Lay Bare the Heart; An Autobiography of the Civil Rights Movement

New York, N.Y.: Arbor House, 1985. First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. Very good/Good. Clem Murray of the Philadelphia Inquirer (Author p. ix, [3], 370, [2] pages. Acknowledgments. Occasional Footnotes. Epilogue. Appendixes. Index. DJ has slight wear, soiling, and sticker residue. Topics covered include Mississippi Revisited; PK (Preacher's Kid); Drawing Board; Intellectual Coming of Age; Looking for a Place to Stand; Spreading of the Wings; Cut Off at the Pass; The Nixon Foray; and Ebbtide. James Leonard Farmer Jr. (January 12, 1920 - July 9, 1999) was an American civil rights activist and leader in the Civil Rights Movement "who pushed for nonviolent protest to dismantle segregation, and served alongside Martin Luther King Jr." He was the initiator and organizer of the first Freedom Ride in 1961, which eventually led to the desegregation of interstate transportation in the United States. In 1942, Farmer co-founded the Committee of Racial Equality in Chicago along with George Houser, James R. Robinson, Samuel E. Riley, Bernice Fisher, Homer Jack, and Joe Guinn. It was later called the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and was dedicated to ending racial segregation in the United States through nonviolence. Farmer served as the national chairman from 1942 to 1944. By the 1960s, Farmer was known as "one of the Big Four civil rights leaders in the 1960s, together with King, NAACP chief Roy Wilkins and Urban League head Whitney Young." This is the autobiographical history of the civil rights movement in the 1960's, as seen through the eyes of James Farmer, founder of CORE and who, with Martin Luther King, Jr., Roy Wilkins, and Whitney Young, formed the "Big Four"--the heart, voice, and mind of an awakening rights-conscious America. A preacher's son, the young Farmer was at first insulated from racism. But no black in the South, however protected, was spared the separate entrance to a movie theater or the "White Only" drinking fountains. It was this that compelled Farmer to mobilize the first sit-in in 1942 at an all-white restaurant in Chicago; to face down Harry Hopkins at a Meeting with Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt; and to found the Congress of Racial Equality, known simply as CORE. But it was not until the 1960s that Farmer's dreams were realized in the most dramatic protest of all--the "Freedom Ride." In 1961, Farmer, who was working for the NAACP, was reelected as the national director of CORE, as the civil rights movement was gaining power. Although the United States Supreme Court in Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia, 328 U.S. 373 (1946) had ruled that segregated interstate bus travel was unconstitutional, and reiterated that in Boynton v. Virginia (1960), interstate buses enforced segregation below the Mason-Dixon line (in southern states). Gordon Carey proposed the idea of a second Journey of Reconciliation and Farmer jumped at the idea. This time the group planned to journey through the Deep South. Farmer coined a new name for the trip: the Freedom Ride. They planned for a mixed race and gender group to test segregation on interstate buses. The group would be trained extensively on nonviolent tactics in Washington D.C. and embark on May 4, 1961: half by each of the two major carriers, Greyhound Bus Company and Trailways. They would ride through Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and finish in New Orleans on May 17. They planned to challenge segregated seating in bus stations and lunch rooms as well. For overnight stops they planned rallies and support from the black community, and scheduled talks at local churches or colleges. Derived from a Kirkus review: It's rare for a public figure to open up the way Farmer has: the book begins in 1961 with the CORE leader boarding an Alabama-bound bus with the Freedom Riders. The narrative is dramatically and thematically structured. Yet there's the breadth of real life: the reader will remember Eleanor Roosevelt's sharp rebuke to her husband for evading Youth-Against-War delegate Farmer's question ("in light of their colonial policies in Africa," how could FDR call Britain and France "champions of freedom"?). This is the story of a civil fights leader whose father was a minister and Ph.D.--and kowtowed to whites; who was academically precocious but not physical, not an athlete or fighter. A theological student at Howard, Farmer refused ordination into a segregated church. Then, working for the Fellowship of Reconciliation in Chicago in the early 40s, Farmer had the idea that secures his place in history--nonviolent direct action against discrimination--and founded CORE (Committee, then Congress of Racial Equality). He was also mesmerized by smoldering Winnie, not a movement sort; they'd eventually marry briefly and disastrously. Local CORE successes, and national expansion, bring conflict with A.J. Muste, foretelling future organizational rivalries; and Farmer spends years in fringe activity, largely supported by Lula, before being chosen to head a CORE whose time has finally come. Farmer sees himself and CORE as "the cutting edge of the movement" (and regrets not fostering a merger with student-equivalent SNCC). Among other incidents and episodes, he recounts: proposing affirmative action to LBJ (who crafted the phrase); shifting CORE from color-blindness to black leadership; debating and making peace with Malcolm X; his post-CORE career as a Nixon HEW appointment. Every page is vividly marked with struggle--and this is the book's attraction.