Extremist for Love by Burrow Jr

Author:Burrow Jr. [Rufus Burrow Jr.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 978-1-4514-8027-6
Publisher: Fortress Press
Published: 2014-01-01T05:00:00+00:00

The Price of Freedom

It would be an egregious error to conclude that there were no repercussions for Robinson, Mary Fair Burks, and others in the WPC who taught at Alabama State College. Not long after the Supreme Court ruled against the state of Alabama’s segregation ordinance in Browder v. Gayle on November 13, 1956, members of the Alabama state legislature began showing up in WPC women’s classes at the College and taking notes. This included not only Robinson and Burks, but other women faculty members who were members of the WPC. The obvious intention was to intimidate the women. “Then, in February 1960, an investigation of a student sit-in at the state capitol—in which Robinson and Burks had not been involved—cost the two women their jobs.”[59] Martin Luther King was certain that they and others involved would not be fired outright by the president, but would be eased out, meaning that some, at least, would be allowed to resign at the end of the school year.[60]

Lawrence D. Reddick, first King biographer, was also on the faculty and was very much involved in the protests. Reddick had actually tendered his resignation effective the end of August, but state officials and the governor were determined to make an example of him, and Governor Patterson ordered Trenholm to fire him “before sundown.”[61] After several other professors were fired, Burks and Robinson left Montgomery in 1960. They took teaching positions in Maryland and California, respectively.[62]

President Trenholm announced that he would “purge” the institution of all “disloyal” faculty members who in any way participated in the student protests and who would not remain loyal to the state’s segregation ordinance. King wrote Governor Patterson to express his dismay over the promise that he “extracted from president Trenholm . . . that the students . . . would not participate in any more anti-segregation demonstrations and that the faculty . . . would remain loyal to Alabama segregation laws.”[63] King sent copies of the letter to A. Philip Randolph and Roy Wilkins, explaining that he had “felt compelled to get some word to the Governor which would indirectly condemn Mr. Trenholm for taking such a cowardly position.”[64] At King’s urging, both Randolph and Wilkins sent similar letters to Patterson. King’s condemnation of Trenholm was reminiscent of Vernon Johns’s public castigation of both R. T. Adair and Trenholm.

As a result of Trenholm’s action, Burks wrote to King requesting assistance in finding employment in the fall of 1960. King wrote back from Atlanta expressing his intention to do all in his power to assist the unemployed professors (eleven in all) in finding teaching positions elsewhere. He also expressed his deep disappointment in Trenholm for failing to take the high road by standing up to the governor and state school board. King said of his former deacon: “I had hoped that Dr. Trenholm would emerge from this total situation as a national hero. If he would only stand up to the Governor and the Board of Education and say that

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.