Diane Nash explains how the practice of nonviolence provides us with the opportunity to evolve as humans. She discusses her admiration for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr, including his work ethic and open mindedness. Nash recalls how she and her ex-husband James Bevel wrote the original draft of the Selma right to vote in the wake of the Birmingham church bombing on September 15, 1963.
Diane Nash was born in Chicago and attended Howard University before transferring to Nashville’s Fisk University in the fall of 1959. By 1961, Diane had emerged as one of the most respected student leaders of the sit-in movement and was a founding member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). She was elected coordinator of the Nashville Student Movement Ride, coordinating efforts from Birmingham, Alabama, to Jackson, Mississippi, and playing a key role in bringing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to Montgomery, Alabama in support of the Riders. In 1962, she was sentenced to two years in prison for teaching nonviolent tactics to children in Jackson, Mississippi, although she was four months pregnant. She was later released on appeal. Nash played a major role in the Birmingham desegregation campaign of 1963 and the Selma Voting Rights Campaign of 1965, before returning to Chicago to work in education, real estate, and fair housing advocacy.
From the HBO / Kunhardt Film Foundation (KFF) Documentary “King in the Wilderness” that follows Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the last years of his life: from the passage of the Voting Rights Act in 1965 to his assassination in 1968, through personal stories of the people who were around him.
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Diane Nash, Field Organizer, SCLC and SNCC
Interviewed By: Trey Ellis
Interview Date: July 14, 2017
Chapters:
00:00 Meeting Dr. King
03:33 Nonviolence
10:25 Selma
18:58 Voting Rights Act
23:35 Personal Relationship with Dr. King
31:19 Jim Bevel
35:02 Questioning Nonviolence
45:35 FBI
49:39 Chicago
55:10 Remembering Dr. King
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