I often feel like I was born in the wrong era. Beginning in college, I was fascinated by the history of the civil rights movement, particularly the courage of black church leaders through the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the passion of the student leaders of the Civil Rights Coordinating Committee. non-violent students. Many of these leaders were deeply inspired in their fight for freedom and human dignity by the Bible, from God hearing and responding to the cries of the Israelites in Egypt, to the proclamations of the prophets, to radical teachings and witness of Jesus.
One of the highlights of this pivotal period of activism was the “Freedom Summer of 1964,” which this year celebrates its 60th anniversary. During that historic summer, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. That same summer, civil rights organizations mounted a massive campaign to register black American voters in the state of Mississippi, shining a spotlight on the violent oppression of black suffrage. We also celebrate the 70th anniversary of the Supreme Court’s 1954 ruling against segregation in public schools in Brown v. Board of Education.
But you don’t have to be a civil rights history buff to understand why these milestones are important today: In case you haven’t noticed, we’re currently in the midst of a backlash major violent attack on racial justice, including many of the rights and freedoms that inspired civil rights leaders. These include book bans, attacks on DEI programsthe decision of the Supreme Court end affirmative action programs in higher education and has prevented efforts to transform our justice system and end racialized police violence. These courageous actions undertaken by our predecessors are not only an important milestone to be celebrated with a beautiful speech and a historical plaque; these actions reverberate through time, providing us with inspiration and resilience for the unfinished cause of freedom and justice.
So let’s go back to 1954, a year that brought us dinner shows, transistor radios, the term “rock ‘n’ roll” and the words “under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. That summer, the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. When the ruling was handed down, Southern states quickly declared their intention to defy it through organized actions.massive resistance” which implemented multiple tactics to prevent school integration, in some cases for decades. Many white Christians joined these efforts, and some private Christian schools were established as what historians call “segregation academies,” or schools intended to remove white children from integrated public schools.
Today, we know full well that the fight for equitable education for Black Americans remains what NAACP President and CEO Derrick Johnson described. recently as “an uphill battle”. Two recent examples of this battle include the Supreme Court’s 2023 decision to effectively end affirmative action and ongoing efforts to erase Black history in schools. I have writing about both of these developments with considerable concern as they are part of a predictable backlash that has followed greater awareness and support for racial justice in 2020.
Although overt racial segregation remains illegal in law, the reality of systemic racism means that inequalities – from wealth to employment to housing to the criminal justice system – are woven throughout our society, leading to segregation de facto in many communities. Recent search from Stanford and the University of Southern California shows that racial segregation has increased 64 percent since 1988 in the nation’s 100 largest school districts.
I do not raise these ongoing challenges to minimize the momentous impact of Brown v. Board of Education; the decision revoked the odious “separate but equal” logic of Jim Crow laws, catalyze the mid-century civil rights movement in the decade that followed. But for those of us facing the backlash against racial justice today, we must remember that after Brown, it took a full decade – and a tireless protest movement – before legislation major federal government does not dismantle most of Jim Crow.
I’m talking about Civil Rights Act of 1964, enacted 60 years ago this July, to prohibit discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex and national origin. The Civil Rights Act had major impacts on access to voter registration, federal programs, public accommodations and employment, and laid the foundations for laws that followed, such as the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968.
Although the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was a major legal setback for white supremacy, when we look around us today, we see that racially exclusionary ideologies have found ways to adapt: because that the narrative of racial inferiority – and therefore opposition – to racial equity remained entrenched throughout the process. Across much of American society, these inequalities have persisted and evolved through discriminatory housing policies and the exodus of many white students to the suburbs and private schools, leaving many urban public schools underfunded. and increasingly segregated. Bipartisan support for voting rights has eroded over the past 20 years, particularly after Shelby County v. Holder from the Supreme Court in 2013, which significantly weakened the Voting Rights Act by removing key provisions. Since this decision, we have seen a slew of new barriers and restrictions to voting, often designed to suppress the vote of Black and Brown communities. From our perspective in 2024, the enduring evolution of white supremacy should cause us to think about the efforts that are still needed today to challenge these ideologies – and the potential resistance we might face. We must also take seriously how our Christian faith has been used to justify much of this resistance, including through the alarming resurgence of white Christian nationalism.
Which brings us to “Freedom Summer»: Sixty years ago, in the summer of 1964, a multiracial team of volunteers from across the country traveled to Mississippi to directly challenge the still intact Jim Crow apparatus, court rulings like Brown Nevertheless. During that summer, Black volunteers and residents registered voters and empowered Black students through “freedom schools” that taught Black history and civic and economic empowerment. Resident resistance was intense and in many violent cases: Eighty volunteers were beaten, 37 churches were bombed or burned, and at least seven people were murdered. Violence against Freedom Summer volunteers and black residents of Mississippi increased political pressure on Congress and President Johnson, galvanizing the political pressure behind the subsequent passage of the landmark Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Given the negative impacts on Black history and empowerment today – not to mention efforts to redress through reparations – we must reclaim the spirit and vision behind Freedom Summer. Fortunately, many organizations are answering this call, including the 30-year work of Freedom Schools movement led by the Children’s Defense Fund; events and actions organized by the Freedom to learn coalition (of which Sojourners is a member); and the National Council of Churches Freedom Summerwhich will register voters and educate and empower people for social change, especially ahead of the 2024 elections.
When I think about these three watershed moments—Brown v. Board of Education, the Civil Rights Act, and Freedom Summer—I am struck by the profound role that faith played. Alongside people of conscience and other religious traditions, many members of the civil rights movement engaged in action for many years precisely because of how they understood their Christian faith.
When Jesus preached his first great sermon in Luke 4:16-19, he read the passage from Isaiah 61 which proclaims: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim the release of the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor. It is a proclamation that explains the fundamentally liberating character of God and his promises. Through this proclamation, we can see our own nation’s struggle to defend equal rights for all as the achievement of the liberation that God so clearly desires for all his people. This is what our ancestors saw in the civil rights movement: by seeking equal justice for the descendants of those who were brought here as slaves, we are bringing this world, little by little, closer to the kingdom of God.
How then can we understand the setbacks we have also seen in the decades since, from setbacks to the painfully unfinished work of achieving an equitable and just multiracial society? The answer is both simpler and less satisfying than we would like: the work of bringing about God’s kingdom “on earth as it is in heaven” is not a straight line, and it will not be completed until day of Jesus’ return. But as Paul so well taught the Galatians: “Let us not grow weary in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not give up” (6:9). These milestone anniversaries are inspiring reminders that never tiring of doing good and tirelessly fighting for justice can actually move mountains and change history. Now it’s our turn to keep pushing.
