Picture by Stephanie Ely
This essay is a part of a sequence—we requested 17 Atlantans to inform us how the Civil Rights Act of 1964 has affected their lives in honor of its sixtieth anniversary. Learn all of the articles right here.
In 1963, I took a visit from my dwelling in Fort Lauderdale to go to my brother in Atlanta. Sooner or later, my mother and father stopped for fuel in South Georgia, and I used to be despatched to make use of the lavatory. As I reached to open the restroom door, my mom’s sudden grip on my shoulder grabbed me. He confirmed me an indication above the door telling me that the door was closed to me. The signal reads “For coloreds solely.” I do not bear in mind a lot from my childhood, however I noticed that signal and I did not know what it meant. For the remainder of the journey, I questioned my mother and father about isolation. I am certain that in that dialog, I requested the easy query “Why?” And to that specific query about Jim Crow legal guidelines, my father merely stated, “That appears unhealthy.”
The passage of the Civil Rights Act despatched me on a journey that I nonetheless stroll as we speak. In 1987, I marched with Hosea Williams to consolidate Forsyth County. In 1993, I organized protests towards Cobb County’s anti-gay proposition. By 1994, 30 years in the past, I started to paved the way to totally exonerate Leo Frank, an harmless man who was overwhelmed to dying in Marietta in 1915.
This previous month, I visited the Nationwide Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama. It opened my eyes and jogged my memory of the horrors of slavery. It jogged my memory of the evils of isolation my father had taught me in 1963. It jogs my memory of the excessive proportion of black males in jail for non-violent drug offenses on this nation. And it additionally jogs my memory that over 500 African People have been overwhelmed to dying in Georgia from 1877 to 1950. Simply as I fought for Leo Frank, all of us want to recollect the African People who have been lynched. They need to be acquitted and their names must also be cleared.
Rather a lot has modified in our nation because the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Each evening after we lie right down to sleep, we should always rejoice what our nation has completed within the final 60 years. And each morning after we get up, we should always acknowledge that there are doorways that also should be opened.
Rabbi Steven Lebow Senior Rabbi Emeritus of Temple Cole Emeth.
This text appeared in our June 2024 challenge.
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