|
|
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
Congressional Gold Medal.com |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
| |
| |
Congressional
Gold Medal Recipients Rev.
Joseph A. DeLaine, Harry and Eliza Briggs, and Levi Pearson
Congress
Honors South Carolina Civil Rights Figures
Wednesday,
September 8, 2004 Last updated 3:44 p.m. PT
By Aparna H. Kumar
Associated Press Writer
Viola
Pearson, center, widow of Congressional Gold Medal winner,
Levi Pearson, receives the award in his honor at the U.S.
Capitol, Wednesday, Sept. 8, 2004, in Washington. The awardees
received the award for their participation in the Briggs v.
Elliott court case which was one of five cases collectively
known as Brown v. Board of Education. Secretary of Education,
Rod Paige, left, Sen. Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., in background,
and Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert, right, took part in
the ceremony. (AP Photo/Lawrence Jackson)
WASHINGTON -- Congress on Wednesday bestowed
gold medals on four South Carolinians whose fight to win school busing
for black students in the 1950s paved the way for the desegregation of
the nation's schools.
The
Rev. Joseph
A. DeLaine,
Harry and Eliza Briggs,
and
Levi Pearson were posthumously
honored with the Congressional Gold Medal in a ceremony in the Capitol
rotunda.
Accepting the medals for their relatives were
Nathaniel Briggs, son of Harry and Eliza; Joseph Armstrong DeLaine
Jr.; and Viola and Ferdinand Pearson, the widow and son of Levi
Pearson.
It was in 1949 when the elder DeLaine, a
school principal as well as a minister, recruited black parents in
Summerton, S.C., to sign a petition to the school board to provide a
bus for their children. While white students in the area had school
buses, black students had to walk up to 10 miles a day to attend their
segregated school.
Harry Briggs, a gas station attendant, and
his wife, Eliza, a hotel maid, were among the parents who signed the
petition. Levi Pearson, a black farmer, filed a lawsuit against the
Clarendon County, S.C., school district on behalf of his three
children.
Pearson's suit was dismissed on a
technicality; the Briggs pushed ahead with their own.
Briggs
v. Elliott, argued by
Thurgood
Marshall, became the first of five cases that was rolled into the
landmark 1954 case,
Brown
v. the Board of Education, in which the Supreme Court declared
school segregation unconstitutional.
They were "ordinary people who had done
such an extraordinary thing," said Rep. James E. Clyburn, D-S.C..
Sen. Ernest Hollings, D-S.C., called them "valiant Americans who
changed history."
"We come to pay you homage - so many
stars have risen because of your courage," said Rep. Elijah E.
Cummings, D-Md., chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus.
Added House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill.,
"Words can't express our gratitude," for their sacrifice.
The medal was first awarded in 1776 to
George
Washington and has honored more 250 people, including
Thomas
Edison,
Irving Berlin,
Bob
Hope,
Rosa Parks,
Mother
Teresa and
Pope John Paul II.
Speaker's Remarks at
Congressional Gold Medal Ceremony Honoring Civil Rights Trailblazers
WASHINGTON, Sept. 8 /U.S. Newswire/ -- House
Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) today presented the Congressional Gold
Medal in honor of Mrs. Eliza Briggs, Mr. Harry Briggs, the Reverend
Joseph A. Delaine, and Mr. Levi Pearson. The four were key
participants in Briggs v. Elliot, one of five cases that made up the
landmark decision Brown v. Board of Education.
At the ceremony today, Speaker Hastert
delivered the following remarks:
"Mrs. Eliza Briggs, Mr. Harry Briggs,
Reverend Joseph DeLaine, and Mr. Levi Pearson. Words can't express our
gratitude. How can we simply thank them? When they walked 10 miles
through a land forged with opportunity, only to be refused at the
schoolhouse door because of the color of their skin. How can we simply
thank them? When their families starved and suffered because American
businesses refused to do business with them because of the color of
their skin. How can we simply thank them? When our land has fought,
and continues to fight for religious freedoms and their churches were
burned to ashes again because of the color of their skin.
"As a former history teacher, I've
pondered these questions many times in my head and in my classes. And
as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, here and now, I still
ponder them. The sadness lies in the cold truth that we cannot replace
the pain in their feet from walking so many miles to school. We cannot
replace the pangs of hunger they suffered. Nor, can we rebuild their
churches that are long gone.
"As a history teacher, I found answers
to these questions exactly where I pondered them. Looking inside our
classrooms, we see black children next to white children. In Congress,
we see African Americans, Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, Jewish
Americans, and Christian Americans all working together to improve the
lives of our fellow citizens. History teaches us that Members of
Congress hold no color, just the ideas and thoughts of the people they
represent. For this, we can truly thank Mrs. Briggs, Mr. Briggs,
Reverend DeLaine, and Mr. Pearson.
"Indeed, time has also taught us that
the only way to stop the bleeding of hatred, racism, and prejudice are
the healing hands of improvement and bettering ourselves. Only the
advances that we make as a country can heal the wounds of the past.
This resolution we have passed stands as an unwavering national
recognition of these scars and a commitment to these individuals. We
must recognize past burdens and forge new paths by providing
opportunities to men and women from all walks of life."
Congressional Gold
Medal awarded to 4 plaintiffs in school desegregation case
By Lauren Markoe
Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON The leaders of a
struggle that began 55 years ago along the dusty roads of Clarendon
County received medals and gratitude Wednesday in a ceremony that
Congress reserves for the rarest of American heroes.
Under the 180-foot dome of the U.S. Capitol,
flanked by life-sized statues of Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant,
the descendants of the Rev. Joseph A. DeLaine, Harry and Eliza Briggs
and Levi Pearson received the Congressional Gold Medal.
Congress and the president can bestow no
higher honor upon a civilian.
Its been a long time coming, said
Viola Pearson of Manning, Pearsons 93-year-old widow.
The four had spearheaded Briggs v. Elliott,
the first school desegregation case to reach the U.S. Supreme Court.
With four other cases in 1954 as Brown v. the Board of Education
of Topeka, Kansas it led to one of the most important court
rulings in American history: that segregation in public schools is
unconstitutional.
We come here today to pay honor and
respect to those with whom it all started, said U.S. Rep. Jim
Clyburn, D-S.C., who filed the House bill to award the medals to the
Briggs plaintiffs and shepherded it through Congress.
U.S. Sen. Fritz Hollings, D-S.C., filed the
companion Senate bill.
As a result of the indomitable courage,
the dogged perseverance, the undying faith in America of Levi Pearson,
Harry and Eliza Briggs and the Rev. Joseph A. DeLaine, Hollings
said, the words from the Declaration of Independence all men
are created equal were finally enshrined into the
Constitution of the United States.
On the podium for the 90-minute ceremony were
House and Senate leaders from both parties, Education Secretary Rod
Paige and S.C. State University president Andrew Hugine Jr.
In the audience were more members of
Congress; the widow of Thurgood Marshall, a lawyer for the Briggs
petitioners who went on to become a Supreme Court justice; Matthew
Perry, the first black federal district court judge in South Carolina;
and about 100 descendants of the dozens of civil rights pioneers who
with DeLaine, Pearson and the Briggses challenged segregation
in the Clarendon County schools.
Those whose faces are etched in the medals
died years before the House and Senate unanimously passed the
legislation to honor them Pearson in 1970, DeLaine in 1974, Harry
Briggs in 1986 and Eliza Briggs in 1998.
But the cheers of their children,
grandchildren, nieces and nephews echoed mightily as Viola Pearson,
the widow of Levi Pearson, received the first medal and held it up to
the assembly.
Every generation works to sacrifice for
the generation that follows, and that was his belief, Ferdinand
Pearson said of his father.
J.A. DeLaine Jr. of Charlotte accepted the
award on behalf of his father, who died exiled from South Carolina
a decades-old, trumped-up assault warrant still hanging over his head.
Nathaniel Briggs, now of Teaneck, N.J.,
accepted the medal on behalf of his parents.
It was in the Briggs home that 107 parents
and children signed a petition asking for equal school facilities for
all children in the Clarendon County schools. That petition led to a
court case filing signed by 20 families and arguing for an end to
segregation in public education.
Though none of the original Briggs plaintiffs
is still alive, two signers of the original petition are, including
James Brown of Detroit, 93, who left South Carolina in 1950 to seek
better educational opportunities for his three children.
Health problems kept him from Wednesdays
ceremony, but his son Joe Brown made the trip and used his cell phone
to beam the speeches and the applause to his father.
He and others who came to honor the South
Carolina pioneers called the day a joyous one. But they also expressed
frustration.
Though no longer legally so, American schools
still are often segregated, they said, and children who are not white
often dont enjoy the same educational opportunities as their white
counterparts.
J.A. DeLaine Jr. called on those assembled to
continue to strive for the equality for which his father sacrificed
his church, his home and nearly his life which was threatened
several times by those who wanted to preserve segregation.
Do not rest on your laurels, he said,
making a special plea for help for schoolchildren in Clarendon County,
one of the poorest in South Carolina.
We need some change down there, and we
need some help for that change.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Articles & Breifings
