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1963 Campaign

Birmingham

Jefferson County, Alabama

Site of the 1963 Birmingham Campaign, in which SCLC and the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights confronted Eugene “Bull” Connor's police with mass nonviolent direct action — including the Children's Crusade of early May 1963, during which Connor turned fire hoses and police dogs on Black schoolchildren on national television. Dr. King wrote the Letter from Birmingham Jail here in April 1963 in response to a public statement by eight white Alabama clergymen counseling patience. On September 15, 1963, the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was bombed.

Editorial Note

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