Category: Civil Rights
The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute Celebrates 30 Years
For decades, the BCRI has educated everyone from local students to global leaders about Birmingham’s role in the Civil Rights movement. Read more.
Martin Luther King’s 1963 Birmingham arrest spurred a Supreme Court case. The ruling still matters.
The case is Walker v. City of Birmingham, which ruled on the legal principles that allowed Bull Conner and Birmingham to jail Martin Luther King Jr. on Good Friday, 1963. Harvard law professor Randall Kennedy explains why the case continues to influence legal thinking during these tumultuous times. Read more.
A New Mural, Shop at Birmingham’s Airport Pays Tribute to U.S. Civil Rights Trail
City and state leaders hope the mural gives visitors to Birmingham’s airport a memorable introduction to the city’s history within the civil rights movement. Read more.
The Historic A.G. Gaston Motel Comes Back to Life With a Coffee Shop and Exhibit
The motel opened in 1954 and became one of the city’s main Black establishments. The motel served as a first-class lodging, entertainment and dining hall for traveling Black people who came to Jim Crow Birmingham. Read more.
Sewell, Alabama’s Lone Congressional Democrat, Seeks to Strengthen Voting Rights, Defeat Party Infighting
Rep. Terri Sewell, D-Birmingham, the lone Democrat in Alabama’s seven-member congressional delegation, is seeking to grow the party with a two-pronged approach — countering Republican-backed voting restrictions while raising money to protect Democratic incumbents against challenges from the left.
First elected in 2011, Sewell has for four successive congresses introduced legislation to restore much of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, legislation that mandated federal oversight of election laws in areas with a history of racial discrimination. That historic legislation was largely struck down by the Supreme Court in 2013. The court’s ruling that the law’s requirements were outdated led to state legislatures issuing a ream of voting restrictions in the wake of that decision.
This year, Sewell again introduced the bill, House Resolution 4, newly named the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act in honor of the Alabama-born Georgia congressman and civil rights icon who died last year.
Read more.
Alabama’s COVID-19 Rate Grows, Hospitalizations Increase
Alabama’s COVID-19 case count continued to rise Friday as the state Department of Public Health reported 1,733 new cases.
There have been 567,243 cases in the state over the course of the pandemic, with an average of 1,238 new cases a day over the past week. The seven-day moving figure had dropped to 121 on July 6 but has steadily risen since then.
ADPH said the number of people hospitalized for the coronavirus reached 727 Friday, more than triple the total of 204 at the beginning of the month.
Read more.
‘Buses Are a Comin’: Remembering the Freedom Riders 60 Years Later
A group of young civil rights activists began their journey to the South to challenge segregation on interstate buses in May 1961. The riders were taunted and beaten by white mobs – and jailed. Participants of the movement share what their fight means now. Read more.
Calls Continue Urging President Biden to Honor ‘Drum Major for Justice,’ Fred Gray Sr.
Even during a pandemic, you can find 90-year-old Fred Gray Sr. at his law office in Tuskegee. He’s been fully vaccinated against COVID-19.
“He’s still working every day,” Fred Gray Jr. said. “It is not because he has to, but it’s because it’s that fire in his belly and it’s because he still wants to help people.”
Gray Jr. and his dad are partners in their law firm. Gray Jr. said his dad just won’t slow down. In fact he’s currently working on behalf of the Macon County Commission to remove a confederate monument in the heart of downtown Tuskegee.
Gray Jr. said his dad’s drive and tenacity are only part of the reason he should be awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
“His IQ and his work is right up there with men like Thurgood Marshall, Oliver Hill and Wiley Branton,” he said. Read more.
