Southern Witness: Unitarian and Universalists in the Civil Rights Era
Gordon Gibson
Few books have delved into the role Unitarian and Universalist (UU) members played in the move to end racial discrimination like Southern Witness: Unitarians and Universalists in the Civil Rights Era. Written by author and UU minister Gordon Gibson, the book tells the story of the many UU ministers and laypeople who took extraordinary risks in the fight against Jim Crow segregation in the 1950s and 60s. Those individuals include the Rev. Donald Thompson in Jackson, Miss., who was shot and forced out of town by segregationists. In another case, the Ku Klux Klan harassed and firebombed the New Orleans church building and parsonage of the Rev. Albert D’Orlando. Gibson also describes the courage of members of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Birmingham who helped facilitate the Selma voting rights marches in 1965. Southern Witness is a moving and powerful account of the UU members who dared to speak out against racial intolerance and injustice. (Skinner House Books)
