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The Unitarian Universalist Society of Fairhaven, Massachusetts "Whitney Young, Jr.: Tireless Warrior for Racial Justice" Rev. Ann C. Fox January 20, 2002 |
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Do you sometimes wonder how ministers come up with the material to write their sermons? Perhaps you think that we do research, read books, get on the Internet for up-to-date information, reflect on it all, and think about our own relationship to the topic. We do all of these things. Every effort becomes a meditation of sorts. This last effort---thinking about my own relationship to the topic---was the most prominent for me this week because on Tuesday, my most favorite and admired uncle, Doug Brown, died. Doug was 80 years old and he was a black man. He married my father's sister, Joyce, at a time when there were few blacks in my city, Stoke-on-Trent, which is in the center of England. Immigrants from Jamaica, India, and Pakistan came almost two decades later. Doug Brown was more charming and kind than anyone I have ever met. He spent almost his entire adult life in public service as a City Councilman and he was twice elected Lord Mayor of Stoke-on-Trent. He founded an organization called The Lads and Dads Clubs that brought fathers and sons together from all over the city to play sports. He also participated in them until a year ago when he was struck with Lou Gehrig's disease. When I went back to England in the late 1960's to visit my family I recall that Doug told me that people from the much bigger city of Wolverhampton had been to see him to ask whether he would represent the colored community in Parliament. He said, "I said, 'No thank you!'" "Oh," I cried, "but you could do so much for immigrants!" He explained that he had been accepted all of his life in Stoke-on-Trent as a person but these people wanted him to be a black person. He said he was content to help the people of his own city. My sister tells me that the local newspapers have been full of Doug Brown's life story and accomplishments and that hundreds are expected to attend his funeral this coming week. His words, "I was accepted as a person, not just a black person" stuck with me all of my life. My early experience with my beloved Uncle, colored my perception (he would have laughed at that pun) of all people of color. My city of origin: Stoke-on-Trent in the shire (or county) of Staffordshire, is not an especially enlightened city but it has strangely escaped the racism of other British cities. When I came to America in 1967, it was puzzling to me that black Americans could be so angry so furious! The Black Power movement was alarming. Poured into this movement was the rage, especially young black Americans felt about not being seen and treated like persons of worth and dignity. And we heard in the reading read by John Simmonds how it had been for Whitney Young as a soldier in World War II. We are very fortunate that he became a Unitarian, in spite of his accomplished wife, Margaret's, dislike of the intellectual tendency of our services as opposed to the emotional style of the Black church service and its music. Whitney Young, Jr. grew up in Kentucky, the only son of well-educated parents. His father was the principal of Lincoln Institute, a private residential high school for black youth. Kentucky would not provide funds to build high schools for blacks and so sometimes paid for promising blacks to go to Lincoln Institute. Whitney Young Sr. had a special talent for persuading wealthy white leaders of industry and government to support his school. The Institute was modeled after Booker T. Washington's philosophy of vocational training for boys in agriculture, business, industrial and building trades and maintenance engineering and home economics and pre-nursing for women. The Young children led a genteel, middle-class life with other middle-class blacks and life was good except when the family went into town and suffered all the indignities of segregation that less affluent black people suffered on a daily basis. Whitney remembered that white people called his father Professor Young or Pastor Young but never Mr. Young. On these trips into town, the children witnessed the sharp tongue of their mother when she encountered discrimination and addressed it on the spot. Whitney Young, Jr. completed his master's degree in social work and entered employment in the influential National Urban League. "Whitney Jr. matured into a polished, versatile, diplomatic, but assertive black leader." (p. 20, Dickerson) Father and son believed that the only way for black people to advance was to be integrated into all aspects of American society. Whitney Jr. worked for the National Urban League in various cities. "Diplomatic advocacy for black concerns became a part of his leadership style." (p. 23, Dickerson) He proved himself so skillful that he became the League's Executive Director in 1961. In my study of Young's life, I found that it helped my understanding of his career and the Unitarian Universalist Association's emphasis on the Whitney M.Young, Jr.'s Urban Ministry Grant program as part of the UUA's effort in our Journey to Wholeness program. So let me give you a short synopsis of the National Urban League or NUL, as it is called. In 1910, Ruth Standish Baldwin, widow of a New York City railway tycoon, wanted to do something about the awful plight of black migrants from the South. She brought together 38 able individuals from both black and white communities whom she knew believed in racial integration. With Mrs.Baldwin's financial backing, the Committee on Urban Conditions among Negroes was formed. Over the next decade, this Committee merged with two others doing similar work and the National Urban League came into being in 1920. The League "helped to train black social workers, and worked in various other ways to bring educational and employment opportunities to blacks. Its research into the problems blacks faced in employment opportunities, recreation, housing, health and sanitation, and education spurred the League's quick growth. By the end of World War I the organization had 81 staff members working in 30 cities." (p.2 Internet article) In the 1940's, the League significantly helped to break through color barriers to gain inroads into many industries for blacks. Even during the Great Depression years, the National Urban League pushed, through political efforts, to include blacks in the New Deal recovery programs. The League continued agitating for better treatment of black soldiers during the war. The nation's need for more people to help during World War II gave the League the opportunity to get blacks into the munitions factories. The National Urban League became a major force in bringing together both white and black corporate and political leaders to assist in the struggle to improve conditions for black Americans. As you know, once the war was over, agitation increased for civil rights for blacks. While black church leaders were organizing boycotts and peaceful demonstrations, Whitney Young, Jr. greatly "expanded the League's fundraising ability and, most critically, made the League a full partner in the civil rights movement... Although the League's tax-exempt status barred it from protest activities, it hosted at its New York headquarters the planning meetings of... other civil rights leaders for the 1963 March on Washington D.C." (Internet article, p2) People who believed in integration founded the League and in that spirit, Whitney Young "was noted for attracting unprecedented support for black advancement from influential whites in corporations, government, and foundations. [While most other black leaders] were associated with black churches, Young over the course of his career came to prefer Unitarianism, [which was and is] an overwhelmingly white denomination." (p. 26 Article by Dickerson) Wherever his job took him, he eventually found his way to a Unitarian church. He was closely associated with the White Plains First Unitarian Church and advised that church in their civil rights work and he preached there on many occasions. To maintain his image in the black community, Young often visited and spoke at black churches as well. He worried that his official affiliation with a mostly white church might harm his credibility with blacks. It was courageous on his part to belong to our church when it could have harme d him. Some blacks already called him "Whitey" Young instead of Whitney. I am happy to remind us that we were the most prominent protestant white denomination in the civil rights movement. This early affiliation brought many black people into our movement. However, we were not uniform in our support for integration and civil rights for blacks. Many of our Southern churches were still traditional in their attitudes. When I was an intern in Houston, Texas, I heard a wonderfully dramatic story about Rev. Horace Westwood who used to be the minister of this Fairhaven church from 1947 to 1953 until he moved to First Unitarian Church in Houston. Since Reverend Westwood now lives here in Fairhaven, I thought I'd check the story out with him and Virginia, his wife. The dramatic story I heard was different from what Horace and Virginia remembered. This is what they told me really happened: A black woman, a social worker, applied for membership. It caused quite a stir in the congregation. Horace asked the President to call a Board meeting and presented the request to them. The Board decided to form a three-member Task Force to interview the woman to determine whether she was really a Unitarian in theology and to make a recommendation to the Board about her membership. The Board had carefully selected for the task force one liberal, one conservative, and one in between. All the task force members were impressed with the woman and recommended that the Board accept her as a member. They then announced it at a congregational meeting and asked the congregation to vote to become integrated. The motion passed. But, about forty-five members resigned. There was a lot of publicity in the Houston newspapers as this was the first white church to integrate in that city. Within one year, the church had replaced the members that resigned and membership continued to expand, thanks to the great publicity! The brave black woman became a longtime and most admired member of Rev. Horace Westwood's Houston congregation. Other blacks joined and today First Unitarian's congregation is quite diverse. Unitarians and Universalists alike were proud of their affiliation with Whitney and Margaret Young and he was in great demand as a speaker in our churches and as an advisor to the newly merged Association about their Civil Rights activities. (Let us remind ourselves that the Unitarians and the Universalists merged in 1961) Young's activities were widely reported in the newspapers, on radio, and on television, as when he met with Presidents John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, and Richard Nixon and he gave testimony before numerous congressional committees. We were proud to have him amongst us. However, Whitney became profoundly disappointed with us when in 1963, our General Assembly (that is our continental annual gathering) voted against a resolution that would deprive congregations of certain privileges if they refused to integrate. Whitney did not actually resign but he distanced from us. He was appalled that we would not require our congregations to integrate. He ma y not have fully understood that our congregational governance gives us the right to decide as autonomous congregations what we will and will not embrace. In 1997, the General Assembly passed a resolution calling on the UUA to work towards becoming an anti-racist, anti-oppressive, multicultural religious community. This sermon is part of that sentiment and in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr. and of the triumph of the Civil Rights movement and all of the brave people who spent their lives in the cause, including one of our own ministers, James Reeb, who on March 9, 1965 was attacked by a group of white thugs in Selma, Alabama and beaten to death. Two other ministers, Orloff Miller and Clark Olsen were also beaten and they survived. The Alabama jury acquitted all three thugs. After 1997, we created a program called The Journey Toward Wholeness Anti-Racism Program. Part of the program is for us all to examine our hearts and minds to discover whether we harbor racism within us. You might each like to ask your own self whether you would truly like our congregation to be more racially diverse. For myself, I would like it very much. I owe that much to my dear Uncle Doug Brown and to our very own John Simmonds, a Unitarian Universalist of more than twenty years. As I look at the world today, I am optimistic that we are indeed more loving of our neighbors, regardless of color, race, or creed. Uncle Doug was not happy that I turned away from the Trinitarian religion of my youth but he did appreciate that our First Principle of belief is in affirming the "Inherent worth and dignity of all persons." May our hearts and minds be free of prejudice. And may we have the courage to actively oppose discrimination in words and deeds wherever we find it. References Dickerson, Dennis C. Militant Mediator: Whitney M. Young Jr., Lexington, Kentucky: The University Press of Kentucky, 1998. Dickerson, Dennis C. "Black Leader in a White Denomination: Whitney M. Young and the Unitarians," Journal of Unitarian Universalist History, Vol. XXV, 1998 Internet article: "History of the National Urban League." Address: www.nul.org/90th/history.html . |
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