine. On the contrary, according to its “guiding principles,” Democratic Majority for Israel pointedly avoids any position beyond states “celebrating Israeli democracy and the right of the Israeli people to determine their own future without outside parties imposing solutions.” This new project claims it is separate and independent from AIPAC, the prominent and powerful pro-Israel lobbying group. However, a recent article in the Forward points out that of Democratic Majority for Israel’s “15 board members, 11 have either worked or volunteered for [AIPAC], donated to it or spoken at its events.” Moreover, the group’s president, Mark Mellman, has made it clear that Democratic Majority for Israel is actively trying to build a Democratic wing that will stand “unwaveringly” with Israel:

Most Democrats are strongly pro-Israel and we want to keep it that way. There are a few discordant voices, but we want to make sure that what’s a very small problem doesn’t metastasize into a bigger problem.

It’s not yet clear how many prominent Democrats will be attracted to this new project, but it has already gained the support of Rep. Hakeem Jefferies of New York, the fourth-ranking Democrat and a potential future Speaker of the House. In announcing his fealty to Democratic Majority for Israel, Jefferies praised the “special relationship between the United States and Israel” that is “rooted in shared values, an important strategic partnership in the Middle East, perhaps the world’s toughest neighborhood,” concluding, “I look forward to working with the Democratic Majority for Israel as it advances the unbreakable US-Israel bond into the future.”

It’s fair to view these new political maneuvers as the tactics of a once-formidable Israel advocacy machine that knows its power is on the wane.

How to respond to the new “divide-and-conquer” atmosphere currently sweeping the Democratic party? As ever, it will come down to money versus people power. In the end, it’s fair to view these new political maneuvers as the tactics of a once-formidable Israel advocacy machine that knows its power is on the wane. While it would certainly be foolhardy to underestimate the strength of the Israel lobby, there is a certain air of desperation surrounding these political efforts to stem the growth of the popular movement responding to the Palestinian civil society call for BDS.

It is clear that the growing movement of support for Palestinian human rights is increasingly popular with young people — including young Jews. Additionally, we now have members of Congress showing solidarity with Palestinians, and the first-ever congressional bill advocating for Palestinian human rights will soon be reintroduced. Bottom line: those who defend the oppressive policies of the state of Israel have every reason to be concerned.

It remains to be seen whether Republicans’ new political wedge tactics will succeed in weakening the Democratic Party. At the very least, they will force Democratic leaders to come clean on precisely where they stand on the issue of Israel/Palestine. With the 116th Congress now under way and the 2020 presidential campaign just out of the gate, the stakes could not be higher.

Michelle Alexander On the Liberation of Palestine and the Ongoing Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Grave Necessity Of Speaking Truth to Power in Global Affairs

All,

THANK YOU MICHELLE as usual for your bedrock courage, knowledge, insight, clarity, and compassion, as well as your customary intellectual, moral, ethical, and political honesty and integrity. As always you make me proud to be an active advocate and steadfast supporter and defender of the social, cultural, political, and intellectual traditions and values that you so brilliantly represent and embody. More than ever we all deeply need and desire what you have to offer and provide us.

Love & Struggle,

Kofi

LONG LIVE DR. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. (1929-1968)

https://www.nytimes.com/…/martin-luther-king-palestine-isra…

Opinion

Time to Break the Silence on Palestine

Martin Luther King Jr. courageously spoke out about the Vietnam War. We must do the same when it comes to this grave injustice of our time.

by Michelle Alexander
January 19, 2019
New York Times

“We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak,” the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. declared at Riverside Church in Manhattan in 1967.  Credit: John C. Goodwin

 
On April 4, 1967, exactly one year before his assassination, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stepped up to the lectern at the Riverside Church in Manhattan. The United States had been in active combat in Vietnam for two years and tens of thousands of people had been killed, including some 10,000 American troops. The political establishment — from left to right — backed the war, and more than 400,000 American service members were in Vietnam, their lives on the line.

Many of King’s strongest allies urged him to remain silent about the war or at least to soft-pedal any criticism. They knew that if he told the whole truth about the unjust and disastrous war he would be falsely labeled a Communist, suffer retaliation and severe backlash, alienate supporters and threaten the fragile progress of the civil rights movement.

King rejected all the well-meaning advice and said, “I come to this magnificent house of worship tonight because my conscience leaves me no other choice.” Quoting a statement by the Clergy and Laymen Concerned About Vietnam, he said, “A time comes when silence is betrayal” and added, “that time has come for us in relation to Vietnam.”

It was a lonely, moral stance. And it cost him. But it set an example of what is required of us if we are to honor our deepest values in times of crisis, even when silence would better serve our personal interests or the communities and causes we hold most dear. It’s what I think about when I go over the excuses and rationalizations that have kept me largely silent on one of the great moral challenges of our time: the crisis in Israel-Palestine.

I have not been alone. Until very recently, the entire Congress has remained mostly silent on the human rights nightmare that has unfolded in the occupied territories. Our elected representatives, who operate in a political environment where Israel's political lobby holds well-documented power, have consistently minimized and deflected criticism of the State of Israel, even as it has grown more emboldened in its occupation of Palestinian territory and adopted some practices reminiscent of apartheid in South Africa and Jim Crow segregation in the United States.

Many civil rights activists and organizations have remained silent as well, not because they lack concern or sympathy for the Palestinian people, but because they fear loss of funding from foundations, and false charges of anti-Semitism. They worry, as I once did, that their important social justice work will be compromised or discredited by smear campaigns.

Similarly, many students are fearful of expressing support for Palestinian rights because of the McCarthyite tactics of secret organizations like Canary Mission, which blacklists those who publicly dare to support boycotts against Israel, jeopardizing their employment prospects and future careers.

Reading King’s speech at Riverside more than 50 years later, I am left with little doubt that his teachings and message require us to speak out passionately against the human rights crisis in Israel-Palestine, despite the risks and despite the complexity of the issues. King argued, when speaking of Vietnam, that even “when the issues at hand seem as perplexing as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict,” we must not be mesmerized by uncertainty. “We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak.”

And so, if we are to honor King’s message and not merely the man, we must condemn Israel’s actions: unrelenting violations of international law, continued occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and Gaza, home demolitions and land confiscations. We must cry out at the treatment of Palestinians at checkpoints, the routine searches of their homes and restrictions on their movements, and the severely limited access to decent housing, schools, food, hospitals and water that many of them face.

We must not tolerate Israel’s refusal even to discuss the right of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes, as prescribed by United Nations resolutions, and we ought to question the U.S. government funds that have supported multiple hostilities and thousands of civilian casualties in Gaza, as well as the $38 billion the U.S. government has pledged in military support to Israel.

And finally, we must, with as much courage and conviction as we can muster, speak out against the system of legal discrimination that exists inside Israel, a system complete with, according to Adalah, the Legal Center for Arab Minority Rights in Israel, more than 50 laws that discriminate against Palestinians — such as the new nation-state law that says explicitly that only Jewish Israelis have the right of self-determination in Israel, ignoring the rights of the Arab minority that makes up 21 percent of the population.

Of course, there will be those who say that we can’t know for sure what King would do or think regarding Israel-Palestine today. That is true. The evidence regarding King’s views on Israel is complicated and contradictory.

Although the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee denounced Israel’s actions against Palestinians, King found himself conflicted. Like many black leaders of the time, he recognized European Jewry as a persecuted, oppressed and homeless people striving to build a nation of their own, and he wanted to show solidarity with the Jewish community, which had been a critically important ally in the civil rights movement.

Ultimately, King canceled a pilgrimage to Israel in 1967 after Israel captured the West Bank. During a phone call about the visit with his advisers, he said, “I just think that if I go, the Arab world, and of course Africa and Asia for that matter, would interpret this as endorsing everything that Israel has done, and I do have questions of doubt.”

He continued to support Israel’s right to exist but also said on national television that it would be necessary for Israel to return parts of its conquered territory to achieve true peace and security and to avoid exacerbating the conflict. There was no way King could publicly reconcile his commitment to nonviolence and justice for all people, everywhere, with what had transpired after the 1967 war.

Today, we can only speculate about where King would stand. Yet I find myself in agreement with the historian Robin D.G. Kelley, who concluded that, if King had the opportunity to study the current situation in the same way he had studied Vietnam, “his unequivocal opposition to violence, colonialism, racism and militarism would have made him an incisive critic of Israel’s current policies.”

Indeed, King’s views may have evolved alongside many other spiritually grounded thinkers, like Rabbi Brian Walt, who has spoken publicly about the reasons that he abandoned his faith in what he viewed as political Zionism. To him, he recently explained to me, liberal Zionism meant that he believed in the creation of a Jewish state that would be a desperately needed safe haven and cultural center for Jewish people around the world, "a state that would reflect as well as honor the highest ideals of the Jewish tradition.” He said he grew up in South Africa in a family that shared those views and identified as a liberal Zionist, until his experiences in the occupied territories forever changed him.

During more than 20 visits to the West Bank and Gaza, he saw horrific human rights abuses, including Palestinian homes being bulldozed while people cried — children's toys strewn over one demolished site — and saw Palestinian lands being confiscated to make way for new illegal settlements subsidized by the Israeli government. He was forced to reckon with the reality that these demolitions, settlements and acts of violent dispossession were not rogue moves, but fully supported and enabled by the Israeli military. For him, the turning point was witnessing legalized discrimination against Palestinians — including streets for Jews only — which, he said, was worse in some ways than what he had witnessed as a boy in South Africa.

Not so long ago, it was fairly rare to hear this perspective. That is no longer the case.

Jewish Voice for Peace, for example, aims to educate the American public about “the forced displacement of approximately 750,000 Palestinians that began with Israel’s establishment and that continues to this day.” Growing numbers of people of all faiths and backgrounds have spoken out with more boldness and courage. American organizations such as If Not Now support young American Jews as they struggle to break the deadly silence that still exists among too many people regarding the occupation, and hundreds of secular and faith-based groups have joined the U.S. Campaign for Palestinian Rights.

In view of these developments, it seems the days when critiques of Zionism and the actions of the State of Israel can be written off as anti-Semitism are coming to an end. There seems to be increased understanding that criticism of the policies and practices of the Israeli government is not, in itself, anti-Semitic.

This is not to say that anti-Semitism is not real. Neo-Nazism is resurging in Germany within a growing anti-immigrant movement. Anti-Semitic incidents in the United States rose 57 percent in 2017, and many of us are still mourning what is believed to be the deadliest attack on Jewish people in American history. We must be mindful in this climate that, while criticism of Israel is not inherently anti-Semitic, it can slide there.

Fortunately, people like the Rev. Dr. William J. Barber II are leading by example, pledging allegiance to the fight against anti-Semitism while also demonstrating unwavering solidarity with the Palestinian people struggling to survive under Israeli occupation.

He declared in a riveting speech last year that we cannot talk about justice without addressing the displacement of native peoples, the systemic racism of colonialism and the injustice of government repression. In the same breath he said: “I want to say, as clearly as I know how, that the humanity and the dignity of any person or people cannot in any way diminish the humanity and dignity of another person or another people. To hold fast to the image of God in every person is to insist that the Palestinian child is as precious as the Jewish child.”

Guided by this kind of moral clarity, faith groups are taking action. In 2016, the pension board of the United Methodist Church excluded from its multibillion-dollar pension fund Israeli banks whose loans for settlement construction violate international law. Similarly, the United Church of Christ the year before passed a resolution calling for divestments and boycotts of companies that profit from Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

Even in Congress, change is on the horizon. For the first time, two sitting members, Representatives Ilhan Omar, Democrat of Minnesota, and Rashida Tlaib, Democrat of Michigan, publicly support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. In 2017, Representative Betty McCollum, Democrat of Minnesota, introduced a resolution to ensure that no U.S. military aid went to support Israel’s juvenile military detention system. Israel regularly prosecutes Palestinian children detainees in the occupied territories in military court.

PHOTO: Relatives of a Palestinian nurse, Razan al-Najjar, 21, mourning in June after she was shot dead in Gaza by Israeli soldiers.CreditHosam Salem for The New York Times

None of this is to say that the tide has turned entirely or that retaliation has ceased against those who express strong support for Palestinian rights. To the contrary, just as King received fierce, overwhelming criticism for his speech condemning the Vietnam War — 168 major newspapers, including The Times, denounced the address the following day — those who speak publicly in support of the liberation of the Palestinian people still risk condemnation and backlash.

Bahia Amawi, an American speech pathologist of Palestinian descent, was recently terminated for refusing to sign a contract that contains an anti-boycott pledge stating that she does not, and will not, participate in boycotting the State of Israel. In November, Marc Lamont Hill was fired from CNN for giving a speech in support of Palestinian rights that was grossly misinterpreted as expressing support for violence. Canary Mission continues to pose a serious threat to student activists.

And just over a week ago, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute in Alabama, apparently under pressure mainly from segments of the Jewish community and others, rescinded an honor it bestowed upon the civil rights icon Angela Davis, who has been a vocal critic of Israel’s treatment of Palestinians and supports B.D.S.

But that attack backfired. Within 48 hours, academics and activists had mobilized in response. The mayor of Birmingham, Randall Woodfin, as well as the Birmingham School Board and the City Council, expressed outrage at the institute’s decision. The council unanimously passed a resolution in Davis’ honor, and an alternative event is being organized to celebrate her decades-long commitment to liberation for all.

I cannot say for certain that King would applaud Birmingham for its zealous defense of Angela Davis’s solidarity with Palestinian people. But I do. In this new year, I aim to speak with greater courage and conviction about injustices beyond our borders, particularly those that are funded by our government, and stand in solidarity with struggles for democracy and freedom. My conscience leaves me no other choice.

PHOTO: The Said al-Mis'hal cultural center in Gaza was hit by an Israeli airstrike in August.CreditKhalil Hamra/Associated Press

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Michelle Alexander became a New York Times columnist in 2018. She is a civil rights lawyer and advocate, legal scholar and author of “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness.” 

A version of this article appears in print on Jan. 19, 2019, on Page SR1 of the New York edition with the headline: Time to Break the Silence on Palestine. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper

PHOTO: “We must speak with all the humility that is appropriate to our limited vision, but we must speak,” the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. declared at Riverside Church in Manhattan in 1967.CreditCreditJohn C. Goodwin

The international BDS movement and the egregious political censorship of Angela Davis: Its ominous causes and consequences

All,

This utterly absurd and egregiously dishonest and perverse series of absolutely false statements about exactly who Angela Davis is and what she stands for--and has always stood for in her public political life--regarding the Israeli state vis-a-vis the Palestinian people both within Israel specifically and in the Gaza and West Bank territories generally is a brazenly transparent attempt to brutally censor and bully Ms. Davis into cowed silence on these very important issues regarding human rights in Israel and Palestine and to further pretend that her openly stated positions on these crucial questions are anti-semitic and defames the Israeli people and their general society. This is nothing but an outrageous LIE and has always been a lie on the given historical evidence

NEVER has Ms. Davis taken such a reactionary and oppressive position on Israel and/or the Jewish people generally, and anyone who has paid any attention at all to her actions and statements knows and understands this.  Nor has her open support of the international BDS movement ever advocated, endorsed, supported, or defended anti-semitism, or the defamation of the Jewish people anywhere in the world in any form or context whatsoever.  Thus the ludicrous notion that she should now be denied  a much deserved public recognition of her historically courageous work on behalf of civil and human rights in her native city of Birminham, Alabama is not merely wrong or "misleading" but is absolutely morally and politically indefensible.  The late great Fred Shuttlesworth (1922-2011) one of the finest, most important and most courageous civil rights leaders in the esteemed history of the movement (and an eloquent defender of Davis during his own life and career), must be roiling like  a rotisserie in his grave at this moment. 

To say that that we must all openly protest this ugly miscarriage of justice in the cowardly denial of the civil rights award should at this very late date go without saying.  It is a measure of just how petty, stupid, phony, and manipulative the current corrupt, reactionary and fiercely rightwing forces within Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud party in Israel and their many supporters throughout the world and especially here in the U.S.  have been and continue to be whenever they are confronted with any principled and nonviolent criticism of their politics and policies regarding the Palestinians and their political, economic, social, and cultural status and fate within both Israel and Palestine. 

So as far as Ms. Davis is concerned it is more important and necessary than ever that her personal, intellectual, and political integrity with respect to the BDS movement and the global struggle for the human and civil rights of ALL people generally be strongly defended and protected no matter what.  This massive struggle needless to say includes not only a crucial ongoing critique of what is wrong and why but a strong and  unambiguous protection of the specific human and civil rights and independence of both the Palestinian and Israeli people.  Dig?  Stay tuned...

Kofi   

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/08/us/angela-davis-israel-civil-rights-institute.html

Angela Davis Says She’s ‘Stunned’ After Award Is Revoked Over Her Views on Israel
by Niraj Chokshi
January 8, 2019
New York Times

The civil rights activist and scholar Angela Davis speaking at the University of Michigan-Flint in 2015. She is a supporter of the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, which seeks to apply economic pressure to Israel in protest of its treatment of Palestinians. CreditJake May/The Flint Journal, via Associated Press

Angela Davis, the activist and scholar, said this week that she was “stunned” after a civil rights group in her native Birmingham, Ala., reversed its decision to honor her with an award amid protests over her support for a boycott of Israel.

Professor Davis, once a global hero of the left who has since earned renown for her scholarship, had been selected for the human rights award months ago by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, but the group’s board rescinded the honor on Friday.

In announcing the move, the institute did not offer an explanation, saying only that “she unfortunately does not meet all of the criteria on which the award is based.” But Professor Davis said in a statement on Facebook on Monday that she had learned it was because of her “long-term support of justice for Palestine.” The revocation of the award, she added, was “not primarily an attack against me but rather against the very spirit of the indivisibility of justice.”

In a statement expressing dismay at the controversy, Mayor Randall Woodfin of Birmingham said the decision had come amid “protests from our local Jewish community and some of its allies.”

The institute did say in its statement announcing the revocation that it had begun hearing from “concerned individuals and organizations” in late December, around the time the magazine Southern Jewish Life published a piece about the award by its editor, Larry Brook.

In it, he wrote that “for some in the community, there might be some indigestion” at the now-canceled February gala where Professor Davis, who retired from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 2008, was slated to be honored.

Mr. Brook noted that Professor Davis has supported the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement, known as B.D.S., which seeks to apply economic pressure to Israel until it ends the occupation of the West Bank, treats Palestinians equally under the law and allows the return of Palestinian refugees.

Many Israelis and their allies oppose the movement, viewing it as anti-Semitic and an existential threat to the country. Supporters, including Professor Davis, describe it as a necessary response to what amounts to modern-day apartheid.

Professor Davis, who has delivered that message on college campuses and elsewhere, has also joined prominent black celebrities and thinkers in comparing the struggles of Palestinians to those of African-Americans. Among those celebrities is the actor Danny Glover, who received the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s human rights award in 2003.

Israel and its allies have defended against the boycott movement around the world, including in the United States, where polls of young people show support growing for the Palestinian cause.

In recent years, more than a dozen states have passed laws to restrict contractors from boycotting Israel. Some of the laws are being challenged as violations of First Amendment rights.

In his statement, Mayor Woodfin called on the institute and those who opposed its decision to engage in dialogue.

The institute’s reversal provided “an opportunity to engage in conversation about how we work together to resolve our differences constructively and continue to move our community forward,” he said. “I would be pleased to facilitate and participate in any such conversation, now and in the future.”

In her statement, Professor Davis said her activism often involved the linking of movements around the world to those within the United States.

“I support Palestinian political prisoners just as I support current political prisoners in the Basque Country, in Catalunya, in India, and in other parts of the world,” she said. “I have indeed expressed opposition to policies and practices of the state of Israel, as I express similar opposition to U.S. support for the Israeli occupation of Palestine and to other discriminatory U.S. policies.”

Professor Davis became a global progressive leader nearly half a century ago. At the time, she was agitating on behalf of three California inmates accused of murdering a white prison guard when guns she had purchased were used in an attack that was aimed at freeing the inmates but left four people dead, including the assailant.

She was not present during the attack and witnesses testified that the guns were purchased for defense, but Professor Davis nonetheless spent 16 months in jail before an all-white jury acquitted her of all charges. In the interim, “Free Angela” had become a rallying cry.

Since then, she has been recognized for her scholarship and activism around feminism and against mass incarceration. Last year, a Harvard University library acquired her personal archive.

In her statement, Professor Davis said she planned to be in Birmingham next month regardless of the institute’s decision.

“I look forward to being in Birmingham in February for an alternative event organized by those who believe that the movement for civil rights in this moment must include a robust discussion of all of the injustices that surround us,” she said.

Related Coverage:

Boycott Drive Put Israel on a Blacklist. Now Israel Has One of Its Own.
Jan. 7, 2018
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Boycott Drive Put Israel on a Blacklist. Now Israel Has One of Its Own.

A New Home for Angela Davis’s Papers (and Her ‘Wanted’ Poster)
Feb. 13, 2018
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A New Home for Angela Davis’s Papers (and Her ‘Wanted’ Poster)

She Wouldn’t Promise Not to Boycott Israel, So a Texas School District Stopped Paying Her
Dec. 19, 2018
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She Wouldn’t Promise Not to Boycott Israel, So a Texas School District Stopped Paying Her


https://www.al.com/life/2019/01/shuttlesworth-biographer-fred-would-honor-angela-davis.html?fbclid=IwAR1jUYFCjw6Xi_kaB5ijsdgQvoD-q4OiwtyD7WQaI-uC21pN-v38rLy6FRw

Alabama Life and Culture

Shuttlesworth biographer: Fred would honor Angela Davis

The historian who wrote a definitive biography of the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth said the legendary firebrand preacher would have loved the idea of controversial activist Angela Davis receiving the human rights award named in his honor. (2007 photo/AP Dave Martin) (AP/Dave )

 by Greg Garrison | ggarrison@al.com

The historian who wrote a definitive biography of the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth said the legendary firebrand preacher from Birmingham would have loved the idea of controversial activist Angela Davis, another Birmingham native, receiving the human rights award named in his honor.

“I can’t even imagine Fred Shuttlesworth hesitating for a moment to honor Angela Davis this way,” said Andrew Manis, author of “A Fire You Can’t Put Out” and professor of history at Middle Georgia State University in Macon.

“Fred was willing to work with anybody regardless of their politics,” Manis said. “If they were on the side of freedom as soon as possible and equality as soon as possible, he was on board with them.”

The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute voted Jan. 4 to rescind an award to Davis, after Birmingham Jewish leaders objected to her being named recipient of the Fred Shuttlesward Award. The Feb. 16 gala at which she would have received it was canceled. An alternative event will be organized on the same day, and Davis issued a statement saying she plans to attend.

Davis, an author and retired professor, was known for a life of activism that included memberships in the Black Panther Party and the Communist Party USA.

Her activism on behalf of Palestinians, including calling for divestment and boycotts against Israel, was cited by members of Birmingham’s Jewish community as a reason to question the award and the invitation to speak in the city where she grew up.

Manis, who traveled with and researched Shuttlesworth for 12 years, said he’s not aware of Davis and Shuttlesworth speaking together or being on the same program.

“I never saw a letter or saw anything that indicated a close relationship,” Manis said.

“I’m certain she was aware of him and he was no doubt aware of her.”

Davis was born in Birmingham in 1944 and raised in a neighborhood in Smithfield that was bombed so often it was nicknamed “Dynamite Hill.”

Shuttlesworth was born in Birmingham in 1922 and from 1953-61 was pastor of Bethel Baptist Church in Collegeville, which served as a headquarters for Birmingham’s civil rights activism as Shuttlesworth led the fight against legal segregation in the city’s schools, buses and public accommodations. Shuttlesworth’s church and home were bombed by the Ku Klux Klan. In 1963, although Shuttlesworth was then pastor of a church in Cincinnati, he returned to help lead civil rights marches in Birmingham with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

“He was much more willing to relate and work with people who were politically radical, much more than King was, up until the last couple years of his (King’s) life,” Manis said.

The rough-edged Shuttlesworth, who died in 2011 at 89, would likely be riled up about the decision to withdraw the Shuttlesworth Award from Davis, Manis said.

“I think Fred would be cussing,” Manis said. “He often bragged about being a cussing preacher. I think he’d be cussing about this.”

During his time as a pastor in Birmingham, Shuttlesworth was brutally beaten by a mob, sprayed with city fire hoses, and arrested by police 35 times.

The defining moment for Shuttlesworth came during the 1956 Christmas night bombing that shattered the Bethel Baptist Church and crumbled the parsonage next door. He walked out of the rubble almost unscathed, yet he recalled that the mattress he was sleeping on was blown to bits.

The day after the bombing, he and his supporters were back in the front seats of city buses, defying segregation laws. He was arrested for again riding in whites-only seats in 1958. Even his children were arrested in 1960 for violating bus segregation laws.

ANGELA DAVIS

https://www.al.com/…/in-caving-to-pressure-to-cancel-davis-… 

News

In caving to pressure to cancel Davis, BCRI insulted Shuttlesworth, stained its own legacy

The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, during a march against racism in Ohio. (Cleveland Plain Dealer files) (David I. Andersen)

by Roy S. Johnson | rjohnson@al.com

rjohnson@al.com

January 9,  2019

This is an opinion column.

WWFD?

What would Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth do?

Certainly not this.

I didn’t have the great fortune of ever meeting the fiery Birmingham preacher who was one of the most seminal figures in our city’s history, but I simply cannot imagine he would have done this.

Or condoned it.

I can’t fathom the man who challenged African Americans to register and vote, who stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Dr. Martin Luther King to organize and lead the critical Children’s Crusade, who stared down Bull Connor to end legal segregation in Birmingham, would have capitulated.

He would not have bowed to anyone trying to dissuade him from honoring someone who fought the same fight— even if they fought with a different fervor, even if they were decidedly more revolutionary.

As long as they fought.

And yet one of our most venerable cultural institutions, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, did just that—it crumbled, embarrassingly so, to outside pressures and rescinded its invitation to honor a widely esteemed daughter of Birmingham, activist Angela Davis, with the BCRI’s Fred R. Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award at its annual fund-raising gala next month. (The board, which announced its decision in the depths of darkness on Saturday evening, also said it canceled the event entirely.)

Institute cancels decision to honor Davis with Shuttlesworth Award. The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute has canceled its plan to honor civil rights activist Angela Davis with its highest annual honor.

It caved to voices clearly uncomfortable with aspects of Davis’ widely known revolutionary past, which includes membership in the Black Panther and Communist parties and, most recently, support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions Movement (BDS) against Israel. (In Chicago in 2017, Davis, who regularly speaks at events nationwide, said she was in “solidarity with the indigenous people of this region,” referring to Palestinians.)

The loudest voices primarily—though not exclusively—came from the city’s Jewish leadership, and the decision transpired suddenly, and stunningly, in a span of just a few days.

Davis, who grew up in a home on Dynamite Hill,’ was indeed announced as the 2019 award recipient last October; it prompted nary a peep. Months later, though, on December 23rd, Larry Brooks, editor of Southern Jewish Life, based in Birmingham, published an essay titled: “Prominent BDS activist Davis to Receive Civil Rights Institute’s Shuttlesworth Award”.

In part, it read: “Something not included in the Institute's publicity for the event is that Davis has also been an outspoken voice in the boycott-Israel movement, and advocates extensively on college campuses for the isolation of the Jewish state, saying Israel engages in ethnic cleansing and is connected to police violence against African-Americans in the United States.”

“When I wrote it,” Brooks told AL.com on Sunday, “it was more to inform the community that there is a bit more to Angela Davis. I figured there might be some who would not want to attend [the gala] because of certain aspects of her activism.”

That essay may have been the spark that grew into a raging flame. “I figure there were some people who reached out to the Institute to see how it all when down,” Brooks said. “The [Birmingham] Jewish Federation was among those.”

Richard Friedman, the BJF’s executive director who, according to sources, participated in the effort to dissuade the BCRI from honoring Davis, did not return a telephone call or text message seeking comment.

BCRI not new to controversy. On Saturday, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute announced it had rescinded its decision to honor Davis with its highest award and canceled the annual gala at which she would have received it.

Theirs, though, was not the only dissenting voice in the cacophony that quickly swayed the BCRI board.

BCRI board vice chair Walter Body said it “received questions from the African-American community, the Jewish community, and the white community. It was not one just community.” (Body would also not reveal specific names)

Among the voices was General Charles Krulak the retired Marine Commander and former president of Birmingham-Southern College. In an email sent to BCRI board members in January 1, and obtained by Al.com, he expressed “sadness” at Davis’ selection.

His feelings, though—which are somewhat diffused by his charge for members to “simply look at her Wikipedia page”—were largely supported by her Communist party membership (“…she was twice a candidate for Vice President of the United States on the CPUSA ticket,” he wrote), her being placed on the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s “10 most wanted fugitive list” (remember, this was J. Edgar Hoover’s FBI) and a reference to a 1972 case in which Davis was found not guilty of “aggravating kidnapping and first degree murder in the death of Judge Harold Haley,” he wrote.

He added: “… the fact that the guns she owned and were used in the crime was judged insufficient to establish her role in the crime.”

The 16-member board voted late last Friday afternoon during an “emergency” telephone meeting in which it, according to sources, went into executive session—meaning only voting members participated. That excluded two ex-officio board members: respected Birmingham icon Odessa Woolfolk and mayor Randall Woodfin.

AL.com submitted an open-records request for the minutes of that meeting to determine the vote tally and how board members voted. As of this posting, we have not received those minutes.

Board chair Mike Oatridge has not returned an email requesting comment on the decision.

To many, across generations, Davis is a icon whose distinctive Afro and recognizable face still adorn t-shirts and posters recounting the era of black empowerment and self-worth that still inspires—and, yes, scares some.

Not surprisingly, the decision prompted a quick and vitriolic backlash, particularly on social media.

Ahmad Ward

on Sunday

*sigh*...this will be a long post so govern yourselves accordingly.

First of all, let me state that I have and will always have nothing but pure, profound love for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. I became a professional there. Met my wife there. My children spent most of their lives in those hallways. I deposited an crazy amount of blood, sweat and tears there. I have no intention of bashing them in this post. 

Angela Davis is a daughter of Birmingham. Born in the fi...  See More

Dee Reed

on Sunday

Typically—I think it’s important to make informed statements and to not get caught up in the noise that usually emanates around controversy.
However, the cancellation of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s annual gala, where global human rights activist Angela Yvonne Davis was set to receive the Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth Award, lays heavy on my heart. ❤️

Therefore, silence is not an option... See More

Nadia Richardson

on Sunday

Those who know and understand her contributions and legacy will continue to celebrate her everyday  with our life’s work.

The Outcast Voters League, led by President Frank Matthews, will hold a 10:45 a.m. press conference Monday at Kelly Ingram Park to also call for release the minutes of the meeting. He says the group is “willing to protest” the Institute.

BCRI CEO Andrea Taylor did not respond to requests for comment.

Mayor Woodfin expressed “dismay” at the decision in a lengthy statement released on Sunday, saying it “harks backward, rather than forward — that portrays us as the same Birmingham we always have been, rather than the one we want to be.”

In truth, he is livid about the process.

Birmingham mayor reacts to decision to cancel Davis

Birmingham mayor Randall Woodfin says the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's decision to rescind its invitation to honor Birmingham native and long-time, outspoken activist Angela Davis "harks backward'

Indeed, this decision merited better than being hastily made and supported with details of why Davis was deemed suddenly to “not meet all of the criteria on which the award is based.”

It merited an intentional, in-depth dialogue among all factions, all perspectives—one that just might have resulted in a compromise, perhaps a gala preceded by a smart, public and enlightened discussion about all aspects of Davis’ eclectic journey.

A discussion worthy of the Birmingham we should be.

Worthy of BRCI’s legacy as the globally renowned steward of our city’s deep, rich and vital history.

Worthy of Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth.

In its statement, the BCRI board said: “… we believe this decision is consistent with the ideals of the award’s namesake, Rev. Shuttlesworth.”

It isn’t. Not at all.

Don’t just believe me. Here’s someone who knew Rev. Shuttlesworth, knew him well:

“Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth would be embarrassed and bewildered by such an action,” Dr. Horace Huntley, a retired professor of history at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and noted keeper of the city’s past, told AL.com. “In fact, it is no secret of how much Rev. Shuttlesworth abhorred the dictatorial nature of the entrenched and out of touch status quo. He exuded courage and was an antidote to cowardliness. Such an action is less indicative of what the Board knows about Angela Davis and more instructive of what the Board fails to understand about Rev. Shuttlesworth.”

…exuded courage…and antidote to cowardliness.

That’s the Rev. Shuttlesworth those who knew him describe. Not a perfect man, but one who spoke his truth to the powers that conspired against him and the people he loved.

Just as Davis—certainly not a perfect woman—has long spoken her truth to powers on these shores and beyond for almost all of her near 75 years.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Roy S. Johnson’s column appears in The Birmingham News, the Huntsville Times, the Mobile Register and AL.com. Hit me up at rjohnson@al.com. 

Follow me at twitter.com/roysj or on Instagram at instagram.com/roysj/

https://www.npr.org/…/civil-rights-award-rescinded-from-ang…

National

Civil Rights Award Rescinded From Angela Davis After Jewish Community Objections

January 8, 2019

by Sherrel Wheeler Stewart 
NPR

Political activist Angela Davis speaks onstage at the National Museum Of African American History and Culture last year in Washington, D.C.   Mike Coppola/Getty Images

The Fred Shuttlesworth Human Rights Award is supposed to honor the civil rights leader's legacy and raise funds for the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. But after some members in the city's Jewish community objected to giving the award to human rights activist Angela Davis, this year's award presentation is derailed and the community is divided.

In October, the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's board announced it would honor Davis at a February event. Now, it says, the award presentation is canceled because Davis' statements and public record do not "meet all of the criteria on which the award is based." Attempts to get more details from the board regarding its decision have been unsuccessful.

The controversy set off social media responses around the country and a protest outside the Civil Rights Institute, where local activists called for leaders of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute to resign after the organization canceled plans to honor Davis. The Birmingham mayor said he's dismayed by the decision.

Temple University professor and commentator Marc Lamont Hill, who has faced criticism himself over his past comments supporting Palestinians, tweeted in support of Davis.

"This is shameful," he wrote.

Marc Lamont Hill ✔ @marclamonthill

This is shameful. I stand with my dear sister and friend Angela Davis.

BCRI @bhamcivilrights

The associated gala event, scheduled for February 16th at Haven has been cancelled. Ticket purchasers will received a full refund.

The JewishVoiceForPeace tweeted: "To argue that Angela Davis is unworthy of a civil rights award is beyond shameful. And to dance around the fact that it's due to her outspoken support of Palestinian rights makes it outrageous."

JewishVoiceForPeace ✔ @jvplive

To argue that Angela Davis is unworthy of a civil rights award is beyond shameful. And to dance around the fact that it’s due to her outspoken support of Palestinian rights makes it outrageous.

Al Jazeera News ✔ @AJENews

US cultural centre backtracks on honouring activist Angela Davis https://aje.io/d5upc

Part of the board's decision may be tied to a statement and social media post from a prominent Birmingham civic leader and an essay in the magazine Southern Jewish Life.









Retired Gen. Charles Krulak, a former local college president, issued a statement saying he was saddened by Davis' selection and questioned whether she deserved the award. He referred to details from Wikipedia discussing Davis' membership in the Communist Party in the 1980s and her support of Soviet bloc countries in the 1970s. The statement was posted to Facebook by Richard Friedman of the Birmingham Jewish Federation last week, but has since been removed:




A portion of a statement by Charles Krulak posted on Facebook last week.
Courtesy Sherrel Wheeler Stewart 
In the Southern Jewish Life article, author Larry Brook took issue with Davis' stance as an "outspoken voice in the boycott-Israel movement" and her comparing Israel's treatment of Palestinians to police shootings of African-Americans.


American Anthem
Nina Simone's 'Lovely, Precious Dream' For Black Children
Davis responded late Monday, saying she asked for more substantive details on the board's decision and learned that her long-term support of justice for Palestinians was at issue.

"This seemed particularly unfortunate, given that my own freedom was secured — and indeed my life was saved — by a vast international movement," Davis said. "And I have devoted much of my own activism to international solidarity and, specifically, to linking struggles in other parts of the world to U.S. grassroots campaigns against police violence, the prison industrial complex, and racism more broadly."

Davis grew up in a Birmingham community that was known as Dynamite Hill, because the Ku Klux Klan frequently bombed the homes of black lawyers, business owners and leaders who lived there.

The author of 10 books, Davis has lectured throughout the United States and in Europe, Africa, Asia, Australia and South America. Her works address the social problems associated with incarceration, poverty and race. In the early 1970s, she spent 18 months in jail and on trial, after being placed on the FBI's "10 Most Wanted List."

Davis said that receiving the award would have been the highlight of her year because "I knew Rev. Shuttlesworth personally and attended school with his daughter, Patricia, and because my mother, Sallye B. Davis, worked tirelessly for the BCRI during its early years."
Davis still plans to visit Birmingham in February and said she will speak at an alternative event.

On Tuesday, the Birmingham City Council unanimously passed a resolution Tuesday recognizing Davis' life's work.

A passionate Birmingham City Councilor Steven Hoyt said: "It's disheartening. It's embarrassing to judge a person by a segment of their life. We let a few folk decide how we celebrate the black community. We all should be outraged. She's a premier person when it comes to women's rights, race relations. Here she has an opportunity to be honored."

Note: The nine-member council includes three whites and six blacks.
• 
  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Shuttlesworth

Fred Shuttlesworth
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

Fred Shuttlesworth

Frederick Lee "Fred" Shuttlesworth (born Fred Lee Robinson, March 18, 1922 – October 5, 2011[1]) was a U.S. civil rights activist who led the fight against segregation and other forms of racism as a minister in Birmingham, Alabama. He was a co-founder of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, initiated and was instrumental in the 1963 Birmingham Campaign, and continued to work against racism and for alleviation of the problems of the homeless in Cincinnati, Ohio, where he took up a pastorate in 1961.[2] He returned to Birmingham after his retirement in 2007. He helped Martin Luther King Jr. during the civil rights movement.

The Birmingham–Shuttlesworth International Airport was named in his honor in 2008.

Early life

Born in Mount Meigs, Alabama, Shuttlesworth became pastor of the Bethel Baptist Church in Birmingham in 1953 and was Membership Chairman of the Alabama state chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1956, when the State of Alabama formally outlawed it from operating within the state. In May 1956, Shuttlesworth and Ed Gardner established the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights to take up the work formerly done by the NAACP.

The ACMHR raised almost all of its funds from local sources at mass meetings. It used both litigation and direct action to pursue its goals. When the authorities ignored the ACMHR's demand that the City hire black police officers, the organization sued. Similarly, when the United States Supreme Court ruled in December 1956 that bus segregation in Montgomery, Alabama, was unconstitutional, Shuttlesworth announced that the ACMHR would challenge segregation laws in Birmingham on December 26, 1956.

On December 25, 1956, unknown persons tried to kill Shuttlesworth by placing sixteen sticks of dynamite under his bedroom window. Shuttlesworth somehow escaped unhurt even though his house was heavily damaged. A police officer, who also belonged to the Ku Klux Klan, told Shuttlesworth as he came out of his home, "If I were you I'd get out of town as quick as I could". Shuttlesworth told him to tell the Klan that he was not leaving and "I wasn't raised to run."

Southern Christian Leadership Conference

In 1957, Shuttlesworth, along with Martin Luther King Jr., Ralph Abernathy from Montgomery, Joseph Lowery from Mobile, Alabama, T. J. Jemison from Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Charles Kenzie Steele from Tallahassee, Florida, A. L. Davis from New Orleans, Louisiana, Bayard Rustin and Ella Baker founded the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. The SCLC adopted a motto to underscore its commitment to nonviolence: "Not one hair of one head of one person should be harmed."

Shuttlesworth embraced that philosophy, even though his own personality was combative, headstrong and sometimes blunt-spoken to the point that he frequently antagonized his colleagues in the Civil Rights Movement as well as his opponents. He was not shy in asking King to take a more active role in leading the fight against segregation and warning that history would not look kindly on those who gave "flowery speeches" but did not act on them. He alienated some members of his congregation by devoting as much time as he did to the movement at the expense of weddings, funerals, and other ordinary church functions.

As a result, in 1961, Shuttlesworth moved to Cincinnati, Ohio, to take up the pastorage of the Revelation Baptist Church. He remained intensely involved in the Birmingham campaign after moving to Cincinnati, and frequently returned to help lead actions.

Shuttlesworth was apparently personally fearless, even though he was aware of the risks he ran. Other committed activists were scared off or mystified by his willingness to accept the risk of death. Shuttlesworth himself vowed to "kill segregation or be killed by it".[2]
Murder attempts

When Shuttlesworth and his wife Ruby attempted to enroll their children in a previously all-white public school in Birmingham in 1957, a mob of Klansmen attacked them, with the police nowhere to be seen. His assailants included Bobby Frank Cherry, who six years later was involved in the 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing. The mob beat Shuttlesworth with chains and brass knuckles in the street while someone stabbed his wife. Shuttlesworth drove himself and his wife to the hospital where he told his kids to always forgive.

In 1956, Shuttlesworth survived another attempt on his life. A church member standing guard saw a bomb and quickly moved it to the street before it went off.[2]
Freedom Rides

Shuttlesworth participated in the sit-ins against segregated lunch counters in 1960 and took part in the organization and completion of the Freedom Rides in 1961.

RELATED:  [Shuttlesworth pastored Bethel Baptist Church from 1953 to 1961. The church served as headquarters and a frequent meeting place for the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR), which Shuttlesworth founded in 1956. Shuttlesworth and his church endured three bombings, the first on December 25, 1956.]

Shuttlesworth originally warned that Alabama was extremely volatile when he was consulted before the Freedom Rides began. Shuttlesworth noted that he respected the courage of the activists proposing the Rides but that he felt other actions could be taken to accelerate the Civil Rights Movement that would be less dangerous.[3] However, the planners of the Rides were undeterred and decided to continue preparing.

After it became certain that the Freedom Rides were to be carried out, Shuttlesworth worked with the Congress of Racial Equality to organize the Rides[4] and became engaged with ensuring the success of the rides, especially during their stint in Alabama.[5] Shuttlesworth mobilized some of his fellow clergy to assist the rides. After the Riders were badly beaten and nearly killed in Birmingham and Anniston during the Rides, he sent deacons to pick up the Riders from a hospital in Anniston. He himself had been brutalized earlier in the day and had faced down the threat of being thrown out of the hospital by the hospital superintendent.[6] Shuttlesworth took in the Freedom Riders at the Bethel Baptist Church, allowing them to recuperate after the violence that had occurred earlier in the day.[7]

The violence in Anniston and Birmingham almost led to a quick end to the Freedom Rides. However, the actions of supporters like Shuttlesworth gave James Farmer, the leader of C.O.R.E., which had originally organized the Freedom Rides, and other activists the courage to press forward.[8] After the violence that occurred in Alabama but before the Freedom Riders could move on, Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy gave Shuttlesworth his personal phone number in case the Freedom Riders needed federal support.[9]

When Shuttlesworth prepared the Riders to leave Birmingham and they reached the Greyhound Terminal, the Riders found themselves stranded as no bus driver was willing to drive the controversial group into Mississippi.[9] Shuttlesworth stuck with the Riders[10] and called Kennedy.[9] Prompted by Shuttlesworth, Kennedy tried to find a replacement bus driver; his efforts eventually proved unsuccessful. The Riders then decided to take a plane to New Orleans (where they had planned on finishing the Rides) and were assisted by Shuttlesworth in getting to the airport and onto the plane.[11]

Shuttlesworth's commitment to the Freedom Rides was highlighted by Diane Nash, a student activist in the Nashville Student Movement and a major organizer of the later waves of Rides. Nash noted,

 "Fred was practically a legend. I think it was important – for me, definitely, and for a city of people who were carrying on a movement – for there to be somebody that really represented strength, and that's certainly what Fred did. He would not back down, and you could count on it. He would not sell out, [and] you could count on that."[2]

The students involved in the Rides appreciated Shuttlesworth's commitment to the principles of the Freedom Rides – ending the segregationist laws of the Jim Crow South. Shuttlesworth's fervent passion for equality made him a role model to many of the Riders.[2]
Project C

Shuttlesworth invited SCLC and King to come to Birmingham in 1963 to lead the campaign to desegregate it through mass demonstrations–what Shuttlesworth called "Project C", the "C" standing for "confrontation". While Shuttlesworth was willing to negotiate with political and business leaders for peaceful abandonment of segregation, he believed, with good reason, that they would not take any steps that they were not forced to take. He suspected their promises could not be trusted until they acted on them.

One of the 1963 demonstrations he led resulted in Shuttlesworth's being convicted of parading without a permit from the City Commission. On appeals the case reached the US Supreme Court. In its 1969 decision of Shuttlesworth v. Birmingham, the Supreme Court reversed Shuttlesworth's conviction, determining that circumstances indicated that the parade permit was denied not to control traffic, as the state contended, but to censor ideas.

In 1963, Shuttlesworth was set on provoking a crisis that would force the authorities and business leaders to recalculate the cost of segregation. This occurred when James Bevel, SCLC's Director of Direct Action and Director of Nonviolent Education, initiated and organized the young students of the city to stand up for their rights.[12] This plan was helped immeasurably by Eugene "Bull" Connor, the Commissioner of Public Safety and the most powerful public official in Birmingham, who used Klan groups to heighten violence against blacks in the city. Even as the business class was beginning to see the end of segregation, Connor was determined to maintain it. While Connor's direct police tactics intimidated black citizens of Birmingham, they also created a split between Connor and the business leaders. They resented both the damage Connor was doing to Birmingham's image around the world and his high-handed attitude toward them.

Similarly, while Connor may have benefited politically in the short run from Shuttlesworth's and Bevel's determined provocations, they also fit into Shuttleworth's long-term plans. The televised images of Connor's directing handlers of police dogs to attack young unarmed demonstrators and firefighters' using hoses to knock down children had a profound effect on American citizens' view of the civil rights struggle, and helped lead to the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

Shuttlesworth's activities were not limited to Birmingham. In 1964, he traveled to St. Augustine, Florida (which he often cited as the place where the civil rights struggle met with the most violent resistance), taking part in marches and widely publicized beach wade-ins.

In 1965, he was active in the Selma Voting Rights Movement, and its march from Selma to Montgomery which led to the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Shuttlesworth thus played a role in the efforts that led to the passage of the two great legislative accomplishments of the Civil Rights Movement. In later years he took part in commemorative activities in Selma at the time of the anniversary of the famous march. And he returned to St. Augustine in 2004 to take part in a celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the St. Augustine movement there.[2][13]

1966–2006: After the Voting Rights Act

Shuttlesworth organized the Greater New Light Baptist Church in 1966.

In 1978, Shuttlesworth was portrayed by Roger Robinson in the television miniseries King.

Shuttlesworth founded the "Shuttlesworth Housing Foundation" in 1988 to assist families who might otherwise be unable to buy their own homes.

In 1998, Shuttlesworth became an early signer and supporter of the Birmingham Pledge, a grassroots community commitment to combating racism and prejudice. It has since then been used for programs in all fifty states and in more than twenty countries.[14]

On January 8, 2001, he was presented with the Presidential Citizens Medal by President Bill Clinton. Named president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in August 2004, he resigned later in the year, complaining that "deceit, mistrust and a lack of spiritual discipline and truth have eaten at the core of this once-hallowed organization".

In 2004, Shuttlesworth received the Award for Greatest Public Service Benefiting the Disadvantaged, an award given out annually by Jefferson Awards.[15]

During the 2004 election that overturned a city charter provision that prohibited Cincinnati's City Council from adopting any gay rights ordinance,[16] Shuttlesworth voiced advertisements urging voters to reject the repeal, saying "The thing that I disagree with is when gay people ... equate civil rights, what we did in the '50s and '60s, with special rights ... I think what they propose is special rights. Sexual rights is not the same as civil rights and human rights."[17]
Family

Although he was born Freddie Lee Robinson, Shuttlesworth took the name of his stepfather, William N. Shuttlesworth.[18]

Shuttlesworth was married to Ruby Keeler Shuttlesworth, with whom he had four children: Patricia Shuttlesworth Massengill, Ruby Shuttlesworth Bester, Fred L. Shuttlesworth Jr., and Carolyn Shuttlesworth. The Shuttleworths divorced in 1970, and Ruby died the following year.[19]

Shuttlesworth married Sephira Bailey in 2007.[19]
After retirement

Prompted by the removal of a non-cancerous brain tumor in August of the previous year, he gave his final sermon in front of 300 people at the Greater New Light Baptist Church on March 19, 2006—the weekend of his 84th birthday. He and his second wife, Sephira, moved to downtown Birmingham where he was receiving medical treatment.

On July 16, 2008, the Birmingham, Alabama, Airport Authority approved changing the name of the Birmingham's airport in honor of Shuttlesworth. On October 27, 2008, the airport was officially changed to Birmingham–Shuttlesworth International Airport.

On October 5, 2011, Shuttlesworth died at the age of 89 in his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama. The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute announced that it intends to include Shuttlesworth's burial site on the Civil Rights History Trail.[20][21] By order of Alabama governor Robert Bentley, flags on state government buildings were to be lowered to half-staff until Shuttlesworth's interment.[22]

He is buried in the Oak Hill Cemetery in Birmingham.[23]
See also

    flagAlabama portal Biography portal iconAfrican American portal

    List of civil rights leaders
    Timeline of the American Civil Rights Movement

References

Houck, Davis W.; Dixon, David E., eds. (2006). Rhetoric, Religion and the Civil Rights Movement 1954-1965. Waco: Baylor University Press. p. 250. ISBN 1932792546. Retrieved 2015-01-18.
Manis, Andrew M (1999). A Fire You Can't Put Out: The Civil Rights Life of Birmingham's Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth. Tuscaloosa, Alabama: University of Alabama Press. ISBN 0-8173-0968-3.
Arsenault, Raymond (2006). Freedom riders: 1961 and the struggle for racial justice. Oxford UP. p. 106. ISBN 978-0-19-513674-6.
African American Registry. "Fred Shuttlesworth, Minister and Leader!" "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2011-03-23. Retrieved 2011-04-07..
Manis, Andrew M. (Summer–Fall 2000) "Birmingham's Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth: unsung hero of the civil rights movement." Baptist History and Heritage, http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0NXG/is_3_35/ai_94160959/?tag=content;col1.
Arsenault, Raymond (2006). Freedom riders: 1961 and the struggle for racial justice. Oxford UP. p. 148. ISBN 978-0-19-513674-6.
Arsenault, Raymond (2006). Freedom riders: 1961 and the struggle for racial justice. Oxford UP. pp. 159–62. ISBN 978-0-19-513674-6.
Arsenault, Raymond (2006). Freedom riders: 1961 and the struggle for racial justice. Oxford UP. pp. 166–9. ISBN 978-0-19-513674-6.
Arsenault, Raymond (2006). Freedom riders: 1961 and the struggle for racial justice. Oxford UP. pp. 170–1. ISBN 978-0-19-513674-6.
The Birmingham News (February 26, 2006). "The Road to Change." "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2010-12-27. Retrieved 2011-04-08..
Arsenault, Raymond (2006). Freedom riders: 1961 and the struggle for racial justice. Oxford UP. p. 172. ISBN 978-0-19-513674-6.
"James L. Bevel The Strategist of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement" by Randy Kryn, a paper in David Garrow's 1989 book We Shall Overcome, Volume II, Carlson Publishing Company
McWhorter, Diane (2001). Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama, the Climactic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-1772-1.
"Birmingham Pledge". Encyclopedia of Alabama. 2011-05-12. Retrieved 2011-10-06.
"O'Connor wins top honor at Jefferson Awards fete". AP. June 24, 2004.
Aldridge, Kevin (November 3, 2004). "City voters repeal amendment on gay rights". The Cincinnati Enquirer.
Johnston, John; Alltucker, Ken (October 17, 2004). "Coming to terms with gay issues: Region leans toward tolerance, not acceptance". The Cincinnati Enquirer.
Thornton, J. Mills, III (2002). Dividing Lines: Municipal Politics and the Struggle for Civil Rights in Montgomery, Birmingham, and Selma. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press. p. 189. ISBN 081731170X. Retrieved 2015-01-18.
Schudel, Matt (October 6, 2011). "Fred L. Shuttlesworth, courageous civil rights fighter, dies at 89". The Washington Post. Retrieved 2011-10-10.
Gates, Verna (October 5, 2011). "Birmingham civil rights leader Fred Shuttlesworth dies". Reuters. Retrieved 2011-10-06.
Washington, Dennis. "Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth passes away". MyFoxAL.com. Retrieved 2011-10-06.
Stewart, Sherrel. "Alabama Gov. Robert Bentley orders flags on state buildings at half staff for Rev. Shuttlesworth". al.com. Retrieved 2011-10-06.

    Garrison, Greg (October 24, 2011). "Shuttlesworth buried at Birmingham's Oak Hill after final tributes". AL.com.

Bibliography

    Andrew Manis. (1999) A Fire You Can't Put Out: The Civil Rights Life of Birmingham's Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press. ISBN 0-8173-0968-3
    Branch, Taylor (1988) Parting The Waters; America In The King Years 1954–63. New York: Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-671-46097-8
    Manis, Andrew M. (Summer–Fall 2000) "Birmingham's Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth: unsung hero of the civil rights movement".. Baptist History and Heritage. – accessed January 17, 2007
    *McWhorter, Diane (2001). Carry Me Home: Birmingham, Alabama, the Climactic Battle of the Civil Rights Revolution. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-1772-1
    Nunnelley, William (1991). Bull Connor. University of Alabama Press. ISBN 0-585-32316-X
    White, Marjorie Longenecker (1998) A Walk to Freedom: The Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Birmingham: Birmingham Historical Society. ISBN 0-943994-24-1
    White, Marjorie, Manis, Andrew, eds. (2000) Birmingham Revolutionaries: The Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights. Mercer University Press. ISBN 0-86554-709-2
    Curnutte, Mark (January 20, 1997) "In the Name of Civil Rights: The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth carries on a 40-year fight as the movement's 'battlefield general'." Cincinnati Enquirer – accessed January 20, 2007.
    "The Champion" (November 26, 1965) Time Magazine.
    Walton, Val (February 19, 2008) "Rev. Shuttlesworth to return to Birmingham for post-stroke therapy." Birmingham News
    Garrison, Greg (June 29, 2008) "Legacy, history of civil rights icon Fred Shuttlesworth." Birmingham News
    The White House – Office of the Press Secretary

External links

    Fred Shuttlesworth from the Encyclopedia of Alabama
    Fred Shuttleswoth's oral history video excerpts at The National Visionary Leadership Project
    Appearances on C-SPAN
    Fred Shuttleswoth in The Road to Equality roundtable discussion on CETconnect