James Reeb

By Lynn Burnett

Born in 1927, James Reeb attended Princeton Theological Seminary, and was ordained as a Presbyterian minister in 1953. Soon afterwards, he began working at the Philadelphia General Hospital as a chaplain. In this position, James offered prayer and spiritual comfort… but he also considered the concrete needs of those he was serving, and what could be done to support them.

Because the sufferings of those he served were often rooted in social disparities, James Reeb’s own spirituality increasingly prioritized taking action to combat those disparities. He wanted to get to the roots of systemic inequities, before harm had been done in the first place. In 1957, his evolving spiritual orientation led him to take a job as youth director of Philadelphia’s West Branch YMCA. The new position allowed him to work directly with poor, primarily Black youth. He moved his family into the neighborhood, abolished the program’s racial quota system, and integrated the busing system that brought youth to and from the program.

During this time, James Reeb’s action-oriented spirituality led him away from Presbyterianism, and to embrace Unitarian Universalism. In 1959, he accepted a position as assistant minister at the Unitarian All Souls Church, in Washington D.C. The Unitarians at All Souls were looking specifically to hire someone who would be the right fit to work on the racial justice issues alive in D.C., and James was soon in the thick of community organizing, especially around housing inequities.

By 1964, James was feeling restless in his role as then associate-minister. He was craving greater leadership opportunities, and found it through a Quaker-run fair housing program in Boston. James was to take on “the complex task of helping the poor to become their own spokesmen, leaders, and representatives, with a special regard for housing for the very poor.” He and his family once again moved into the neighborhood that James would be serving, and his four children enrolled in the public schools. It was a poor, primarily Black and Latino neighborhood… and rife with all manner of housing abuses by slum lords.

As one of his colleagues recalls: “Many of us who worked with him toured the wracked and broken streets . . . gazed at the houses with broken windows, peeling paint, falling porches, and, invisible from the outside, the lack of heat, or hot water, of rubbish removal, of decent sanitation and who knows how many infractions…” James quickly got to work building relationships with the community, learning about people’s needs, and working with them to fight for their rights to humane housing conditions.

Amongst the infractions that ran rampant in Boston’s poorest neighborhoods were fire-code violations. James Reeb had only been in his position for a few months when a fire broke out in an apartment, killing four people. James threw all of his energy into building a case that would show how the local government’s refusal to enforce safety codes was killing people. He hoped that building a strong case around the recent tragedy would lead to the enforcement of codes that could improve living conditions for many residents… and save lives.

But then, Selma happened. After the beatings on the Edmund Pettus Bridge on “Bloody Sunday”, Martin Luther King urged clergy across the country to rush to Selma. James Reeb was torn. On the one hand, he felt a sense of urgency around the call to support the civil rights movement in the South. What was happening in Selma was clearly a turning point… and one that would effect the whole nation. On the other hand, if he left for Selma, James risked losing momentum and influence during a crucial stage of the campaign for fire safety. He spent the day talking the decision over with his wife and colleagues. He boarded a plane at 11PM.

James Reeb arrived in Selma on Monday, March 8, 1965. A major march was planned for the following day. However, on what became known as “Turnaround Tuesday,” after crossing the bridge, Martin Luther King directed the crowd to retreat. King had his reasons: he was worried about lack of federal protection, and inadequate preparation to meet the needs of a full five-day march. Mostly, King was worried about a federal court order blocking the march: ignoring a federal order might damage federal support for the march, and for the cause of voting rights. King believed the order would soon be rescinded, and decided to wait. However, his decision angered many Selma organizers… and confused and frustrated the hundreds of clergy and other supporters who had travelled to Selma after his urgent call. King assured them that the time would soon come.

Many clergy boarded planes that evening and headed back home, but James Reeb decided to stay. He walked to downtown Selma for dinner with two other Unitarian ministers, Orloff W. Miller and Clark Olsen. They stopped to ask a local for a recommendation of where to eat, and were led to a place called Walkers Café, which was teeming with civil rights organizers. It took a while to get a table, and by the time the three White ministers had finished their dinner, the crowd had dispersed. It was dark when the three left, and walked up the deserted sidewalk. Four White men approached them from behind, and Clark Olsen turned around just in time to see one of them swinging a pipe, as if it were a baseball bat, into James Reeb’s head. Then, Clark and Orloff Miller were pummeled with fists, shoved to ground, and kicked.

Then the assailants ran away. Clark and Orloff were able to pull themselves together, but James’s eyes were glazed, and his speech incoherent. Because White hospitals would refuse to take a civil rights worker, James Reeb was rushed to a small Black hospital, which was ill equipped to handle his injury. He regained some consciousness, and expressed that there was an increasingly horrifying pain in his head. Clark Olsen recalled that James “knew something was seriously wrong; his face showed great anxiety and worry. When the doctor came, Jim took hold of my hand with both hands and squeezed as if to keep in contact with the world he knew.”

James was rushed to a hospital in Birmingham to see a neurosurgeon… one willing to treat a civil rights worker. Birmingham was a full 90 miles away. At one point, the makeshift ambulance – a hearse from a Black funeral home – got a flat tire. Cars passed by slowly, circling back and shining their lights into the integrated vehicle. When police arrived, they refused to escort the group to safety.

By the time James Reeb arrived in Birmingham, it was too late. He lapsed into a coma, and passed away from a massive brain injury two days later. Unlike the murder of Jimmie Lee Jackson – the Black man murdered by police during a peaceful protest for voting rights, and whose murder helped ignite the Selma movement – James Reeb’s death gained huge media attention, caused a national outcry, and may have even helped pave the way for the swift passage of the Voting Rights Act. Clearly, some lives mattered more than others… a fact that had long created bitter feelings within the Black Freedom Movement. Meanwhile, the men suspected of murdering James Reeb were, unsurprisingly, acquitted within 90 minutes by an all-White jury.

James Reeb’s old spiritual home prior to his Boston move – the Unitarian All Souls Church in D.C. – eulogized him with these words:

“His life can speak to us. It says: come in out of the suburbs and revive the dying city. It says: don’t flee from the sinking schools—get in them and work on them. It says: don’t settle for nice houses in the suburbs and rotten houses in the ghetto—change it through every appropriate way: community organization, legislation, code enforcement, and I think he might say, if he were here: There is a killer in the dark and racist streets of the South. But there is a killer in the North too, one which strikes Negro and white in the bright light of the day, every day; and the killer’s name is non-involvement; it is apathy and lack of interest; it is self-concern. This is the killer James Reeb was stalking and when he found him, he was going to wrap him around with righteousness and justice and love.”

Martin Luther King declined a meeting with the President of the United States to offer James Reeb a proper eulogy in Selma. He opened by quoting Shakespeare:

“And, if he should die,
Take his body and cut it into little stars.
He will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night.”

Additional Resources

Books

Adar Cohen & Steve Fiffer: Jimmie Lee & James: Two Lives, Two Deaths, and the Movement that Changed America.

Duncan Howlett: No Greater Love: The James Reeb Story.

Podcast

NPR: White Lies.

Articles

DeNeen L. Brown: Slaying of civil rights activist James Reeb in 1965 is reexamined in the face of new evidence.

Homer A. Jack: James Reeb: Civil Rights Martyr.

Martin Luther King’s eulogy for James Reeb.

Jack Mendelsohn: A Good Man’s Death.

James Reeb UU Congregation: Who Was James Reeb?