Veterans of the Civil Rights MovementCTVivian

"Put your arm down and put your hand in your pockets son, bow your head," says ," said Rev. Dr. C.T. Vivian during an attack on a young black college student. The attack was on a young man who was involved in a sit-in at a lunch counter where he was refused service because of the color of his skin. In Nashville, Tennessee in

It was 1960; Nashville Tennessee, theaters, hotels, and city buses were segregated. Blacks were permitted to shop at downtown stores, but were refused service at the stores’ lunch counters. Vivian along with James Lawson studied Gandhi’s tactics for non-violent resistance. Young northern college students, unfamiliar with the segregated society of the Deep South took the initiative to bring about social change. They decided to contact Vivian to devise a strategy on how this could be accomplished. Vivian provided leadership and training for the young activists who were determined to confront segregation. Vivian’s life has been dedicated to eliminating racism. Vivian along with James Lawson, a minister like Vivian organized sit-ins. Vivian and Lawson studied Gandhi’s tactics for non-violent resistance. One of the ideas was a belief that violence, even in self-defense, is not justifiable under any condition. Negotiations should be used as a means of solving disputes.

In Nashville the first sit-in took place on February 13, 1960. That is to say students sat at the "whites" only lunch counters and tried to get served. Two months went by; students were arrested and were even beaten. When black consumers boycotted the downtown stores it put pressure on local merchants. Vivian, a member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) recalls the first major march of the movement: "Four thousand people marching down the street and all you hear was their feet as they silently moved..." Ben West, Nashville’s mayor finally said alleged it was not morally right for the stores to sell the merchandise to black patrons but refuse food service. Three weeks after the that statement, black customers were served for the first time at lunch counters in downtown stores.

This was one of the major events that event set the civil rights movement into action. In 1961 CORE (Congress of Racial Equality) undertook a new tactic aimed at desegregating approach. They wanted to desegregate public transportation throughout the south. These tactics One way to do this was to board greyhound buses and ride through the Deep South to end the segregated bus stations. This tactic became known as the "Freedom Rides." The Freedom Ride took place on May 4^th. 1961 when seven blacks and six whites left Washington D.C. on two public buses bound for the Deep South. When CORE ended the Freedom Rides, Vivian and the Nashville group picked it up. They took the rides on to Jackson Mississippi, and became the first group of ministers and students to be arrested for actively trying to end racism. In Parchman Prison he was beaten and later brought action against the prison system in Mississippi.

Vivian’s life has been dedicated to eliminating racism. Dr. Vivian is a battle-scarred American civil rights pioneer. He and as a result has written several books and his become a legend of the Civil Rights Movement. Vivian later worked on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s executive staff. Vivian is now President of Black Action Strategies and Information Center, which conducts antiracism workshops nation wide. His energy and activism continues today. Vivian’s non-violence stance is one that can still be effective today.