>> David Ferriero: Good evening.
Good evening!
>> Good evening.
>> David Ferriero: Thank you.
I'm David Ferriero, the Archivist of the United
States and it's a pleasure to welcome you
here whether you're here in person or joining
us on our YouTube Channel.
I'd like to welcome you to the McGowan Theater.
Tonight's program, "Shared Legacies: Honoring
the Black-Jewish Civil Rights Alliance," examines
the importance and supportive bond between
Jewish and black activists during the Civil
Rights movement.
I'd like to thank our partners, the 2016 March
on Washington Film Festival, and also give
a special welcome to the imminent group of
civil rights icons scholars and theologians
assembled tonight.
Before we begin, I'd like to tell you about
a program that will be coming up in this theater
in August.
On Thursday, August 25, at noon, we will continue
our commemoration of the 100th Anniversary
of the National Park Service with "From the
Vault" the National Park Service on film featuring
archival footage from the holdings of the
National Archives.
To learn more about this and all of our public
programs and exhibits, consult our monthly
Calendar of Events on print or online at archives.gov.
There are copies in the lobby as well as signup
sheets to receive it by regular mail or e-mail.
Another way to get more involved with the
National Archives is to become a member of
the National Archives Foundation.
The foundation supports all of the work of
the agency in education and outreach programs.
There are applications for membership also
in the lobby.
And a little-known fact that I keep sharing
with everyone.
No one has ever been turned down for membership
in the National Archives Foundation.
>> [Laughter]
>> David Ferriero: And in fact, our Executive
Director, our President, our Chair, is sitting
right there, A'Lelia Bundles of the National
Archives Foundation.
>> [Applause]
>> David Ferriero: The records in the National
Archives document the story of America.
And part of that story reflects the changes
and how we have defined citizenship.
The starting point in the story is our Constitution
which is on permanent display with the Bill
of Rights and Declaration of Independence
in the rotunda, one floor above us.
The "Amending America" exhibit in the gallery
teaches us how starting 225 years ago the
Bill of Rights and subsequent amendments set
the stage for expanding and securing individual
rights.
More of the story is told in the "Records
of Rights" exhibit on the ground floor and
online at archives.gov.
But the items showcased in our exhibits are
just the starting point.
The story of the struggle for civil rights
in America can be found in the records we
hold here in the Washington area in the National
Archives facilities and Presidential Libraries
across the country.
Among the Federal Court records one can find
arrest records and testimony of civil rights
icons such as Rosa Parks and John Lewis and
ground breaking decisions made by the Supreme
Court and lower courts.
Among the records of Congress are petitions,
resolution and legislation concerning the
limitation or protection of civil rights.
In our extensive motion picture and photograph
collections, they can take us into the moment
and allow us to witness significant episodes
of the Civil Rights movement firsthand.
By preserving our nation's documentary heritage,
we ensure that the stories of our struggles
are successes and failures will not be forgotten.
We're presenting tonight's program in partnership
with the 2016 March on Washington Film Festival
and we are pleased to welcome them back after
last year's very successful writers and scholars
roundtable on civil rights.
The festival is the production of The Raben
Group.
It's now my pleasure to turn the program over
to its President and Founder, Robert Raben.
Before founding The Raben Group in 2002, Robert
served as counsel for Congressman Barney Frank
and later as Assistant Attorney General for
Legislative Affairs during the Clinton Administration.
While at the Department of Justice, Robert
drove Attorney General Janet Reno's legislative
initiatives and handled the political challenges
of congressional oversight of the department.
Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Robert
Raben.
>> [Applause]
>> Robert Raben: Thank you very much, Archivist
Ferriero, for having us back.
It's an honor and a treat to be at this important
institution.
I also want to thank Dr. A'Lelia Bundles,
who is waving.
We literally would not be here without her.
It was her idea several years ago to co-join
the festival and the National Archives.
And we deeply appreciate that.
We are on day eight of a 10-day festival,
17 events.
Tomorrow afternoon at the Smithsonian we'll
have a fantastic conversation with Dr. Clarence
Jones and Rabbi Ben Kamin.
It's the third in the series of Jewish Americans
and the Civil Rights movement.
You can look at marchonwashington.org or the
Smithsonian website for information.
Tickets are still available.
It will be a terrific program.
Our festival was formed as a national platform
to give people with direct experience and
stories from the classic Civil Rights movement
in this nation an unfiltered opportunity to
talk to us about the facts.
Our history in this country is frequently
mistold, sometimes on purpose.
The National Archives is doing its part to
correct the record and make available to Americans
the truth.
And this festival is doing its part.
And tonight we have a paradynamic example
of that.
We have a group of individuals who were there,
not just there but leading.
And it's going to be a very, very rich evening.
And I'm particularly excited about it.
I'll tell you just the run of the show quickly.
We'll screen a fantastic documentary and immediately
after that documentary, Deborah Lauter, the
Senior Vice President at the Anti-Defamation
League and a long-time champion of civil rights,
will come to the stage and introduce the panel.
We'll learn more about her and the panel.
But now I'd like to do two things.
One, of course, thank our funders and sponsors.
They are in your program book.
These programs are offered free to the public
and they are generously supported by foundations
and individuals.
And I'd like to welcome our new sponsor tonight,
the Anti-Defamation League.
Thank you very much.
Now it's my privilege to introduce the perfect
person to kick off tonight's program.
He inspires us with his words, with his acting,
with his actions.
A few nights ago in a documentary about Maya
Angelou, he came on the screen and talked
to us about his relationship with her and
how together they had moved artistry and civil
rights.
He's an Academy Award winner.
He's charming.
He's funny.
He's smart.
Louis Gossett, Jr.
>> [Applause]
>> Louis Gossett, Jr.: Thank you very much
When Dr. King was arrested in Birmingham on
April 12, 1963, he was put into a very small
cell.
He was accused of being an extremist by the
clergyman in Birmingham.
And one of his visitors, Dr. Jones, would
pick up pieces of paper that he would write
and bring him pieces of paper that he would
write.
And these are excerpts, letters from the Birmingham
jail written by Dr. Martin Luther King.
It's letters to his fellow clergymen.
"My dear fellow clergymen, while confined
here in the Birmingham City Jail, I came across
your recent statement calling my present activities
unwise and untimely.
Seldom do I pause to answer criticism of my
work and ideas.
If I sought to answer all the criticism that
crossed my desk, my secretaries would have
little time for anything other than such correspondence
in the course of the day and I would have
no time for constructive work.
But since I feel that you are men of genuine
good will and that your criticisms are sincerely
set forth, I want to try to answer your statements
in what I hope will be patient and reasonable
terms.
In any non-violent campaign there are four
basic steps: collection of the facts to determine
whether injustices exist, self-purification,
and direct action.
Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever.
The yearning for freedom eventually manifests
itself and that is what has happened to the
American negro.
Something within has reminded him of his birthright
of freedom.
And something within and without has reminded
him that it can be gained.
Consciously and unconsciously he has been
caught up by the gist.
And with his black brothers of Africa and
his brown and yellow brothers of Asia, South
America and the Caribbean, the United States
negro is moving with a sense of great urgency
toward the promised land of racial justice.
So I have not said to my people get rid of
your discontent.
Rather, I have tried to say that this normal
and healthy discontent can be channeled into
the creative outlet of non-violence, direct
action.
And this approach is now being termed extremist.
Is it initially disappointing to be categorized
as an extremist, as I continue to think about
the matter?
I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction
from the label.
Was not the Jesus extremist for love?
"Love your enemies, bless them that curse
you, do good to them that hate you and pray
for them which despitefully used you and persecuted
you?"
Was not Amis an extremist for justice?
"Let justice roll down like water and righteousness
like an ever-flowing stream."
Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian
gospel?
"I bury my body the marks of the Lord Jesus."
Was not Martin Luther an extremist?
"Here I stand.
I cannot do otherwise, so help me God."
And John Bunyan, "I will stay in jail until
the end of my days before I make a butchery
of my conscience."
And Abraham Lincoln, "This nation cannot survive
half slave and half free."
And Thomas Jefferson, "We hold these truths
to be self-evident that all men are created
equal."
So, the question is not whether we will be
extremists but what kind of extremists will
we be?
Will we be extremists for hate or for love?
Will we be extremists for the preservation
of injustice or for the extension of justice?
Before the pen of Jefferson etched the magical
words of the Declaration of Independence across
the pages of history we were here.
For more than two centuries our forbearers
labored in this country without wages.
They made cotton king.
They built the homes of their masters while
suffering gross injustices and shameful humiliation.
And yet out of a bottomless vitality they
continued to thrive and develop.
We will win our freedom because the sacred
heritages of our nation and the eternal will
of God are embodied in our echoing demands.
I hope this letter finds you strong in the
faith.
I also hope that circumstances will make it
possible for me to meet each of you not as
an integrationist or civil rights leader but
as a fellow clergyman and a Christian brother.
Let us all hope that the dark clouds of racial
prejudice will soon pass away and the deep
fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from
our feared drenched communities and some not
too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of
love and brotherhood will shine over our great
nation with all their scintillating beauty.
Yours truly, Martin Luther King.-
>> [Applause]
>> " please don't give up on your treatments
end"
>> The closest persons in the United States
with a shared history of the African American
people are the Jewish people.
>> Not only should whites and Jewish people
learn up close and personal about the experience
of slavery but those of us who have had that
heritage, we need to learn up close and personal
the experience that the Jewish people have
had.
>> My father wrote a note to Dr. King, "The
day we march together out of Selma was the
day of sanctification."
It was passion from the prophets, passion
from the Bible, from their religious spirit.
>> Even without words our march was worshiped.
I felt my legs were praying.
>> In my mind, Martin Luther King was a king
and is a king.
>> Do you love this country?
Do you love Martin Luther King Jr.?
Don't just love him.
Do something about it.
He wants you to remember
>> A number of them went to jail with us
>> Jews participated in Civil Rights movement.
That's abstract -- no, no no.
I saw it.
I knew.
I touched them
>> That's the importance of the alliance.
We are concerned and must show concern for
each other.
>> The relationship between blacks and Jews,
if it's not talked about, if we don't see
those images and pictures, if we don't hear
the stories of these people so that they will
learn and they will understand and they won't
duplicate certain mistakes.
>> We have to reach out to the younger generation
to teach them a lesson, help them understand
what has occurred, how we got to where we
are now.
>> History has sanitized and erased all that
both of us are talking about.
>> Harriet Tubman, who freed many slaves,
was referred to as Moses because Moses was
the endearing symbol of freedom, of freeing
the Hebrews out of Egyptian slavery.
>> The only thing we should get together to
pay attention and do what we're supposed to
do for the salvation of us all.
The ironic answer and solution, those who
have been stepped upon have to lead the way.
>> As an African proverb, if the Lions don't
tell their stories, the hunters will get all
the credit.
So I'm telling you the story now.
I'm telling you the story now because you're
young lions and lionesses.
>> With this knowledge, with this understanding,
with these experiences, we'll be able to spill
the honey.
>> By bringing people together, there's a
sweetness that spills over that will change
the nastiness and the bitterness of racism
and anti-Semitism.
That's what spilling the honey is all about.
>> "Spill the Honey."
I learned more about this, about Martin Luther
King, in 30 minutes in his relation with the
Jewish community than I have in my entire
career as a student.
>> We will not stand and sit silently idly
by.
That's the lesson we learned from the Holocaust.
That's the lesson we learned from the legacy
of slavery.
>> -yeah
I'd be spilling honey -
>> Put your hands together and applaud all
that God has done through you, with you, for
our country!
>> The civil rights challenges of our time,
the human rights challenges of our day, they
hang on me!
They hang on you!
They hang on who?
>> Us!
>> They hang on us.
>> Because they look at me as a beneficiary
of the greatest apostle of the 20th Century
on the question of non-violence, love, and
anti-Semitism.
>> - Spilling honey
Your love is sticking to me
So that pain and darkness
Nothing
Nothing
Nothing
Yeah
Yeah --
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: As the panelists are gathering,
I was thinking for a moment, there's so much
going on in this country right now.
You could have been in Cleveland for a big
night in American history.
You could have been at Comic-Con, right, in
San Diego.
But you chose to spill the honey with us this
evening and we are delighted.
That was quite remarkable.
The hugs you were seeing up here was Shari
Rogers who produced this film.
Shari, why don't you take another --
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: And this is just an excerpt.
It's 45 minutes of what's going to be a much
longer film.
I hope you agree with me that this was quite
extraordinary.
And for those who do this kind of business
and are entrenched, there were so many images
and themes in this movie that Shari, really,
kudos to you for bringing to light.
Clearly when this series was planned, nobody
could predict what was going on in this country
or what would be happening now.
And there's been so much tension and unrest.
So to watch this, such an uplifting film and
to be able to explore some of the themes with
the people that starred in this film and,
in fact, have starred in American history
is quite extraordinary.
I want to thank the March on Washington Film
Festival, Robert Raben, for providing this
forum for us tonight.
It's really quite exceptional
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: Thank you.
As Robert said, I'm Deborah Lauter, Senior
Vice President of the Anti-Defamation League.
Over the past 10 years I actually was head
of our Civil Rights Division and had the privilege
to work with many of these individuals.
I'm going to introduce our panel up here and
then many of the people you saw in the film
are with us and are special guests.
I'm going to introduce them as well.
And I'm hoping we can engage them in the conversation tonight as well.
So I'll introduce our panel in alphabetical
order.
Right here to my right is Dr. Gerald Durley.
I think you saw his wit and humor in the film.
Dr. Durley served for 20 years as pastor of
the Historic Providence Missionary Baptist
Church in Atlanta.
25.
Sorry, Doctor.
You should know last Monday was Dr. Gerald
Durley Day in Atlanta.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: And that really comes from
the decades of this man's incredible leadership
in civil rights, in human relations.
I will just say quickly, I've had the privilege
to travel with Dr. Durley in interfaith missions.
I need to recognize real quick Iman Al Amin.
It was quite a surprise.
The three of us traveled together.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: I want to introduce Rabbi
Dresner.
Rabbi Dresner, as you heard, was billed on
the screen as the most arrested rabbi in America.
That's quite a claim to fame.
He was a close friend of Dr. King and clearly
very instrumental in the Civil Rights movement.
So we're thrilled you can join us tonight,
Rabbi.
Thank you so much.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: Dr. Susannah Heschel.
Dr. Heschel is the Eli Black Professor of
Jewish Studies at Dartmouth College.
As you saw in the film, she's the daughter
of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel.
But we're thrilled and she's here to give
us more perspectives on her father.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: And last but certainly
not least we have C.T.
Vivian.
Dr. Vivian is a minister, author, close friend,
lieutenant of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
He was the recipient of the Presidential Medal
of Honor in 2013.
I want to read what the president said at
that time.
He said, "C.T.
Vivian was one of Martin Luther King's closest
advisors.
Martin taught us,- he says, "that it's in
the action that we find out who we really
are.
And time and again Reverend Vivian was among
the first to be in the action."
So we're thrilled that he's here.
And I will tell you, in about nine days Dr.
Vivian is going to be celebrating his 92nd
birthday.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: Amazing.
Amazing.
As I mentioned, we have special guests in
the audience.
You saw several of them on the film.
Rabbi Ben Kamin, also teacher, counselor,
scholar on Martin Luther King.
And I believe he's doing a program as part
of the film festival tomorrow.
We have -- you saw Dr. Clarence Jones, the
intelligent, handsome man.
His wife's with him.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: We're absolutely thrilled
he's with us.
Hopefully we'll get some discussion with him
tonight as well.
He's a speechwriter, attorney, personal advisor
to Dr. King.
He actually drafted the first six paragraphs
-- seven paragraphs of the "I Have a Dream"
speech.
So --
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: And we have also -- you
met Dr. Shari Rogers.
Again, kudos on this amazing, amazing documentary.
And finally, Rabbi Jonah Pesner, who you saw
give the incredible blessing to Clarence,
a moving part of the film.
Actually, I think what I think I'd like to
do real quickly -- Rabbi, I know you had some
prepared comments.
Do you want to come up before we begin the
panel and give them?
No?
You want to hold them?
Ok.
Why don't we let you lead off.
You can either do a blessing on all of us,
which would be appreciated --
>> Rabbi Jonah Pesner: Let me say what's on
all of our minds.
God bless you and thank you for the leadership
you gave our country and our world.
Thank you.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: So Jonah, Rabbi Pesner,
is head of the Religious Action Center.
You saw him leading activists, pretty recently
-- this was maybe August of this past year?
So he's inspiring the new generation and we're
looking forward to hearing more about your
good work.
So I want to start with you, Reverend Durley,
Gerald.
You had talked on the film about humanity
and getting to know the other.
If you could just talk about that.
What has inspired you to really dig deeper
into relationships and to have, as you say,
not only conversations but true communication.
>> Dr. Gerald Durley: First of all, let me
thank Shari and Bae and all the other panelists
for coming here.
This has been a long, powerful journey.
As we say, every journey begins with one step.
As we begin to look back over the time -- particularly,
this is so important now because America now
needs hope.
And what you see on this panel is what we've
seen in the film and what we've seen over
the last five decades with Dr. Jones and C.T.
and so many rabbis.
It's hope.
We're facing a lot of hopelessness.
And we are involved even in Atlanta today
with all of the shootings that's going on
around the country, and people are in conversations.
I'm through conversating.
I'm through conversating.
I've been in conversations for a long time.
I'm ready to communicate now.
There's a vast difference, I think, between
conversations and communications.
I've seen couples who I've counseled and they're
in conversation but they don't communicate.
And communication is predicated upon three
primary principles, which I think is germane
to what we're talking about here and what
we've seen between the African American and
the Jewish experience.
Communication, in order for us to communicate,
we've got to understand each other.
We've got to understand each other's stories,
pains, understand each other's losses.
So there has to be a level of understanding
which automatically says we've got to have
a desire to understand.
Secondly, we've got to -- if we can understand
each other, we've got to move toward a level
of respect.
Where there's no respect, there can be no
communication.
And finally, I think the third points which
is so poignant, Deborah, is that we've got
to develop, once again, trust.
There was a lot of trust that was going on
in the films that we've seen and the conversations
that was going on.
So the conversations have understanding, they
have respect, and they had trust.
And I think when we can, once again, generate
that kind of dialogue, where we begin to seriously
understand -- we've just had at the temple
in Atlanta -- the black Jewish said for where
we talked about the Passover and we were explaining
the differences and the culture.
We had an understanding.
And an understanding gives you an appreciation.
And once you have an appreciation for the
person who has gone through the same degradation,
then you can respect their pain and their
joys and then can you begin to trust.
And I think that's the essence of what this
is all about now, this entire week around
the experiences that we've gone through as
two separate people.
So that's what I mean, communication.
Now, on Channel 2 we had conversations last
night in "Unite Atlanta" but there was very
little communication because people left and
went back to their various camps.
We've got to break down the camps by communicating
with one another.
>> Deborah Lauter: Right.
So, Rabbi Dresner, if I may, picking up on
that theme, when you were involved in the
movement, what was the communication like
between the two communities?
Was there a strategic plan for how you were
communicating and walking forward or it just
kind of happened?
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: I also want to thank
the March on Washington Film Festival for
inviting me, particularly Shari Rogers who
called me on the phone and asked me if I would
come, and lastly, all of you who are here
tonight.
I was told that I have seven and a half minutes.
I don't know --
>> Deborah Lauter: You can do it as a rap
in a minute.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: One of my former
congressmen is supposed to be here.
Is Harlan-Marks here?
Oh, you are.
Ok.
He knows that it's hard for me to say hello
in seven and a half minutes.
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: So I'm going to confine
myself to three anecdotes with Dr. King.
In 1962 Dr. King invited me and a white Methodist
minister who I had been arrested with in the
previous year, 1961 in a freedom ride, Lloyd
[Indiscernible], come down to Selma, Alabama,
where the movement was centered.
At that time that's where I had the pleasure
of meeting C.T.
Vivian.
We came down.
And when we got to Selma -- when we got to
Albany -- they pronounced it Albany down there,
I remember.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Right.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: It's in southwest
Georgia, about 280 miles south of Atlanta,
closer to the Florida line and Alabama line.
Much closer than to Atlanta.
And Dr. King was in jail at the time, along
with Ralph Abernathy.
And the people who greeted us, Wyatt T. Walker,
Andy Young, they brought us to the jail.
It was the first time I had the pleasure of
shaking Dr. King's hand, through the bars.
And I started talking, as I usually do.
But he said, "Wait a second."
He walked over to the wall, separate -- he
was in a cell with Ralph Abernathy, just of
two of them.
But next to them was a same-sized cell with
about 10 young men in it, looked like college
students or something.
And he knocked on the wall between his cell
and the students' cell.
And they started singing.
And then he came back to me and he said, "I
didn't want anybody to hear what I'm telling
you because I don't want the sheriff to know,
I don't want the press to know, I'm coming
out on bail at 4:00 p.m."
This was about 11:00 a.m. in the morning.
I'll never forget.
It was the first time I had ever heard one
of the freedom songs.
I can't sing at all.
Every cantor in my congregations love me because
I never interfere and I never competed.
So you'll forgive me for singing because I
started crying when they were singing.
They sang -
? Oh freedom
Oh freedom
Oh freedom over me, over me
And before I'll be a slave
I'll be buried in my grave
And go home to my Lord and be free end ?
That was the first time I met Dr. King.
For the next four days in Albany, I followed
him around like a little puppy dog.
He spoke in little congregations, little churches
in the area, endorsing George, I remember
-- in a place right near plains, Georgia.
I had never heard of Jimmy Carter at the time
or Plains.
One of the churches in the area had been burned
by the Klan.
It was a Baptist Church.
And it was called Mount Herman Baptist Church.
For those of you who know Hebrew here, it's
[speaking Hebrew] Mount Herman.
It's up in the Golan Heights.
It's covered with snow year-around, even the
summer.
It's the only skiing area in that vicinity.
Dr. King decided to have a funeral service
-- it was a Second Sunday Church, I remember.
Do any of you know what that is?
Except for the ministers here.
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: Apparently there
were tiny little congregations all over the
South that couldn't afford a full-time minister.
And so they would have a minister who came
once a month.
There was the First Sunday Church when they
would get a minister, there was a Second Sunday
when the minister -- it was a itinerant preacher.
And he would go on every second Sunday, go
to Mount Herman.
And every third Sunday, you know.
It was an August day in 1962 and we were all
shvitzing, and Dr. King pointed to two guys
in the back who were dressed in suits and
shirts and ties and a fedora on their head.
That was the male garb, you know, with the
brim kind of thing.
And Dr. King said, "FBI, and they are no help
whatsoever."
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: And J. Edgar Hoover
was not only no help but much hindrance.
He was a terrible, terrible guy.
By the way, Albany is where Ray Charles was
born and raised.
If you saw the film "Ray," you'll remember
it.
I think it won an Academy Award a dozen years
ago or so.
Dr. King asked me to deliver the invocation.
So I stood up and gave an invocation.
And then the choir of the church came forward.
And they were on the platform that hadn't
been burned.
And they sang a hymn called "John the Baptist
was a Baptist."
I was sitting next to Dr. King and I remember
saying to him, "No, he wasn't.
He was Jewish."
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: Dr. King got up,
eventually, after the choir sang and started
his remarks and he said, "I want to commend
the choir.
They were just wonderful and marvelous but
there was one little error that they made,
which Rabbi Dresner pointed out to me.
The Baptist Church was not founded until the
reformation in the 16th Century, which is
15 centuries after Jesus was killed.
John the Baptist wasn't a Baptist.
He was Jewish."
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: I'll never forget
that.
If any of you have been in Ayn Karim, some
of you in the first row, I know, it's where
John the Baptist was born.
It's a little suburb of Jerusalem.
It's where Hadassah Hospital is.
The third anecdote --
>> Dr. Gerald Durley: Was it a good song?
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: It was good, yeah.
>> Dr. Gerald Durley: Ok.
Ok.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: But I'm a musical
moron.
That's why every cantor loved me.
I can't sing on key.
Boom, boom.
etc.
I just have a loud voice.
That's it.
The third anecdote occurred a day and a half
later.
It was an evening.
And we were in the home of W.D. Anderson.
Is he here, Shari?
>> Shari Rogers: No.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: No.
No.
He was the head of the Albany movement.
C.T. would remember.
And he was a marvelous, marvelous guy.
He and his wife, and I think he had two kids
at the time, lived in the black part of Albany.
By the way, you knew when the black part of
Albany started.
There was no pavement, no paving.
The white part was all paved.
And there were no paved streets or sidewalks
or anything on the black side.
He was the only black doctor.
There were 20,000 blacks out of the 50,000
people in Albany.
He was the only black doctor.
His house was surrounded by -- it must have
been dozens of members of the White Citizens
Council.
They weren't wearing robes or anything.
I think the White Citizens Council was sort
of a lower middle class Klan or something
like that.
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: They were shouting
things -- they were shouting things like,
uh, "Outside agitators, go home," I remember.
I was scared to death.
I remember I was sitting there urinating in
my pants kind of thing.
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: In Brooklyn we said
"pissing in my pants."
I was brought up in Brooklyn.
>> [Laughter]
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: And Dr. King was
cool as a cucumber through the whole thing.
And it was the longest single conversation
I ever had with him.
It must have been 30 minutes where we talked.
He told me -- this was August 1962.
He told me that in April 1962 he had been
invited to the first Passover Seder in his
life.
And he said he was tremendously impressed,
particularly because a young boy got up and
asked some questions, in Yiddish, [speaking
Hebrew].
The four questions: Why is this night different
from all other nights?
You know.
And he said -- and then the family that invited
him began to read from a book, from the Haggadah.
In America, pronounced Haggadah.
And he said, "I was enormously impressed by
what --" the first word -- does anybody, other
than Susannah and the rabbis, remember what
the first words in the Haggadah are of the
narration after the four questions?
[Speaking Hebrew ]
"We were slaves on to Pharaoh in Egypt."
And Dr. King quoted to me in English.
"We were slaves on to Pharaoh in Egypt."
And he said to me the following.
He said, "The Jewish people 32 centuries later
have not forgotten their slave ancestors."
not only that, you're not ashamed of them.
You don't claim to be only the descendants
of King David and King Solomon and so forth.
Quite the contrary.
You're proud of them, of their stick-to-itiveness,
their perseverance, their wanting, their desire,
their hope to be free."
He said, "We negroes" -- African American
was not the term at the time.
"We negroes are not going to forget our slave
ancestors.
And we're not going to be ashamed of them.
We're going to be proud of their perseverance,
their heroism, their courage.
You don't blame the victim."
I conclude, since I have the pleasure of sitting
here with Susannah Heschel, in March of 1965,
I got a phone call.
Remember, March 7 was Black Sunday --
>> Deborah Lauter: Bloody Sunday.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: They almost killed
John Lewis.
>> Deborah Lauter: Bloody Sunday.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: March 9, 1965, was
turnaround Tuesday.
Dr. King was not there on Black Sunday.
He was preaching at Ebenezer Baptist.
>> Dr. Gerald Durley: Bloody Sunday.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: Bloody Sunday I mean.
Bloody Sunday is what I meant.
I'm getting old.
I'm 87.
I'm not in the league --
>> C.T.
Vivian: Don't worry about it.
>> Dr. Susannah Heschel: Him.
>> [Laughter]
>> C.T.
Vivian: Keep going.
Keep going.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: And Dr. King led
us across the Pettus Bridge -- Edmund Pettus
was a Confederate general in the Civil War
and he was the second head of the Ku Klux
Klan which was founded after the Civil War.
The bridge still bears his name, by the way,
to this day.
They haven't changed it.
And Dr. King stopped us as we crossed the
Pettus Bridge.
It was the day that Reverend Reeb, the minister
from Boston, was killed.
And Dr. King asked everybody to kneel.
We saw the state police that Wallace had ordered
out again.
And he asked two people to deliver a prayer,
Ralph Abernathy, the Vice President of SCLC,
the Southern Christian Leadership Conference,
and he asked me -- he wanted a non-Christian.
And then he turned us around.
And a lot of the SNCC kids began to criticize
him at that point as an Uncle Tom for selling
out.
They didn't understand why.
When we got back to -- what was the name of
the chapel?
Marshall?
>> Brown.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Brown Chapel.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: Brown Chapel.
He explained to us that the day before -- the
day between Bloody Sunday and Turnaround Tuesday,
SCLC had gone to the Federal District Court
to ask them for a ruling prohibiting Governor
George Wallace from opposing the march.
>> C.T.
Vivian: That's right.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: And the ruling from
Judge Johnson came through on the following
Wednesday which was March 17.
And Judge Johnson ruled that the state had
no business prohibiting a peaceful march,
protest march.
And Andy young called me up the day afterwards.
Andy Young was then sort of the -- he had
replaced Wyatt T. Walker already.
And he said -- I was sort of acting as unofficial
liaison between the organized Jewish Community
and the Freedom movement, the Civil Rights
movement.
And he said, "Si, we need a Jewish leader"
-- no, it was Friday he called me up on not
Thursday, Friday, the 19th of March.
And he said, "We need a Jewish leader to start
the march."
And I picked up the phone and called Rabbi
Abraham Heschel -- who I was not a student
of his but we knew each other because we had
had him for a two-day seminar up in the Catskills.
All the reformed rabbis in the New York area.
And I had met him on two other occasions.
I was at the National Conference on Religion
and Race in January 1963 at the Edgewater
Beach Hotel.
>> C.T.
Vivian: I remember.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: We had met before.
And I said, "Andy young just called me and
said they need a Jewish leader.
Will you do it?"
And he immediately said yes.
There was no hesitation.
And then he said, "Oiy, I have a problem."
I said, "What is the problem?"
He said, "I have a problem with Shabbats."
He wouldn't travel on the Sabbath.
And he said, "Wolfe will solve the problem."
Wolfe was Rabbi Wolfe Kelman.
The Executive Director of all the conservative
rabbis.
>> Deborah Lauter: Ok.
So let's hand it off, Rabbi --
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: I'm really proud
of that.
Because if you remember the march, one person
away, next to Dr. King was Ralph Bunche who
had none the Nobel Peace prize for bringing
Arabs and Jews together.
>> C.T.
Vivian: That's right.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: In Amistad agreements.
>> Deborah Lauter: So you can understand --
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: And then Rabbi Heschel.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: Thanks.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Love you.
>> Rabbi Israel Dresner: Thank you all.
>> Deborah Lauter: There's nobody in this
room I think that wouldn't want to stay here
every night to listen to every single one
of these panelists.
We threw it off here to Susannah.
So when this is happening -- and you spoke
so beautifully in the film about your father's
passion, if you could expand on that, what
was it when he got that call that made him
stand up and act?
>> Dr. Susannah Herschel: So my father had
come from Nazi Europe.
He said he was like a bran plucked from the
fire.
He came to this country in March 1940, and
he tried desperately to save his mother and
three of his sisters who were stuck there
and they were all killed, family, friends.
And, yeah, I think it's extraordinary.
And I think this is a lesson today.
There's a lot of anger in this country, a
lot of rage.
I understand it.
Some of it is justified.
The question is, What do we do with the anger,
with the rage, even that which is justified?
And the lesson I take from my father is never
turn the anger into resentment.
And that's what I'm afraid we're seeing today,
a lot of resentment, angry resentment.
That's very dangerous.
We've seen it before in history.
I'm teaching this summer at Dartmouth a course
in German Jewish history.
And every day in my class that I talk about
German history, I think, my God, am I seeing
it all happening again?
There are too many parallels.
We have to be careful.
I would say what I'm grateful for is that
after what happened, that was really quite
extraordinary, unbelievable that six million
Jews were killed in a very short period of
time, the European Judaism was destroyed.
We were lost as Jews.
I say the Civil Rights movement saved our
souls.
It saved Jews from becoming like some of these
people we saw this week in Cleveland, I mean
Cleveland, Ohio, at that convention.
It has saved so many of us.
It at least offered us the opportunity to
remember what it is to be a Jew.
And my father said Judaism comes as a religion
of descent.
We descend.
And we descend what we see in justice.
That's what it's about.
And yes, it's true.
How many people in antiquity talk about their
origins as slaves?
People talk about, oh, we originated as kings,
as gods, as sons of gods.
Who says this?
You know, the Pagan writer Kelsa said, "Slaves?
You started as slaves?
That's a frog in rain worlds perspective on
the world."
It's ridiculous.
And yet, no, it means something.
It means that we descend from this prevailing
rage and resentment and the politics that
are derived from it.
And the Civil Rights movement gave us back
the Bible, gave us back the prophets, gave
us something to stand for as Jews and to feel
good about.
My father felt with Dr. King, that they were
united by their faith in God.
They were united by the Bible.
That was extraordinary.
I think what that meant for my father to come
from Nazi Germany, where the Christian theologians
threw the Old Testament out of the Bible because
it was a Jewish book and said Jesus wasn't
a Jew, he was an Aryan, and Hitler's doing
what Jesus wanted, and he comes to this country
and he meets Dr. King and the exodus is the
central motif of the Civil Rights movement?
That's extraordinary.
The Civil Rights movement gave us back our
Judaism and saved our souls.
And I just want to conclude with one story,
which is about Dr. Jackson.
We saw the home in the film that Shari made.
In Selma, the home of Dr. and Mrs. Sullivan
Jackson.
You remember him.
You stayed there.
He was a dentist in Selma.
My father went there.
Actually, I don't know if it was a phone call.
I remember the telegram coming that day before
the Selma march.
It was a Friday afternoon.
It was a very nervous Shabbat.
When the Sabbath was over, I remember walking
my father downstairs and he kissed me goodbye
and he got in a taxi and he went to the airport.
And I didn't know if he would come back because
Bloody Sunday was scary.
But he went there.
He stayed overnight at the home of the Jacksons,
which is the headquarters in Selma.
Dr. King had been there for months.
And Mrs. Jackson told me that the morning
of the march in Selma she woke up, she went
into the living room, and that Sunday morning
she saw Dr. King praying on one side of the
living room, my father was praying on the
other side of the living room, there were
other priests, ministers praying in the dining
room.
It was quiet.
And everyone was praying in their living room.
I think that was extraordinary.
What an extraordinary thing to witness.
And that's what the Civil Rights movement
did for all of us also.
For that I'm very grateful.
>> [Applause]
>> C.T.
Vivian: Thank you.
Thank you.
>> Deborah Lauter: So Dr. Vivian, do you want
to pick up on those themes of shared oppression
and overcoming together?
>> C.T.
Vivian: What I really like -- you've got to
continue this.
This is great stuff.
Where are the parallels?
And we're talking about forever, the parallels.
When I really think about them, we -- the
slave -- the former slaves always look for
a leader.
You did not.
You never stopped dealing with the Moses.
You never stopped seeing the people that were
basic to your religion.
And you brought them with you.
You didn't have to look for them.
Right?
You kept a constant set of taking it all down
the road.
You know all of your history.
Right?
Now, see, this is -- and we imitate.
We use it.
We preach it all the time.
We preach it probably more than you do.
>> [Laughter]
>> C.T.
Vivian: Because there's more preachers.
>> [Laughter]
>> C.T.
Vivian: But -- and you're always waiting for
that leader that is going to go beyond.
Right?
This is what we were doing when Martin King
came on the scene.
The idea was -- somebody asked me today, what
was the greatest moment for me personally
within the Civil Rights movement?
And to me and my wife -- and that's something,
we forget who their wives were.
Right?
We forget the civil rights people even had
wives.
>> [Applause]
>> C.T.
Vivian: And the idea was that when we met
-- the wife and I had both lived in different
places.
She was in Pontiac, Michigan.
I was in Peoria, Illinois, Macomb, Illinois.
It was in Illinois.
In spite of that, we were both doing the same
thing.
We were involved in non-violence at least
12 years before Montgomery.
Right?
So the big question for me, and the wonderful
thing about Martin and for my wife, was the
fact that we knew when we heard him that he
was what we had been waiting for, just like
you waited for a Moses or etc., the kings
in the series.
We were looking for a leader.
All right?
We knew what we wanted to do but we could
not do it.
And it was for violence that we could not
do it.
And here comes a man that says non-violence,
already starting something that was going
to be basic to us from now on.
All right?
We will be dead -- it's a whole cycle.
Who cares?
The point is -- and that's the thing about
the Old Testament to me.
We're looking at centuries of stuff.
Right?
And you're still following day by day, week
by week to make your faith the faith that
it could be, should be, was, and was not here
and there but became on a consistent basis
what it should be.
This is where we are now.
When I see a Martin King, Martin King was
the follow-through of what we really wanted.
When I go into that -- Martin's church, his
father's church, right -- Daddy King, as we
call him and Martin King Ph.D., right?
I see up in the one corner you see his son.
You see his grandfather, of his wife, really.
He was the man who started the church.
And you look in the other corner and there
was Daddy King.
And he kept it going.
And there's no one in the middle.
But I have a picture that I got from you,
right, of Martin praying in that middle part.
And it reminded me of a third generation kind
of thing.
Adam Clayton Powell was the same way.
About every third generation by came forward
with a great leader.
Right?
Each one of them was a third generation person.
Now, I see that Gandhi brought non-violence
to the West -- pardon me, to the East.
Martin King has brought it to the West.
Right?
>> Dr. Susannah Herschel: Yeah.
>> C.T.
Vivian: I was in Rio.
It had nothing to do with the Olympics.
[Laughter] And I was giving a speech about
non-violence but I had to leave.
And these students just got up and followed
me out, and right down the steps, waiting
for a cab.
Because they wanted to do the same thing.
What I'm saying is that we are part of a major
cycle.
And what the too young miss is the fact that
we're in a long-term struggle.
And what Jews have always understood, they
were in a long-term struggle.
Right?
And that you remain faithful to it.
So right now, when we see these new, young
black kids come forward, right, and people
-- they speak it and people don't understand
what they are saying.
White people don't understand.
As a result of that, we got the conflict.
How do we make it come around?
It takes the time to then go to a South America
and begin to make the whole circuit.
So mankind becomes to use what we're talking
about.
Right?
And our relationship with Jews, though not
as personal as it might be, but we're preaching
it all the time.
Right?
In fact, actually, we preach more of the Old
Testament than we do of the New Testament.
Right?
I don't like that but.
>> [Laughter]
>> C.T.
Vivian: Because I want quickly to get to love
because that is non-violence.
Right?
And if you keep preaching about love, you
can most easily deal with non-violence.
And you can take it on to the next step.
And the next step will be a fulfilling circuit.
As soon as Gandhi left, they tried to forget
Gandhi.
Right?
But there were scholars that made certain
that all Indian knew.
We look at where we are.
People want to forget non-violence, the new
kids do.
Right?
Now, let's see what we can do to make them
effective, all right, and make -- and not
forget that Martin King started it again for
us.
Right?
>> Dr. Susannah Herschel: Right.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Like what you said because he started
again for us, all of us.
All right?
So that we're not talking about a piece of,
separate from.
We're talking about a piece of that's involved
in all of us, bringing the love and the truth
and the justice.
Only three words to me: love, truth, and justice.
And you filled it in with justice, so I should
use it second.
When we really deal with it, we are looking
at a way to bring us all together because
we fought the Civil Rights movement together.
Right?
And then there was a period in there where
we lost each other.
>> Dr. Susannah Herschel: Yeah.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Right?
And a Jewish fellow was leading a group that
I was speaking to, he told me -- he says,
"You're worried about that.
Don't worry about it because we don't need
you anymore."
>> Deborah Lauter: I pause.
I'm getting the signals.
Again, this is so frustrating because I'd
love to --
>> C.T.
Vivian: Just one line.
>> [Sneeze]
>> Deborah Lauter: Bless you.
Bless everybody.
>> [Laughter]
>> C.T.
Vivian: The point being is we are a part of
an ongoing cycle that may be larger than we
think but it is the fulfillment of all of
our ancestors.
And we'll fulfill our need as human beings
to really love and care for one another.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: So, I know Dr. Durley wanted
to follow up on that.
Real quickly.
And then I'd like to hear the perspectives
of Rabbi Pesner and Clarence Jones.
Because as you saw in the film, they are really
impacting that next generation.
And it would be interesting to hear your perspectives
on how you take these lessons and are really
doing that work.
>> Dr. Gerald Durley: 30 seconds.
For the last several weeks I've been in cities
around the country with the Black Lives Matter
movement and further to places.
And then I come to places like this as all
of us have been involved.
Certainly, Dr. Heschel, when you're teaching,
it's so critical when talking about "Spill
the Honey."
And I said at the end of the film, something
that sweetens something so negative and nasty.
What makes it important, and all of us being
together, C.T. was saying, how do we come
back together, and that comes with what we
started with.
How do we begin to communicate that tonight
is only as important as we become individual
beacons of light to communicate in our various
-- with our young people, to begin to get
them to understand the various histories,
and then to respect the differences in the
culture, that the differences make us strong
and then get the respect.
And then we can begin to trust.
That's what's missing.
And when all of that comes together, the one
missing ingredient is all of this.
And this is what I think all of this is about.
How do we engender hope?
I've often said black folks feel hopeless
and white folks feel helpless.
What do we do?
How do we do it?
If we can get passed the helplessness and
the hopelessness, we've got an opportunity
to make a difference.
Thank you.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: So, Rabbi Pesner, how do
we do it?
>> Rabbi Jonah Pesner: The only thing I would
add, as the leader of the largest denomination
in Jewish life, the Reform Jewish movement,
we are a movement of people who mostly weren't
born on Bloody Sunday.
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was drafted in
the conference room of the Religious Actions
Center, reformed Judaism, the reformed movement
social justice offices just a mile or two
that way.
But most reformed Jews, most Jews in America,
were not born in 1964.
And so the question that we're asking ourselves
is, What will galvanize, mobilize, and organize
this generation of Jews and African Americans
and the broad array of God's children?
Because the truth is, this presidential election
will be the first since the Voting Rights
Act of 1965 was eviscerated.
And though we know that Jim Crow is gone,
there is a new Jim Crow.
And so we are having, in the Jewish community,
a movement-wide conversation about the new
Jim Crow.
We are reading -- reading [Indiscernible],
we are reading Brian Stevenson, we are reaching
across lines of difference, across neighborhood,
across the usual gap that divide us and trying
to foster not just conversation, not just
communication, but organization.
Because Dr. King did say love without power
is sentimental.
And it becomes irrelevant.
So the danger -- the beauty of the movie is
to inspire us and agitate us with our history.
The danger is we get sentimental about it.
For a generation who didn't live through it
we say, oh, that's so nice.
We don't just need the love.
We need the power to make change.
So my favorite part -- I'll stop talking but
my favorite part of the movie -- there are
so many amazing, amazing parts.
But if you saw the NAACP's "American Journey
for Justice," where thousands of thousands
and thousands of folk marched from Selma to
Washington last summer because our lives matter
and our votes must count, when Cornell Brooks,
Reverend Brooks, the President of the NAACP,
called us and said, "Do you think we could
get some rabbis to carry the Torah from Selma
to Washington?", we thought, well, the journey
was going to be 40 days and 40 nights, a good
biblical number.
Right, Rabbi Dresner?
We thought, could we get 40 rabbis to come?
We put out the call.
More than 200 rabbis brought hundreds and
hundreds of young people and members of their
congregations to march hand in hand.
Because they are angry and they are frustrated
that votes are not being counted and that
mostly black folk are victims of mass incarceration.
I as a white man have a 1 in 17 shot of going
to jail.
If I were a black man, it would be a 1 in
3 shot.
So we need to organize and mobilize and not
just live in the nostalgia of our history
but to build the power to transform the history
that is before us.
>> Deborah Lauter: Thank you.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: So, I think it's fitting
we give Dr. Jones some of the final words
for the program.
>> [Applause]
>> Dr. Clarence Jones: Thank you.
The takeaway of the film and the lesson I
think that is appropriate today is that power
can seize nothing without a demand and that
the reason that the African American and Jewish
community was able to end American apartheid
by transforming the soul of America was because
the two communities came together and they
shared and understood a commonality of necessity.
And that necessity was -- all of the Jewish
people that I knew that came to the movement,
they intuitively as well as ideologically
understood that unless racial segregation
ended, unless negroes, as we referred to at
that time, were free, ultimately they would
not be free.
They would have the illusion of freedom but
they would not have substantive freedom.
And so the takeaway for us today is, first
of all -- first of all, we have to acknowledge
a reality of what's going on in America, in
our countries.
We can't shy away from something -- I live
in Palo Alto, California.
It's supposed to be the brightest people out
there, with technology and so forth.
There seems to be like a disconnect that I
see across the nation.
What's that disconnect?
The disconnect is I don't care whether it's
in Washington, D.C. or Baltimore or Palo Alto
in California, never since 1960, never since
the period of the Civil Rights movement, have
I seen, have I seen, such a rise in resentment
between a significant segment of the African
American community, mainly young people, and
the police in our country.
There is no way you can talk around it and
avoid it.
It is a reality.
Now, when you say that, it doesn't mean you're
anti-police.
It means that if you're really interested
in dealing with social justice today in 2016,
you have to address the issue.
It is the elephant in the room.
The elephant in the room is that young black
men across this nation --
>> C.T.
Vivian: Are being murdered.
>> Dr. Clarence Jones: -- are being killed
because the police exercise as a first option,
in affecting an arrest, lethal force rather
than the use of a subsequent option.
Now, that's what's happening in America today.
That's what's happening in reality.
And so, I say again, there's a challenge -- there's
a challenge to white people but you can't
teach an old dog new tricks -- so I don't
mean to offend white people who are not Jewish.
I don't mean to say it.
>> [Laughter]
>> Clarence Jones: I don't mean to say anything
about white people who are not Jewish.
But out of my experience --
>> C.T.
Vivian: Well?
>> Dr. Clarence Jones: Out of my experience,
ok?
I'm ringing the bell!
I'm saying -- I'm pleading with you!
I'm pleading with you to do today what you
did for us and with us in 1960, otherwise
this country is not going to remain as it
is.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Talk!
>> Clarence Jones: Putting it bluntly, in
my judgment, there's never been a time except
today that came as close to where we were
when you read the history.
They won't tell you what really was going
on in 1968.
>> C.T.
Vivian: Well?
>> Dr. Clarence Jones: They won't tell you
it's the closest period after 1865 with this
country, just beneath the surface of Civil
War!
They won't tell you that, but that's really
what was going on between the combinations
of the young people who were just enraged
about Vietnam and got sick and tired of what
was happening in our country with respect
to civil rights.
So the takeaway, the takeaway is --
>> C.T.
Vivian: Well, well?
>> Dr Clarence Jones: Shared legacy?
So, someone says to me, "Professor Jones,
I thought you knew better.
I heard you say something about -- you seemed
to be in support of Black Lives Matter movement."
I said, "Well, let me put it in the way I
want you to understand.
All of the Black Lives Matter young people
are saying is that pay attention once and
for all because what's been happening to us
is that you have not treated young men with
respect to what's happening with police, like
their lives matter."
That's all.
It's not that white lives don't matter.
It's just like black lives have to mean, have
to be something important.
Well, let me tell you historically what you
should understand what's going on with Black
Lives Matter movement.
Listen to me carefully.
If black lives don't matter, if black lives
don't matter in America, neither will white
lives.
Do you hear what I'm saying?
If African Americans cannot be free of excessive
police force, you will not have tranquility
in this country.
There's a choice.
America has to be prepared to deal with this
insidious virus of excessive force or it will
be ungovernable.
I don't care whether Hillary Clinton is elected,
I don't care whether Trump is elected.
The country will become ungovernable unless
we have the courage to recognize what's taking
place and to talk honestly about it.
Thank you.
>> [Applause]
>> Deborah Lauter: Wow.
So, I'd like to end -- there's another portion
of the program.
There's a musical presentation.
But I was rereading -- so moved by Louis Gossett,
Jr.'s reading of the Birmingham letter.
When I speak about civil rights around the
country, I often quote from Dr. King's march
on Washington speech.
So the words that I now know that Clarence
Jones drafted I want to say here as I conclude
this program.
Dr. King said, "We have also come to this
hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce
urgency of now.
This is no time to engage in the luxury of
cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug
of gradualism.
Now is the time to make real the promises
of democracy."
Thank you all for joining us.
>> [Applause]
>> Please stand and take a photograph.
If you'll indulge us a few more moments.
I've heard people say, and I agree, I don't
want to be a part of a movement that has no
music.
Or Dizzy Gillespie said -- no, Duke Ellington,
"Don't mean a thing if it ain't --
>> Got that swing."
>> There you go.
>> I'm the Executive Producer of the March
on Washington Film Festival.
We are so gratified to have you.
We hope you will indulge us five more minutes
as we cap this evening with some music.
We'll be hearing from Yvette Speers, who is
a mezzo soprano, with Herman Bernie, upright
bass, followed by the Temple Micah cantors,
Rabbi Susan Landau, cantor Meryl Weiner, and
music director Teddy Klaus.
So please bear with us and we will close our
evening with song.
Thank you.
>> [Applause]
>> --
" Southern trees bear a strange fruit
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root
Black bodies swingin' in the southern breeze
Strange fruit hangin' from the poplar trees
Pastoral scene of the Gallant south
The bulgin' eyes and the twisted mouth
Scent of magnolias sweet and fresh
Then the sudden smell of burnin' flesh
Here is a strange and bitter fruit -
"Pastoral scene of the Gallant south
The bulgin' eyes and the twisted mouth
Scent of magnolias so sweet and fresh
Then the sudden smell of burnin' flesh
here is the Fruit for the crows to pluck
For the rain to gather
For the wind to suck
For the sun to rot
for the tree to drop
Here is a strange and bitter crop --
>> [Applause]
>> Thank you so much for having us.
It's a privilege to close this powerful evening
with a prayer.
We will sing "Oseh shalom," our continuous
prayer for peace.
We pray that we continue to be God's partners
in this work and partners with each other
to make peace.
Oseh shalom.
Please join in when you can.
>> --
" Oseh shalom, shalom bimromav
hu ya-aseh, ya-aseh shalom
hu ya-aseh shalom, hu ya-aseh shalom
Aleinu v'al kol Yisrael
V'al kol yosh'vei teiveil"
>> [Applause]
>> Thank you very much.
Good night.
>> [Applause]
