Civil Rights Activist
In 1962 Chaney participated in a Freedom Ride from Tennessee to Greenville, Mississippi, and in another from Greenville to Meridian. He and his younger brother also were part of other non-violent demonstrations. James Chaney started volunteering in late 1963, joining the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) in Meridian. He organized voter education classes, introduced CORE workers to local church leaders and helped them get around the counties.
In 1964 he met with leaders of the Mt. Nebo Baptist Church to gain their support for letting Michael Schwerner, local leader of CORE, come to address the church members, to encourage them to use the church for voter education and registration. He acted as a liaison with other CORE members.
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Famous quotes by civil rights activist:
“If we love-and-serve an ideal we reach backward in time to its inception and forward to its consummation. To grow is sometimes to hurt; but who would return to smallness?”
—Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 3, ch. 3 (1962)
“... one of the blind spots of most Negroes is their failure to realize that small overtures from whites have a large significance ... I now realize that this feeling inevitably takes possession of one in the bitter struggle for equality. Indeed, I share it. Yet I wonder how we can expect total acceptance to step full grown from the womb of prejudice, with no embryo or infancy or childhood stages.”
—Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 1, ch. 10 (1962)