May 1961, 13 people boarded a bus headed to Washington, D.C. with plans to help desegregate the South by organizing sit-ins in public establishments that abided by Jim Crow laws. It was the first freedom ride orchestrated by Jim Farmer, founder of Congress of Racial Equality.
Now a U.S. Representative
from Georgia, John Lewis was one of the ones who boarded the bus that day. Hank
Thomas, now president of Hospitality Properties Inc. was another participant.
The men recalled their harrowing experiences in a recent interview with the
Defender.
The riders were often met by
angry white mobs who would verbally abused and brutally beat them upon their
arrival, and Lewis and Thomas would be jailed several times in their pursuit of
justice – a quest that almost cost them their lives.
It was in Alabama that the
two recall their first brush with death.
Their bus was firebombed in
Anniston, Ala., something Lewis remembers vividly.
"I really thought I was
going to die, I was just trying to decide which was the best way to die,"
said Lewis, who was a founder and leader of the Student Non-violent Coordinating
Committee. "If I got off the bus I was going to be beaten to death by that
mob, of course it would've been a very painful death, if I stayed on the bus I
was under the mistaken impression that if you breathe in toxic smoke it will
simply put you to sleep and that was the way you would die.
Lewis said after a couple of
seconds of smoke inhalation the natural instincts kicked in and compelled him
"to get air any way you can."
It wasn't until he tried to
get off the bus that he realized the mob was holding the bus doors shut.
"I heard them say ‘burn
them niggers up, burn them up,’" the Georgia Democrat said. "And the
sad irony of this is that a lot of these people had just come from church. They
had their children with them as they were coming to watch what was going to
happen to the freedom riders."
Another memorable attack
occurred in Selma, Ala. on March 7, 1965. It would also make national headlines
and an indelible mark on the country’s Civil Rights Movement.
Only 25 years old, Lewis had
planned to lead a march of 600 civil rights activists from Selma approximately
50 miles to the state capitol of Montgomery. But the marchers only made it to
the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma where a gruesome scene would take place that
would later be called Bloody Sunday.
Police armed with tear gas
and other weapons awaited the marchers at the foot of the bridge.
When they reached the bridge
Lewis said they saw a sea of blue uniforms and were warned they had two minuets
to turn around.
Lewis decided that since they
were already there, and the crowd was too big for them to turn around even if
they wanted to, they should stop and get in the prayer position.
Only that message wouldn't
get far, said Lewis, because the next thing the crowd knew, it was being
attacked.
The Alabama native recalled
being struck with weapons and having tear gas used against them. He and his
crowd were then chased back to a chapel in Selma.
It wasn't until later on that
night Lewis found out he had suffered a skull fracture from the blow he took on
the left side of his head from a trooper’s club. He was admitted to the
hospital for three days where he was visited by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who
reassured him the march would take place.
But out of that and other
bloody encounters before it came voting rights legislation.
Lewis said the images were so
disturbing to people that there were "demonstrations in more than 80
cities protesting the brutality and urging the passage of the voting rights
act. There were speeches on both floors of congress, condemning the attack and
calling for voting rights legislation."
On Aug. 6, 1965, the
legislation was signed by more than 60 Congressman and sent to President Lyndon
Johnson, said Lewis. The Voting Right's Act outlawed discriminatory practices
that would hinder or prevent Blacks or any other people from voting.
Copyright 2011 Chicago
Defender
