Here for a Purpose

Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, readers' choice as Best Local Hero, hopes he helped

From the distance of nearly 50 years, the intensity of the civil rights movement in the South is hard to comprehend. Photographs of neatly dressed protesters marching to end segregation can look almost quaint, belying the ferocity of the struggle.

Rev. Shuttlesworth

For Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, the cost became clear the night of Christmas 1956, when 16 sticks of dynamite destroyed his house and the church he led in Birmingham. As if he needed a reminder, a mob armed with baseball bats and chains attacked Shuttlesworth and his wife less than a year later, when they tried to enroll their two daughters in an all-white Birmingham high school.

Now 79 years old, Shuttlesworth is a living icon of the power of nonviolence in the face of injustice. Earlier this year, President Clinton awarded Shuttlesworth the Presidential Citizens Medal. Thirteen years ago, Birmingham renamed a street in his honor.

"In 1988, when Birmingham named a street for me, I thought it was ironic that the same Birmingham that tried to kill me has now begun to honor me," Shuttlesworth says. "It's amazing how things do change. Yet they haven't changed enough. There's too much rage and hate and fear of one another."

CityBeat readers named Shuttlesworth this year's Best Local Hero.

"It's always an honor to be thought of by people you work with and live with and try to serve," he says. "I'm deeply honored to be thought of as somebody who tried to contribute something to make everybody's life better."

But Shuttlesworth plays down the honors bestowed on him decades after the struggle that made him famous.

"I don't want people thinking I'm somebody special," he says. "I think we should feel the importance of each individual in the community of mankind. That's been my hope."

Shuttlesworth moved to Cincinnati in 1961 to become pastor of Revelation Baptist Church. Five years later, he founded New Light Baptist Church in Avondale, where he remains pastor today. The church sits on a street bearing his name.

Perhaps ironically, Cincinnati City Council's decision in 1998 to rename North and South Crescent avenues for Shuttlesworth aroused controversy, too ("Streets Turn Mean for Shuttlesworth," CityBeat issue of Aug. 6-12, 1998). Longtime residents complained the name change would prove an inconvenience, and others said the new street name would taint Shuttlesworth's reputation with the high crime rate in the neighborhood.

Arrested more than 30 times and involved in filing dozens of lawsuits in the cause of civil rights, Shuttlesworth has seen his activism benefit not only African Americans. A U.S. Supreme Court ruling bearing his name bolstered citizens' right to demonstrate peacefully against the government.

The ruling in that case - Shuttlesworth v. Birmingham - threw out Shuttlesworth's conviction for violating a city ordinance requiring permits for parades. The late Justice Potter Stewart, a former Cincinnatian, wrote the high court's opinion.

"On the afternoon of April 12, Good Friday, 1963, 52 people, all Negroes, were led out of a Birmingham church by three Negro ministers, one of whom was the petitioner, Fred L. Shuttlesworth," Stewart wrote. "They walked in orderly fashion, two abreast for the most part, for four blocks. The purpose of their march was to protest the alleged denial of civil rights to Negroes in the city of Birmingham. The marchers stayed on the sidewalks except at street intersections, and they did not interfere with other pedestrians. No automobiles were obstructed, nor were traffic signals disobeyed.

"The petitioner was with the group for at least part of this time, walking alongside the others, and once moving from the front to the rear. As the marchers moved along, a crowd of spectators fell in behind them at a distance. The spectators at some points spilled out into the streets, but the street was not blocked and vehicles were not obstructed. At the end of four blocks the marchers were stopped by the Birmingham police, and were arrested."

Shuttlesworth's march came after he tried, but failed, to obtain a permit. City Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor, who later became police chief and is now infamous for unleashing police dogs on peaceful demonstrators, sought to block the march.

"Shuttlesworth himself sent a telegram to Commissioner Connor requesting, on behalf of his organization, a permit to picket 'against the injustices of segregation and discrimination,' " Stewart wrote. "In reply, the Commissioner sent a wire stating ... 'I insist that you and your people do not start any picketing on the streets in Birmingham, Alabama.' "

Remaining active in the civil rights struggle in Birmingham even after moving to Cincinnati, Shuttlesworth invited Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. there in May 1963 to help desegregate stores, restaurants and schools. The success of their joint effort precipitated new federal civil rights legislation in 1964.

"I hope I made some contribution, and I hope my life commitment to God will help us realize we're here for a purpose," Shuttlesworth says. ©