PAYING A PRICE FOR YOUR OWN FUTURE
LEARN FROM THE CHILDREN OF THE HISTORY-MAKING MLK
“CHILDREN’S CRUSADE!”
The year: 1963
The place: Birmingham, Alabama
The subject: The Martin Luther King, Jr. Crusade
The newspaper headline:
“The ‘Children’s Crusade’ added a new dynamic to the struggle in Birmingham and was a major factor in the success of the campaign.”
The MLK quote to Parents:
“Don’t worry about your children; they are going to be alright. Don’t hold them back if they want to go to jail, for they are not only doing a job for themselves, but for all of America and for all of mankind.”
My message regarding today’s children and youth:
“Just as the children and young people of 1963 Birmingham paid a PRICE for their own future, so, too, must the children and young people of this time and place pay a price for their own freedom and future. When they are encouraged and led in doing so, we will see, I believe, the greatest revival in history break forth in power.”
The attempted desegregation of Birmingham, Alabama was a seminal event in the history of the civil rights movement and, indeed, in the history of the United States. In May of 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King was leading a march on Birmingham Alabama. Up to this point, the movement had achieved a rather tenuous degree of progress. The marchers, including Dr. King, faced one of the most virulent racists of that time, the infamous Bull Conner, who was the Director of Public Safety for the city of Birmingham. In short order, Dr. King and many of the other leaders of the march were arrested and thrown into the city jail.
Recognizing that the movement had reached a critical crossroads and that, in fact, it was beginning to falter; the Reverend James Bevel organized what came to be known as the “Children’s Crusade.” In this event, which occurred between May 2nd and 5th 1963, students from area elementary, middle and high schools purposed to march downtown in order to confront and talk to the mayor about segregation in their city. While there had always been some younger participants in the civil rights events that had come before, this event was unique in that it was exclusively “manned” by the children of the city. To quote from “Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Global Freedom Struggle: (please refer to the following ‘link’: http://kingencyclopedia.stanford.edu/encyclopedia/encyclopedia/enc_childrens_crusade/
“The 1963 campaign to desegregate Birmingham, Alabama, generated national publicity and federal action because of the violent response by local authorities and the decision by Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) to recruit children for demonstrations.
Aware that support for protests in Birmingham was waning during April 1963, King and the SCLC looked for ways to jumpstart the campaign. When the arrest and jailing of King did little to attract more protestors, SCLC staff member, James Bevel, proposed recruiting local students, arguing that, while many adults may be reluctant to participate in demonstrations for fear of losing their jobs, their children had less to lose. King initially had reservations but, after deliberation, he agreed, hoping for the action to “subpoena the conscience of the nation to the judgment seat of morality.” SCLC and the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights (ACMHR) members immediately canvassed colleges and high schools for volunteers and began training them on the tactics of nonviolent direct action.
On 2 May, more than a thousand African American students skipped their classes and gathered at Sixth Street Baptist Church to march to downtown Birmingham. As they approached police lines, hundreds were arrested and carried off to jail in paddy wagons and school buses. When hundreds more young people gathered the following day for another march, Commissioner Bull Connor directed the local police and fire departments to use force to halt the demonstration. Images of children being blasted by high-pressure fire hoses, clubbed by police officers, and attacked by police dogs appeared on television and in newspapers and triggered outrage throughout the world.
On the evening of 3 May, King offered encouragement to parents of the young protesters in a speech delivered at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. He said, ‘Don’t worry about your children; they are going to be alright. Don’t hold them back if they want to go to jail, for they are not only doing a job for themselves, but for all of America and for all of mankind.’
After intervention from the U. S. Department of Justice, the Birmingham campaign ended on 10 May when the SCLC and local officials reached an agreement in which the city promised to desegregate downtown stores and release all protestors from jail if the SCLC would end the boycotts and demonstrations. A week and a half later, the Birmingham board of education announced that all students who participated in the demonstrations would be either suspended or expelled. The SCLC and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) immediately took the issue to the local federal district court, where the judge upheld the ruling. On 22 May, the same day as the initial ruling, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision and condemned the board of education for its actions.”
This event is a model for those of us who are involved in national and global intercession. In short, “RELEASE THE CHILDREN!” In the civil rights movement of the 1960’s the participation of the children caused the “breaking” of the evil human and spiritual opposition to equal rights for all.
In our time, the participation of the children in a multi-generational PRAYER ASSAULT on the enemies of our Lord and His Church will, I firmly believe, have the same effect. That is, the BREAKING of the enemies strongholds in the lives of all Christians, but especially in the lives of what I am calling the “Survivor Generation”; those children and young people who have survived the assault upon them from their mother’s womb to the government classrooms.
I reiterate because time is of the essence: Just as the children and young people of 1963 Birmingham paid a PRICE for their own future, so too must the children and young people of this time and place pay a price for their own freedom and future. When they are encouraged and led in doing so, we will see, I believe, the greatest revival in history break forth in power.
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