When I think about the Legacy Sites—a series of memorials and museums in Montgomery, Alabama, that commemorate America’s dark history of slavery, lynching, and racial terror—they almost seem like a miracle that they exist at all. Montgomery was once one of America’s largest slave trading spaces. But thanks to the remarkable work by Bryan Stevenson, a longtime racial justice advocate and founder and executive director of the Equal Justice Initiative, the city is now what Bryan likes to call “arguably the most truthful space in America when it comes to confronting the legacy of slavery and the legacy of lynching.”
As we approach America’s 250th anniversary, I’ve been thinking a lot about our past. I recently traveled to Montgomery to interview Bryan and visit the Legacy Sites. You might remember my last visit there when I was working on Reveal’s award-winning seven-part series, Mississippi Goddam, about the death of Billey Joe Johnson Jr. Each time I visit, I feel a similar feeling: overwhelmed. Overwhelmed by the number of lynchings in this country. Overwhelmed by the long, brutal history of slavery. Overwhelmed by a history of racism this country has never fully confronted.
But I’m heartened by listening to Bryan and how he sees the fight for racial justice in this country. “It’s like being in a rowboat: If you don’t stroke, if you don’t work, you’re gonna float backward. It’s just the way currents work,” he told me on this special episode of More To The Story from Montgomery. “But you shouldn’t be burdened by that. You shouldn’t be. Because it means that you get to commit.”
—Al Letson
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