This Weekly Reflection is written by Cornelius Corps Board member The Rev. Steve Reedy. The video posted below features events surrounding the murder of Jimmie Lee Jackson in February 1965 – 60 years ago this month.
In the early days of 1965, the Civil Rights movement was gaining momentum, especially at the national level. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 had just been signed the previous July, a hard-won victory. The year before that In August 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his iconic “I Have a Dream’ speech at the culmination of the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
As 1965 unfolded, the movement’s strategy of organized non-violent resistance to racial injustice was met by intensified opposition in the Segregation states. James Orange, a civil rights organizer for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference had been arrested in Marion, Alabama under spurious charges. He had been organizing a voter registration drive. Union leader John Sweeney relates a story of the event, where an Alabama State Trooper warned Orange: “…`Sing one more freedom song and you’re under arrest’ ’Five hundred students promptly followed Rev. Orange to jail, singing all the way.”[1]
A large crowd of Orange’s supporters gathered outside of Zion Methodist Church, ready for a night march in support of his release. Unarmed and singing hymns, they were met with violence by Alabama State Troopers who chased and beat the demonstrators. Marcher Jimmy Lee Jackson took his mother and grandfather to shelter in a local cafe, where they were pursued and beaten by troopers. Jackson, protecting his family, was shot by trooper James Fowler and died eight days later.
In his eulogy of Jackson, Dr. King connected the murder of Jackson to a much larger reality: “We must be concerned not merely about who murdered him but about the system, the way of life, the philosophy which produced the murderer.” The atrocity of Jackson’s murder and the injustice of his state-sponsored killer walking free (until 2007) proved a catalyst for the Selma to Montgomery marches. which saw even greater backlash and resistance to the movement for justice.
What are the lessons and patterns of history we can apply to the work of justice today? James Orange was arrested and jailed more than one hundred times for his justice work. Despite his massive 6’3, 300 lb. frame, even as he was beaten, he never violated his commitment to non-violence. James Orange never gave up and never gave in. Rather, he used his booming voice to lead others in songs of freedom, rooted in God’s faithfulness.
In this national hour of backlash and resistance to justice for the marginalized, the witness of James Orange calls us to never give up and never give in. In this hour, the faith community is called to move in the ways of Christ, as Orange embodied.: To sacrifice for justice for others, To sing with others the grass-roots work of non-violent, redemptive justice, To sing together prayers of blessing to those who persecute and curse, To sing hymns together of God’s faithfulness in bringing God’s just peace to the world.
“Lift every voice and sing…Let us march on till victory is won.”[2]
[1] https://apwu.org/news/rev-james-orange-champion-labor-and-human-rights
[2] Verses from the song “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” later known as the Black National Anthem, was written in 1900 by NAACP leader James Weldon Johnson.