,
6 tweets,
2 min read
Read on Twitter
my first editor, Gene Patterson, wrote this column the day in 1963 that a white supremacist killed 4 black girls by bombing a church in Birmingham AL
it resonates in this moment, too tampabay.com/opinion/column…
it resonates in this moment, too tampabay.com/opinion/column…
“It is too late to blame the sick criminals who handled the dynamite. The FBI and the police can deal with that kind. The charge against them is simple. They killed four children.
Only we can trace the truth, Southerner — you and I. We broke those children's bodies.
/2
Only we can trace the truth, Southerner — you and I. We broke those children's bodies.
/2
“We watched the stage set without staying it. We listened to the prologue unbestirred. We saw the curtain opening with disinterest. We’ve heard the play.
We — who go on electing politicians who heat the kettles of hate.”
/3
We — who go on electing politicians who heat the kettles of hate.”
/3
“This is no time to load our anguish onto the murderous scapegoat who set the cap in dynamite of our own manufacture.
He didn't know any better.
Somewhere in the dim and fevered recess of an evil mind he feels right now that he has been a hero. He is only guilty of murder.”
/4
He didn't know any better.
Somewhere in the dim and fevered recess of an evil mind he feels right now that he has been a hero. He is only guilty of murder.”
/4
“We, who know better, created a climate for child-killing by those who don't.
Let us not lay the blame on some brutal fool who didn't know any better.
We know better. We created the day. We bear the judgment.”
/5
Let us not lay the blame on some brutal fool who didn't know any better.
We know better. We created the day. We bear the judgment.”
/5
“May what has happened hasten the day when the good South, which does live and has great being, will rise to this challenge of racial understanding and common humanity, and in the full power of its unasserted courage, assert itself.”
/6
/6
