Fannie Lou Hamer! Someone You Should Know!

Fannie Lou Hamer was a giant of a woman! She took on the state of Mississippi, the Democratic Party and even Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Civil Rights Leadership.

She was a purest who's commitment to social justice was unwavering and unparalleled to any one person in the Civil Rights Movement.

I had heard about Fannie Lou Hamer, I mean anyone working in any Civil Rights organization better. And of course, everyone knows her famous quote from the 1964 Democratic Convention, "I'm tired of being sick and tried." But it really wasn't until I went to seminary that I really began to explore Ms. Hamer's life.

My professor Mark Wendoft assigned a book, This Little Light of Mine, The Life of Fannie Lou Hamer by Kay Mills. When I finished reading the book, I was in awe and I needed to know more. I needed an inside scoop. So I made my way over to Mrs. Jacqueline Jackson, the wife of Rev. Jesse Jackson to talk to her about Ms. Hamer for a paper I was writing

Sitting in her dining room, which was our hangout, I  said to Ms. J, as I call her, "Tell me about Fannie Lou Hamer." The first thing to come out of her mouth was, "She was one of the most integrist person's of the Civil Right Movement." She added, "Fannie took them all to task and when she was in jail, they beat her like she was a man."

Ms. Hamer lived in Mississippi all of her life. She was born October 6, 1917.  One of twenty children, the value of her life was an extra $50.00. In those days, the planation owners gave $50 for each new child; a possible field hand for the sharecroppers family. She was a sharecroppers daughter that herself became a sharecropper with an education level that barley reached the six grade. Most black children  from sharecroppers family only went to school 6 months out of the year following the cropping season. They had a sub-standard education, where the students  in all the grades shared one teacher in one classroom.

August 31, 1962, Fannie Lou Hamer's life changed forever and that changed the course of history for the state of Mississippi.  She was 45 years old as she made her way with 17 others to register to vote for the first time in her life. The Circuit Clerk turned 15 of them away that day. Ms. Hamer and Ernest Davis stayed and took the literacy test that was required to register. They had been tutored by the members of SNCC, The Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee there for Freedom Summer.

Plus, you had to interpret whatever portion of the Mississippi constitution they requested of you. That day, she was asked a question about, "de facto law." Huh? What? Right! You get it. But she didn't back down, she did what she could. Later Ms. Hamer admitted, "I didn't no nothing about no de facto law." On the way back to the rural area from the city the bus carrying the passengers was stopped for being, "to yellow."

By the time Ms. Hamer arrived to her house that night, the plantation owner had already made his way to her place. He told her point blank, "Go get your name off that book!" believing that she had actually been able to register that day. She stood tall and told him point blank, "Mr. Dee I didn't go down there to register for you. I went down to register for myself." That took a lot of balls for a black woman to stand toe to toe, eye to eye with a white man in 1962. Not only was her life in danger but her livelihood, the planation owner to sharecroppers was your bread and butter. Fannie Lou Hamer stood her ground and never turned back.

To really understand the boldness of their work, one must understand the Delta. It was a stronghold of oppression for black people. Mississippi would take the lives of  Emmett Till, Medgar Evers and James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael  Schwerner, the three SNCC workers who had come for Freedom Summer to help register voters. The stronghold was so tight, by 1965, after 2 1/2 years of work, there were still  only 155 black registered in Sunflower County out of 13, 524.

The work that Fannie Lou Hamer and SNCC did in the Delta was courageous. She became, the voice, the face and the spirit of the movement in Mississippi. Well after the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was passed, they were still fighting hard in Mississippi. Harassment never stopped. Hamer's husband driving a car carrying white students from Georgetown University there to help register  blacks, was stopped for speeding.

The Hamer's sued the city and police chief  Curtis Floyd in Hamer v. Floyd, becoming the first lawsuit under the federal Voting Rights Act brought by private parties to block a state's prosecution, claiming harassment and infringement on their right to register and vote.

A major part of the work in Mississippi was challenging business as usual. They formed the Mississippi Freedom Party in direct challenge to the standing Democratic leadership. On one level they formed the party as a way to educate and organize blacks in Mississippi, but the primary goal was to unseat the all-white Mississippi delegation to the Democratic Convention in both 1964 and 1968.

History records her as uncompromising and uncontrollable when it came to the rights of people. The 1964 convention was plagued with controversy, sell-out and compromise, depending on how you read history. In a meeting with Ms. Hamer, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Hubert Humphrey, the then vice-presidential candidate, two congressman and two other Civil Rights Activist; where they were trying to reach a compromise;

Ms. Hamer said to Humphrey, "Do you mean to tell me that your position is more important to you then the four hundred thousand black people lives?"

Indeed she was uncontrollable and unpredictable. They excluded her from every other meeting after that. The Civil Rights leadership believed getting Johnson elected was the most important goal and would in the long run help further the cause. The Mississippi delegation left Atlantic City in 64 with a bitter taste.

Jacqueline Jackson's description of Fannie Lou Hamer was on point. She was integrist and a purest to the core. Her commitment to the rights of Blacks in Mississippi was unswerving. Rulevile, Mississippi erected a statue in her honor last week. It is one of four free-standing statue's of a black woman in the United States. The others are Harriet Tuman, Sojourner Truth and Harriet Tuman.

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