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Reviewed by:
  • Rhetoric, Religion, and the Civil Rights Movement 1954–1965
  • Robert E. Terrill
Rhetoric, Religion, and the Civil Rights Movement 1954–1965. Edited by Davis W. Houck and David E. Dixon . Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2006; pp xvi + 1002. $44.95 paper.

As Davis W. Houck and David E. Dixon remind us in their introduction to this extensive volume, the mid-twentieth-century American civil rights movement was profoundly religious. Religious themes and warrants gave movement discourse lift and depth, allowing it to reach toward human universals as well as the Judeo-Christian narratives that undergird so much of American civic culture. These themes were instrumental in attracting adherents to the movement in the first place, and in retaining commitments and lifting sagging spirits during the many times of frustration and darkness. Often it was the religious commitment of the participants—the conviction that they were participating not in a mere moment of political history but in an odyssey quite literally of biblical proportions—that inspired them to breathtaking acts of courage and eloquence. The public discourse of the civil rights movement was so thoroughly shaped by religious images, metaphors, and narratives that it would be otherwise unrecognizable.

If this anthology were a handy collection of texts otherwise available, drawn together for the first time, it would be of immense value for scholars of rhetoric, race, history, and religion. But as Houck and Dixon note, scholars of American public address have never had the opportunity to explore in detail the religious traditions within civil rights discourse because most of these texts have never before been available for study: "Aside from the civil rights documentaries and anniversaries so freighted and weighted with the voice of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the religious sounds of the movement remained elusive" (1).

The editors listened to audiotapes of meetings and rallies, seeking to recover the sounds "that articulate the Judeo-Christian foundations of the [End Page 744] modern civil rights movement" (3), and many of the speeches contained here are transcribed from those sound recordings. To their credit, the editors exert a light touch. The texts are broken into paragraphs in a natural manner, retaining the cadences, asides, ellipses, and parentheses that characterize oral speech. The editors occasionally have added words or phrases in brackets to clarify meanings that sometimes are lost in the translation from oral to written prose, and they note when a given tape was incomplete, damaged, or inaudible, but they have retained vernacular English. Where their sources are printed speeches, they say that they have only corrected spelling. The result is a highly readable volume presenting authoritative texts.

There are speeches from religious leaders whose names are familiar to anyone who has studied the civil rights movement: Fred Shuttlesworth, Adam Clayton Powell, Ralph Abernathy, James Bevel, John Lewis, Roy Wilkins, Wyatt Tee Walker, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. There are also speeches from members of the black clergy who are less frequently anthologized: Mordecai Wyatt Johnson, Benjamin E. Mays, Lawrence Campbell, Edwin King, James Lawson, Kelly Miller Smith, Robert A. Reed. Of particular note are the entries for both the well-known and lesser known African American lay people who contributed to the movement by speaking on religious themes: Dr. T. R. M. Howard, Dick Gregory, Dave Dennis, Dr. Aaron Henry.

It was important, Houck and Dixon acknowledge, to include the voices of white southern clergy who at sometimes great personal risk "were trying to lead typically recalcitrant all-white congregations to a more enlightened understanding of race relations" (10). The white ministers and rabbis represented include Robbins Ralph, Marion A. Boggs, Bruce William Klunder, Edward W. Harris, Thomas Merton, Max D. Davidson, Charles F. Wittenstein, and Morris B. Abram. Also included are addresses from lay whites who supported the movement through discourse touching on religious themes, such as Branch Rickey, P. D. East, and LeRoy Collins.

There are omissions, but these should not be considered flaws—not even an anthology of this scope (130 complete speech texts) could or should strive to achieve exhaustive coverage. The focus on texts that resonate with Judeo-Christian tradition excludes Muslim religious leaders; it also skews the sampling toward the South...

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