Сильвия Рид Курран, Генеральный консул США

Sylvia Reed Curran, U.S. Consul General

The third Monday in January is celebrated in the United States as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day. Dr. King's actual birthday is January 15, and this is why the holiday is in January. Dr. King was the leader of the Montgomery, Alabama bus boycott, which lasted from December 1, 1955 when Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man to December 20, 1956 when a federal ruling took effect and led to the U.S. Supreme Court decision that declared the Alabama and Montgomery laws requiring segregated buses to be unconstitutional. The Montgomery bus boycott is considered the official start of the Civil Rights Movement in the United States, which Dr. King led for more than ten years (1955-1968).

The goal of the Civil Rights Movement was to outlaw discrimination against black Americans, including such truly horrible practices such as lynching, and to restore to America's black citizens the voting rights that had been guaranteed by the 15th Amendment of the United States Constitutuion in 1870. As a result of the Civil Rights Movement, the following laws were passed: the Cvil Rights Act of 1964, which barred discrimination of the basis of race, religion, and national origin in public accommodation and housing; the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which restored and protected the voting rights of citizens; the Immigration and Nationality Service Act of 1965, which greatly opened immigration to people not from northern and western European countries; and, the Fair Housing Act of 1968 that banned discrimination in the rental and sale of housing. While the focus was the rights of black citizens, it really started Americans to focus on discrimination against all citizens and equal protection for all regardless of gender, race, ethnicity, and disability, etc.

My African ancestors first came to the territory that later became the United States about 300 years ago as slaves. My great grandparents moved from southern Alabama and northern Florida to rural Ohio at the start of the Great Migration in order to escape oppressive laws that denied them political rights and kept black people tied to the land as sharecroppers (a system similar to serfdom). They wanted to be able to compete for jobs on an equal footing and earn enough to support their family. My first television memory was of the Civil Rights marches in Birmingham in 1963 that were part of what was called the "Children's Crusade.” I remember being transfixed by the sight of children, some not much older than I was, being attacked by dogs and water cannons.

In 1959, my hometown of Chicago was declared he most segregated city in America by the U.S. Civil Rights Committee. When Dr. King visited Chicago in 1966, he had said he had never seen anything "so hostile and so hateful" in the South as in Chicago where he was hit in the head by a rock by angry whites in the Marquette Park neighborhood on the southwest side. He had come to Chicago to promote fair housing.

No one had to tell residents of Chicago that the city was highly segregated. Except for a few neighborhoods near college campuses, there were no integrated neighborhoods. My own neighborhood had a few inter-racial families, but everyone else was black. I knew that there some neighborhoods I could go to safely, and that I would not be welcome in the others. The play "Raisin in the Sun" deals with an attempt by a black family to move to a nicer, white neighborhood in Chicago, and how they were unwelcome. I remember newspaper stories when I was a kid about black families trying to integrate certain neighborhoods, and how their neighbors would burn their houses down.

Of the 1600 students at my private high school, only 40 were black. When I was 17, I wanted to attend a friend's party in a white neighborhood. I didn't have a car and my Dad couldn't give me a ride. Nevertheless, Chicago has a good public transportation system; a bus could take you within a few blocks of almost every point in the city. I decided that I would take the bus. I also decided that I would be strategic. The bus would drop me off about three blocks from this friend's house. I couldn't go when it was dark, because someone might assume I was a criminal. (I wore a navy blue windbreaker jacket, because then anyone could see I had no weapons.) If I went too early, I would attract too much attention. I decided to arrive around dinnertime, because most people would be in their kitchens or dining rooms and wouldn't notice me. As I transferred between buses, everything seemed to be going according to plan. However, as the last bus neared where I was needed to get off, I noticed something that was not according to plan.

In Chicago, when the weather was warm, companies would set up street fairs on vacant lots. These fairs had various games, where you could win prizes, as well as fairground rides. I noticed that at the corner right across from my bus stop was one of these fairs. I knew this would foul up my plans to walk around this neighborhood unnoticed. I had come too far and decided to just take my chances. I got off the bus and started to walk toward the address of the party. I soon noticed that a crowd had gathered behind me and that it seemed to be getting bigger. Kids from the fair, some with bats and other things in their hands, were following me and calling me names. Living room lights of the houses on the block were turning on. My plan to not attract attention had failed completely. All of a sudden, a man with a shotgun or rifle runs out of his house towards me. Immediately, I thought to myself, “Sylvia, this is a stupid way to die.” The man positioned himself between me and the crowd and started to yell at me. "What are YOU doing here?” I stammered in reply something about party and friend's house. "WHERE IS THIS HOUSE? WHY SHOULD I BELIEVE YOU?” I stammered that it was just a couple of blocks away. The guy then said to hurry up and go and to never, ever come back to that neighborhood. And I never have.

One of the things I am proudest about the United States is our ability to evolve. The United States of America is a country that was founded on an ideal -- that all men are created equal and each individual is endowed with rights that are inherent and not given by government. Nevertheless, it has taken us more than 230 years to get closer and closer to that ideal. Even in my own lifetime, we have gone from a nation where citizens were denied rights in certain parts of the country simply due to their race to the election of our first black President. We are not locked into our past.

On the eve of his first inauguration in 2009, President Obama instituted a National Day of Service in recognition of the Martin Luther King Day holiday. In 2013, there were National Service Day events planned in all 50 states. President Obama and the First Lady participated by helping at a renovation project at an elementary school. By participating in these service projects, we are carrying on the dream of Dr. King by helping to make the United States a better place for all.