United States Civil Rights Trail

Do your homework! I have one objective in writing this post. I desire to inspire the motivated to do the hard work of understanding black history in the United States. Lisa and I recently took a week to spend time touring museums and monuments in the south to gain a better understanding of the path of black citizens through our nation's history. I believe that you will be enlightened and moved by the sacrifices that have been paid for the same rights the whites have had all along. 

The declaration of Independence preamble clearly presents the concept that all men are created equal.  The Bible teaches that God loves all and Jesus died for all. We have equal footing before God and as US citizens. The picture above is of Lisa and I standing at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. This was the sight where hundreds were denied the right to simply protest their right to vote. You can go to the National Voting Rights Museum and Institute right at the foot of the bridge in Selma.

Our journey continued in Mongomery, Alabama where we visited the Legacy Museum. This museum presented the injustices of blacks from the boats of Africa to the modern incarceration of black men and women. It also captured the vast amount of black men who were lynched. Just down the street, you can visit The National Memorial for Peace and Justice. It is sobering to see the thousands of men who were killed because of the color of their skin. It is a hard pill to swallow. When you read what each man was accused of, it sickens me that no one was ever prosecuted for these murders. 

We moved on to the Rosa Parks Museum in downtown Mongomery next. It is amazing the resolve and unity the black citizens had once she was confronted on the bus in late December of 1956. The collective community did not step foot on a public bus for three hundred and eighty-one days. They walked, carpooled, and started their own cab infrastructure. I am amazed how many of the people in the leadership of this movement were pastors. Most people do not know that Dr. Martin Luther King Jr was Rosa Park's pastor for a time. You can visit the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church and the Holt Street Baptist Church where the masses were inspired to stand for their rights.

We moved north to Memphis on our journey. For me, a highlight was the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel. The exhibits are a comprehensive look at the history of the civil rights movement in the United States from the 17th century until today. It is sobering to review our history where a primary leader of the civil rights movement was gunned down. If you have to make a choice of where you must go, this would be my vote. 

I gained so much knowledge and understanding of history on this trip. You can learn more by visiting civilrightstrail.com. 

I thought I would leave you with the definition of critical race theory being that I have had no one who could define it for me yet. I am not going to weigh in at this point.

critical race theory (CRT), intellectual movement, and loosely organized framework of legal analysis based on the premise that race is not a natural, biologically grounded feature of physically distinct subgroups of human beings but a socially constructed (culturally invented) category that is used to oppress and exploit people of color. Critical race theorists hold that the law and legal institutions in the United States are inherently racist insofar as they function to create and maintain social, economic, and political inequalities between whites and nonwhites, especially African Americans.  Written by The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica