Ralph Abernathy

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Ralph David Abernathy Sr. (Template:IPAc-en; March 11, 1926 – April 17, 1990) was an American civil rights activist and Baptist minister. He was ordained in the Baptist tradition in 1948. Being the leader of the civil rights movement, he was a close friend and mentor of Martin Luther King Jr. He collaborated with King and E. D. Nixon to create the Montgomery Improvement Association, which led to the Montgomery bus boycott and co-created and was an executive board member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). He became president of the SCLC following the assassination of King in 1968; he led the Poor People's Campaign in Washington, D.C.,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> as well as other marches and demonstrations for disenfranchised Americans. He also served as an advisory committee member of the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE).

In 1971, Abernathy addressed the United Nations, speaking about world peace. He also assisted in brokering a deal between the FBI and American Indian Movement protestors during the Wounded Knee incident of 1973. He retired from his position as president of the SCLC in 1977 and became president emeritus. Later that year, he unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. House of Representatives for the 5th district of Georgia. He later founded the Foundation for Economic Enterprises Development, and he testified before the U.S. Congress in support of extending the Voting Rights Act in 1982.

In 1989, Abernathy wrote And the Walls Came Tumbling Down, a controversial autobiography about his and King's involvement in the civil rights movement. Abernathy eventually became less active in politics and returned to his work as a minister. He died of heart disease on April 17, 1990. His tombstone is engraved with the words "I tried."<ref name="philly" />

Early life, family, and educationEdit

Abernathy, the 10th of William L. and Louivery Valentine Abernathy (Template:Nee Bell)'s 12 children,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> was born on March 11, 1926, on their Template:Convert family farm in Linden, Alabama.<ref name="legacy"/><ref name="SE">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=EB>Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref><ref name="Who's Who">Template:Cite book</ref> Abernathy's father was the first African-American to vote in Marengo County, Alabama, and the first to serve on a grand jury there.<ref name="nb"/> Abernathy attended Linden Academy (a Baptist school founded by the First Mt. Pleasant District Association). At Linden Academy, Abernathy led his first demonstrations to improve the livelihoods of his fellow students.<ref name="nb">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

During World War II, he enlisted in the United States Army advancing in rank becoming platoon sergeant before being discharged.<ref name="legacy"/><ref name="huff">Template:Cite news</ref> Afterwards he enrolled at Alabama State University using the benefits from the G.I. Bill, which he earned with his service.<ref name="rowman3">Template:Cite book</ref> As a sophomore, he was elected president of the student council, and led a successful hunger strike to raise the quality of the food served on the campus.<ref name="rowman3"/> While still a college student, Abernathy announced his call to the ministry, which he had envisioned since he was a small boy growing up in a devout Baptist family. He was ordained a Baptist minister in 1948 and preached his first sermon on Mother's Day (in honor of his recently deceased mother). In 1950 he graduated with a bachelor's degree in mathematics.<ref name=EB/> During the summer of 1950 Abernathy hosted a radio show and became the first black disc jockey on a white radio station in Montgomery, Alabama.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> In the fall, he went to Atlanta University earning a Master of Arts degree in sociology with high honors in 1951.<ref name="rowman3"/><ref name=EB/> While enrolled at Alabama State, Abernathy pledged becoming an initiated brother of Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity.

He began his professional career in 1951, when he was appointed as the dean of men at Alabama State University.<ref name="anb">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Later in the same year, he became the senior pastor of the First Baptist Church, the largest black church in Montgomery; he held the position for ten years.<ref name=EB/><ref name="anb"/><ref name="pbs">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

He married Juanita Odessa Jones of Uniontown, Alabama, on August 31, 1952.<ref name="bio"/><ref name="nps"/> Together they had five children: Ralph David Abernathy Jr., Juandalynn Ralpheda, Donzaleigh Avis, Ralph David Abernathy III, and Kwame Luthuli Abernathy.<ref name="nps">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="rowman2">Template:Cite book</ref> Their first child, Ralph Abernathy Jr., died suddenly on August 18, 1953, less than two days after his birth on August 16, while their other children lived on to adulthood.<ref name="rowman2"/> His grandson, Micah Abernathy, is currently an American football player for the Atlanta Falcons.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In 1954, Abernathy met Martin Luther King Jr., who was at that time becoming a pastor himself at a nearby church.<ref name="bio">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Abernathy mentored King and the two men eventually became close friends.<ref name="bio"/>

Civil rights activismEdit

Montgomery bus boycottEdit

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After the arrest of Rosa Parks on December 1, 1955, for refusing to give up her seat on a bus to a white man, Abernathy, then a member of the Montgomery NAACP, collaborated with King to create the Montgomery Improvement Association, which organized the Montgomery bus boycott.<ref name="legacy"/><ref name=EB /><ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="WP">Template:Cite news</ref> Along with fellow English professor Jo Ann Robinson, they called for and distributed flyers asking the black citizens of Montgomery to stay off the buses.<ref name="leaflet">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The boycott attracted national attention, and a federal court case that ended on December 17, 1956, when the U.S. Supreme Court, in Browder v. Gayle, upheld an earlier District Court decision that the bus segregation was unconstitutional.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> The 381-day transit boycott, challenging the "Jim Crow" segregation laws, had been successful.<ref name="demnow">Template:Cite news</ref> And on December 20, 1956, the boycott came to an end.<ref name="bp">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

After the boycotts, Abernathy's home and church were bombed. His family were barely able to escape their home, but they were unharmed. Abernathy's church, Mt. Olive Church, Bell Street Church, and the home of Robert Graetz were also bombed on that evening, while King, Abernathy, and 58 other black leaders from the south were meeting at the Southern Negro Leaders Conference on Transportation and Nonviolent Integration, in Atlanta.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="nyt"/><ref name="aberpdf">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=EB/>

Southern Christian Leadership Conference and support of Freedom RidersEdit

File:Abernathy Children on front line leading the SELMA TO MONTGOMERY MARCH for the RIGHT TO VOTE.JPG

Abernathy and his wife Juanita Abernathy with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his wife Coretta Scott King. James Reeb and the Abernathy children are shown in the front line, leading the Selma to Montgomery March in 1965.

On January 11, 1957, after a two-day-long meeting, the Southern Leaders Conference on Transportation and Non-violent Integration was founded.<ref name="statement">Template:Cite press release</ref> On February 14, 1957, the conference convened again in New Orleans. During that meeting, they changed the group's name to the Southern Leadership Conference and appointed the following executive board: King, president; Charles Kenzie Steele, vice president; Abernathy, financial secretary-treasurer; T. J. Jemison, secretary; I. M. Augustine, general counsel.<ref name="SCLChistory">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="EA2">Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref> On August 8, 1957, the Southern Leadership Conference held its first convention, in Montgomery.<ref name="threshold">Template:Cite book</ref> They changed the conference's name a final time to the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and decided to start voter registration drives for black people across the south.<ref name="threshold"/><ref name="tns">Template:Cite book</ref>

On May 20, 1961, the Freedom Riders stopped in Montgomery while on their way from Washington, D.C., to New Orleans to protest the still segregated buses across the south.<ref name="crmvetM">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Many of the Freedom Riders were beaten by a white mob once they arrived at the Montgomery bus station, causing several of the riders to be hospitalized.<ref name="crmvetM"/> The following night Abernathy and King set up an event in support of the Freedom Riders, where King would make an address, at Abernathy's church.<ref name="program">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> More than 1,500 people came to the event that night.<ref name="wgbh">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name="unc">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> The church was soon surrounded by a mob of white segregationists who laid siege on the church.<ref name="EA">Template:Cite encyclopedia</ref><ref name="doj">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> King, from inside the church, called the Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, and pleaded for help from the federal government.<ref name="unc"/> There was a group of United States Marshals sent there to protect the event, but they were too few in number to protect the church from the angry mob, who had begun throwing rocks and bricks through the windows of the church.<ref name="usm">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Reinforcements with riot experience, from the Marshals service, were sent in to help defend the perimeter.<ref name="usm"/> By the next morning, the Governor of Alabama, after being called by Kennedy, sent in the Alabama National Guard, and the mob was finally dispersed.<ref name="unc"/> After the success of the Freedom Riders in Montgomery, Birmingham, and Huntsville, Alabama in 1961, King insisted that Abernathy assume the pastorate of the West Hunter Street Baptist Church in Atlanta; Abernathy moved his family from Montgomery becoming the pastor in 1962.<ref name=EB/>

The King/Abernathy partnership spearheaded successful nonviolent movements in Montgomery; Albany, Georgia; Birmingham, Mississippi, Washington D.C., Selma, Alabama; St. Augustine, Florida; Chicago, and Memphis. King and Abernathy journeyed together, often sharing the same hotel rooms, and leisure times with their wives, children, family, and friends. And they were both jailed 17 times together, for their involvement in the movement.<ref name="nyt"/>

During Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassinationEdit

Template:Further On April 3, 1968, at the Mason Temple, Abernathy introduced King before he made his last public address; King said at the beginning of his now famous "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech:

As I listened to Ralph Abernathy and his eloquent and generous introduction and then thought about myself, I wondered who he was talking about. It's always good to have your closest friend and associate to say something good about you, and Ralph Abernathy is the best friend that I have in the world.<ref name="mountaintop">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

The following day, April 4, 1968, Abernathy was with King in the room (Room 306) they shared at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis. At 6:01 p.m. while Abernathy was inside the room getting cologne, King was shot while standing outside on the balcony. Once the shot was fired Abernathy ran out to the balcony and cradled King in his arms as he lay unconscious.<ref name="huff"/><ref name="rowman">Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="espn">Template:Cite news</ref> Abernathy accompanied King to St. Joseph's Hospital within fifteen minutes of the shooting.<ref name="dorrien">Template:Cite book</ref> The doctors performed an emergency surgery, but he never regained consciousness.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> King was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m. at age 39.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Leadership of the Southern Christian Leadership ConferenceEdit

File:Ralph Abernathy portrait by Robert Templeton.jpg

Abernathy as painted by the artist Robert Templeton, oil, 1974

Until King's assassination, Abernathy had served as Southern Christian Leadership Conference's first Financial Secretary/Treasurer and Vice President At-Large.<ref name="sixties">Template:Cite book</ref> After King's death, Abernathy assumed the presidency of the SCLC.<ref name=EB/><ref name="nyt"/> One of his first roles was to take up the role of leading a march to support striking sanitation workers in Memphis which King and Abernathy had planned to attend before King's assassination.<ref name="wp">Template:Cite news</ref> In May 1968, Abernathy led the Poor People's Campaign in Washington, D.C.<ref name="npr">Template:Cite news</ref>

Protest at NASAEdit

On the eve of the launch of Apollo 11, on July 15, 1969, Abernathy arrived at Cape Kennedy with several hundred members of the poor people campaign to protest against the spending by government on space exploration, while many Americans remained poor.<ref name="rocket">Template:Cite thesis</ref> He was met by Thomas O. Paine, the administrator of NASA, whom he told that in the face of such suffering, space flight represented an inhuman priority and funds should be spent instead to "feed the hungry, clothe the naked, tend the sick, and house the homeless".<ref name="otto">Template:Cite book</ref> Paine told Abernathy that the advances in space exploration were "child's play" compared to the "tremendously difficult human problems" of society Abernathy was discussing.<ref name="otto" /> Despite protesting against the launch, Abernathy acknowledged that he was "profoundly moved by the nation's achievements in space and the heroism of the three men embarking for the moon", but added that "What we can do for space and exploration we demand that we do for starving people."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Later in 1969 Abernathy also took part in a labor struggle in Charleston, South Carolina, on behalf of the hospital workers of the local union 1199B, which led to a living wage increase and improved working conditions for thousands of hospital workers.<ref name="momentum">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Wounded KneeEdit

In 1973, Abernathy helped negotiate a peace settlement at the Wounded Knee uprising between the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the leaders of the American Indian Movement, Russell Means and Dennis Banks.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Abernathy remained president of the SCLC for nine years following King's death in 1968.<ref name=EB/> After King's death the organization lost the popularity it had under his leadership.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> By the time Abernathy left the organization the SCLC had become indebted, and critics stated that it wasn't as imaginative as the SCLC led by Dr. King.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In 1977 Abernathy resigned from his leadership role at the SCLC, and was bestowed the title president emeritus.<ref name=EB/>

Political career and later activismEdit

Abernathy addressed the United Nations in 1971; he spoke about world peace.<ref name="legacy">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> He was also a member of the board of directors of the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> In 1977, he ran unsuccessfully for Georgia's 5th Congressional District seat, losing to Congressman Wyche Fowler.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> He founded the nonprofit organization Foundation for Economic Enterprises Development (FEED), which offered managerial and technical training, creating jobs, income, business and trade opportunities for underemployed and unemployed workers for underprivileged blacks.<ref name="SE"/>

In 1979, Abernathy endorsed Senator Edward M. Kennedy's candidacy for the Presidency of the United States.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> However, he shocked critics a few weeks before the 1980 November election, when he endorsed the front-runner, Ronald Reagan, over the struggling presidential campaign of Jimmy Carter.<ref name="carter">Template:Cite news</ref> Abernathy stated of his endorsement: "The Republican Party has too long ignored us and the Democratic Party has taken us for granted and so since all of my colleagues and the latter in various places across the country were supporting the Democratic Party, I felt that I should support Ronald Reagan."<ref>Template:Cite AV media</ref> Abernathy withdrew his endorsement of Reagan in 1984, citing his disappointment with the Reagan Administration on civil rights and other areas.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In 1982, Abernathy testified—along with his executive associate, James Peterson of Berkeley, California—before the Congressional Hearings calling for the Extension of the Voting Rights Act.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Template:External media

Documents declassified in 2017 show that Abernathy was on the National Security Agency watchlist because of FBI leadership's hatred of the civil rights movement.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

And the Walls Came Tumbling DownEdit

In late 1989, HarperCollins published Abernathy's autobiography, And the Walls Came Tumbling Down.<ref name=EB/> It was his final published accounting of his close partnership with King and their work in the civil rights movement.<ref name="people"/> In it he revealed King's marital infidelity, stating that King had sexual relations with two women on the night of April 3, 1968 (after his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech earlier that day).<ref name="people">Template:Cite news</ref> The book's revelations became the source of much controversy, as did Abernathy.<ref name="people"/><ref name="philly"/> Jesse Jackson and other civil rights activists made a statement in October 1989—after the book's release—that the book was "slander" and that "brain surgery" must have altered Abernathy's perception.<ref name="people"/><ref name="philly">Template:Cite news</ref>

Unification ChurchEdit

In the 1980s, the Unification Church hired Abernathy as a spokesperson to protest the news media's use of the term "Moonies", which they compared with the word "nigger".<ref name="gorenfeld">Template:Cite book</ref> Abernathy also served as vice president of the Unification Church–affiliated group American Freedom Coalition,<ref name="leigh">Template:Cite news</ref><ref name="nix">Template:Cite news</ref> and served on two Unification Church boards of directors.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

DeathEdit

Abernathy died at Emory Crawford Long Memorial Hospital on the morning of April 17, 1990, from two blood clots that traveled to his heart and lungs, at the age of 64.<ref name="nyt">Template:Cite news</ref> After his death George H. W. Bush, then the President of the United States, issued the following statement:

Barbara and I join with all Americans to mourn the passing of the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, a great leader in the struggle for civil rights for all Americans and a tireless campaigner for justice.<ref name="nyt"/>

He is entombed in the Chapel Mausoleum of Lincoln Cemetery in Atlanta.<ref>Resting Places: The Burial Places of 14,000 Famous Persons, by Scott Wilson</ref> At Abernathy's behest, his tomb has the simple inscription: "I TRIED."<ref name="philly"/>

Tributes and portrayalsEdit

File:Alabama State University December 2018 29 (Ralph David Abernathy Home).jpg

Ralph David Abernathy Home on the campus of Alabama State University in Montgomery

During his lifetime Abernathy was honored with more than 300 awards and citations, including five honorary doctoral degrees.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref name="mr">Template:Cite book</ref>Template:Self-published source He received a Doctor of Divinity from Morehouse College, a Doctor of Divinity from Kalamazoo College in Michigan, a Doctor of Laws from Allen University of South Carolina, a Doctor of Laws from Long Island University in New York, and a Doctor of Laws from Alabama State University.<ref name="mr" />Template:Self-published source

Ralph D. Abernathy Hall at Alabama State Hall is dedicated to him, with a bust of his head in the foyer area.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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Interstate 20 Ralph David Abernathy Freeway,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Abernathy Road,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation

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Abernathy was portrayed by Ernie Lee Banks in the 1978 miniseries King.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> He was also portrayed by Terrence Howard in the 2001 HBO film Boycott, Colman Domingo in the 2014 film Selma,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> and Dohn Norwood in the 2016 film All the Way.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Hubert Point-Du Jour also portrayed Abernathy in Genius.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

WorksEdit

ReferencesEdit

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External linksEdit

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