Bernard Lafayette Jr. (born July 29, 1940 in
Tampa, FloridaTampa is a Gulf Coast city in Hillsborough County, on the west coast of the state of Florida in the United States. It serves as the county seat for Hillsborough County. The population of Tampa in 2000 was 303,447...
) is a longtime civil rights
activistActivism, in a general sense, can be described as intentional action to bring about social change, political change, economic justice, or environmental wellbeing...
and organizer, who was a leader in the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. His most noteworthy achievement was playing a leading role in early organizing of the
Selma, AlabamaSelma is a city in and the county seat of Dallas County, Alabama, United States, located on the banks of the Alabama River. The population was 20,512 at the 2000 census. The city is best known for the 1965 Selma Voting Rights Movement and its Selma to Montgomery marches, three civil rights...
voting rights campaign.
His parents were Bernard Lafayette Sr. and Verdell Lafayette. Lafayette spent much of his childhood in Tampa, Florida, but also lived in several other places as his father was an itinerant laborer.
Bernard Lafayette Jr. (born July 29, 1940 in
Tampa, FloridaTampa is a Gulf Coast city in Hillsborough County, on the west coast of the state of Florida in the United States. It serves as the county seat for Hillsborough County. The population of Tampa in 2000 was 303,447...
) is a longtime civil rights
activistActivism, in a general sense, can be described as intentional action to bring about social change, political change, economic justice, or environmental wellbeing...
and organizer, who was a leader in the 1960s Civil Rights Movement. His most noteworthy achievement was playing a leading role in early organizing of the
Selma, AlabamaSelma is a city in and the county seat of Dallas County, Alabama, United States, located on the banks of the Alabama River. The population was 20,512 at the 2000 census. The city is best known for the 1965 Selma Voting Rights Movement and its Selma to Montgomery marches, three civil rights...
voting rights campaign.
Early life
His parents were Bernard Lafayette Sr. and Verdell Lafayette. Lafayette spent much of his childhood in Tampa, Florida, but also lived in several other places as his father was an itinerant laborer. His family spent two years in
Philadelphia, PennsylvaniaPhiladelphia is the largest city in Pennsylvania and the sixth-most-populous city in the United States.In 2008, the population of the city proper was estimated to be over 1.4 million, while the metropolitan area's population of 5.8 million made it the country's fifth-largest...
, which gave young Bernard his first exposure to
integrationRacial integration, or simply integration includes desegregation . In addition to desegregation, integration includes goals such as leveling barriers to association, creating equal opportunity regardless of race, and the development of a culture that draws on diverse traditions, rather than merely...
.
Early career
As a young man, Lafayette enrolled in the
American Baptist Theological SeminaryAmerican Baptist College is a small, predominantly African American liberal arts college located in Nashville, Tennessee...
. During this time he took classes in nonviolence at the Highlander Folk School, run by
Myles HortonMyles Horton was an American educator, socialist and cofounder of the Highlander Folk School, famous for its role in the Civil Rights Movement . Horton taught and heavily influenced most of the era's leaders. They included Dr...
. Soon after that he was exposed to the in-depth philosophy of
GandhianGandhism is a collection of inspirations, principles, beliefs and philosophy of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi , who was a major political and spiritual leader of India and the Indian Independence Movement....
nonviolenceNonviolence is a philosophy and strategy for social change that rejects the use of violence. As such, nonviolence is an alternative to passive acceptance of oppression and armed struggle against it...
while taking seminars from activist
James LawsonFor details on the English football player, see James Lawson .For the comic book artist, see Jim Lawson.James Morris Lawson, Jr. , was a leading theoretician and tactician of nonviolence within the American Civil Rights Movement...
. Lafayette went on to co-initiate and participate in the 1960 Lunch Counter Sit-In as a member of the Nashville Student Movement.
Freedom rides
In 1961, the
Congress of Racial EqualityThe Congress of Racial Equality or CORE is a U.S. civil rights organization that played a pivotal role in the Civil Rights Movement from its foundation in 1942 to the mid-1960s...
(CORE) initiated a movement to enforce federal integration laws on interstate bus routes. This movement, known as the
Freedom RidesFreedom Riders were Civil Rights activists who rode on interstate buses into the segregated southern United States to test the United States Supreme Court decision Boynton v. Virginia . The first Freedom Ride left Washington D.C. on May 4, 1961, and was scheduled to arrive in New Orleans on May...
, had
African AmericanAfrican Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa. In the United States, the terms are generally used for Americans with at least partial Sub-Saharan African ancestry...
and white volunteers ride together on bus routes through the segregated south. When a group of Freedom Riders organized by CORE was violently attacked in the city of
Birmingham, AlabamaBirmingham is the largest city in the state of Alabama in the United States. It is the county seat of Jefferson County and includes part of Shelby County. According to a 2007 estimate, the city had a population of 229,800 The Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Area, as of the 2008 census estimates,...
, the Nashville Student Movement, of which Lafayette was a member, vowed to take over the journey. In May 1961, Lafayette and two other riders narrowly escaped being killed by members of the
Ku Klux KlanKu Klux Klan , informally known as The Klan, is the name of several past and present hate group organizations in the United States whose avowed purpose was to protect the rights of and further the interests of white Americans by violence and intimidation. The first such organizations originated in...
when their group was attacked in the city of
Montgomery, AlabamaMontgomery is the capital, second most populous city, and the fourth most populous metropolitan area in the Southern U.S. state of Alabama, and is the county seat of Montgomery County. It is located southeast of the center of the state, in the Gulf Coastal Plain. The city population was 201,568...
.
Selma
In the summer of 1962, Lafayette accepted a position with the
Student Nonviolent Coordinating CommitteeThe Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee ' was one of the principal organizations of the American Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s. It emerged from a series of student meetings led by Ella Baker held at Shaw University in Raleigh, North Carolina in April 1960...
(SNCC), to do organizing work in Selma, Alabama. Upon arriving in the city, he began leading meetings at which he spoke about the condition of African Americans in the South, and encouraged local African Americans to share their experiences. On the night of June 12, 1963 (the same night that
Medgar EversMedgar Wiley Evers was an African American civil rights activist from Mississippi who was murdered by Byron De La Beckwith.- Early life :...
was murdered in
MississippiMississippi is a state located in the Southern United States. Jackson is the state capital and largest city. The state's name comes from the Mississippi River, which flows along its western boundary, and takes its name from the Ojibwe word misi-ziibi . The state is heavily forested outside of the...
), Lafayette was severely beaten by a white assailant. While badly injured, he was not deterred from continuing his work. In late 1964 the board of Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) decided to join the ongoing Alabama Project and chose Selma as the focal point to gain voting rights for African Americans. In early 1965 Lafayette,
James BevelJames L. Bevel was an American minister and leader of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement who, as the Director of Direct Action and Director of Nonviolent Education of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference initiated, strategized, directed, and developed SCLC's three major successes of the era:...
, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,
James OrangeJames Edward Orange[, MLK March website biography. Accessed 2008-02-17.] was a pastor
,
Diane NashDiane Judith Nash as a leader and Chairman of the Nashville Student Movement, a founder of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee , and a major participant in the Southern Christian Leadership Conferences' Birmingham Movement and Selma Voting Rights Movement, was a key force in the 1960s...
and others organized a series of public demonstrations that finally--with the march from Selma-to-Montgomery--put enough pressure on the federal government to take action, and gave enough support to President Lyndon Johnson for Johnson to demand the drafting and passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
Life after Selma
Lafayette went on to work on the 1966 Chicago Open Housing Movement (he had worked in Chicago earlier with Kale Williams and other leaders of the American Friends Service Committee), and later became president of the American Baptist Theological Seminary.
He now holds the post of Senior Fellow at the
University of Rhode IslandThe University of Rhode Island, commonly abbreviated as URI, is the principal public research university in the State of Rhode Island, with its main campus in Kingston area of South Kingston, and three other campuses located throughout the state, including Providence's Feinstein Campus, the...
, where he heads the Center for Nonviolence and Peace Studies. The Center promotes nonviolence education using a curriculum based on the principles and methods of Martin Luther King Jr.
Sources