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SYMPOSIUM HONORS TEXAS BORN CIVIL
RIGHTS LEADER

 The Texas African American Heritage Organization (a group dedicated to the preservation of African American heritage in the Southwest) will host the annual James Farmer Memorial Symposium On Equal Rights, April 16, 17, and 18, 2004 in Houston, Texas. The three-day Symposium will be held at Hilton University of Houston and at Texas Southern University. Theme: "PROMISES DEFERRED / DREAMS DENIED"The board of directors, members and friends have worked together to institute this Symposium to be named for the venerable civil rights hero, James Farmer. Farmer was born in Marshall, Texas in 1920. His father held a doctorate in theology from Boston University and his mother a teacher with a teaching certificate from Bethune-Cookman Institute. Farmer entered Wiley College in Marshall, Texas at 14 years of age with the idea of becoming a doctor. However, after he received a Bachelor of Science degree in chemistry he decided that he would enter the ministry. When his father joined the faculty at Howard University in Washington, DC, Farmer entered the School of Religion there. He graduated in 1941 but refused to work in a segregated church. He accepted a job with a pacifist group based in New York called the Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR) and was assigned to work in Chicago. From his Chicago base he visited other areas in the Midwest speaking about pacifism and racial equality. As a consequence of this work and his study and observation of the Gandhi movement he addressed several proposals to leaders suggesting the formation of a committee dedicated to racial equality. It was first called the Committee of Racial Equality and, finally, the Congress of Racial Equality. Farmer received as national chairman of CORE from 1942 to 1944 and again in 1950. He was elected national director in 1961 and served in that position until 1966. Even during the years that Farmer was not leading CORE he remained interested in the organization's work. During the period from about 1945 to 1959 Farmer worked as a labor union organizer. For the next two years, 1960 -1961, he worked as a program director for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). In 1946 the Supreme Court had ruled that racially segregated seating on interstate buses was unconstitutional, and in 1960 it declared that segregation in terminals used by interstate passengers was also unconstitutional. Yet the southern states continued to force blacks to sit in the back of the bus and use segregated facilities, The thirteen freedom riders decided to travel by bus from Washington, DC to New Orleans with white members sitting in the back and Black riders in the front. AU of the riders were instructed to refuse to move when they were asked. They also decided that at the bus terminals the white riders would use "food for colored" facilities and the Blacks "for white." The riders left Washington DC, and made their historic trip without violence until they arrived in Alabama. In that state the "freedom Riders" were attacked and beaten. Finally, hostile whites burned the bus. Youths who were members of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) volunteered to act as replacements or reinforcements for the original 13 riders. Although hundreds of riders spent weeks in Alabama prisons, new recruits continued to come forward. The conditions in the jails were almost primitive and the guards usually hostile. Although many riders continued to be attacked in other states, the idea of freedom rides caught on. CORE received nationwide attention, and James Farmer became well known as a civil rights leader. Farmer began to meet regularly with a group of well-known Black leaders that became known as the "big six" of civil rights. The group included Farmer, King, leader of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference; Dorothy Height of the National Council of Negro Women; John Lewis (or sometimes James Forman) from SNCC; Roy Wilkins of the NAACP; and Whitney Young of the National Urban League. This group of leaders met regularly and sometimes invited other civil rights leaders to attend. When A. Philip Randolph, a leader, asked to make a presentation before the group, he proposed that the group revise his idea of a massive march on Washington. DC. a plan that he originally had formulated in 1941.

The purpose of the march was to dramatize the need for jobs, freedom, and civil rights legislation. The group agreed to support the march. When it took place in Washington DC, on August 28, 1963, over 250,000 Blacks and whites participated. However, Farmer was in jail and could not attend. Farmer continued to lead CORE, which grew quickly during the early 1960s. Numerous sit-ins and boycotts occurred and thousands of people, many of them students, were involved. When Farmer resigned as the leader of CORE in 1966 he continued to be active in a number of areas. He taught at several Universities and in 1968 he ran unsuccessfully against Shirley Chisholm for the New York 12th district seat in the House of Representatives. In 1969 President Nixon appointed him assistant secretary for administration of the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare. In that position, he initiated affirmative action and hiring practices at HEW. Unhappy with the Nixon administration, Farmer resigned the following year to resume teaching.

Over the years Farmer taught and lectured at numerous institutions, and in the mid 1980s began teaching at Mary Washington College in Fredericksburg, Virginia, eventually joining their staff as a history professor. In 1996 he had over 250 students on his roster, more than any other history teacher at the Liberal Arts College. For his efforts, President Clinton awarded Farmer the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1998. Farmer died on July 9, 1999, at Mary Washington Hospital in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

In his award winning autobiography “Lay Bare the Heart”, Dr. Farmer mentions a young fiery minister, who was with him and the other freedom riders. Rev. Cox, who now resides in Jackson, Tennessee, will be one of the principal speakers at the Symposium. Rev. Cox will be the principal speaker for the Memorial / Thanksgiving Meditations Service, Sunday 9:00 a.m. at the Hilton, Plaza Room #247. Public is cordially invited to attend this and all other sessions. The first session of the Symposium will be a workshop focused on community involvement in preservation movements for the civil rights movement in the Southwest and possible grassroots program. Session II at 1:15 p.m., Panel Discussion, Session III 7:30 p.m., Heritage Hour. All of the Friday sessions will be held at the Hilton University of Houston, Plaza Room 247. Dr. Thomas F. Freeman will be the Keynote speaker Friday evening.

Saturday, session IV will begin at 9:00 a.m. Featured speakers and presenters: Dr. Bobbye B. Coleman former professor of Education at Spelman College, Atlanta, Georgia and presently an educational consultant; Dr. Gary Conti, professor of Adult Education, Oklahoma State University; Dr. Blayne E. Hinds, Associate vice-president, Langston University, Oklahoma City Campus. Friday session II is at 1:15 p.m. Presenters will be Dr. James Jones and Dr. Steven Wilson, Prairie View A &M University, Roland C. Hayes Austin Community College Austin, Texas; Dr. Funsho Akingbala, University of Texas at Austin; Pamela McKinney, Austin Parks and Recreation, Austin. Texas; Rev. Ben E. Cox, Jackson, TN.
Saturday sessions will be at Texas Southern University, 3100 Cleburne Street. 9:00 a.m. session IV, "LEARNING AND EDUCATION AND THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT." 1:15 Youth Heritage Extravaganza. Leroy Davis, Principal Kealing Middle School, Austin, Texas will preside. Both sessions will be in the Education Auditorium room 113. Sunday morning at 9:00 a.m. Rev. Ben E. Cox "Freedom Rider," Jackson, TN, will be the featured speaker. Session will be at the Hilton at University of Houston, Plaza Room 247.