'Freedom Fighters' win
Emotional day as Clemency Board clears records of civil rights crusaders
TALLAHASSEE -- Maude Burroughs Jackson of Middleburg recalled that in 1962, she went to a St. Augustine restaurant and the waitress said they "didn't serve certain people."
Outside, she was met with a water hose and arrested, the first of three arrests she suffered.
"Three women and three men were confined to an open wire pen where you'd put chickens or dogs," she said. "It was awful in the summer heat."
The Florida Cabinet on Thursday met and unanimously approved a proclamation that said, in essence, that all these criminal records of those "Freedom Fighters" were to be expunged and put into the Florida State Archives for historians to examine. The state is working to determine the exact number of people whose records will be expunged.
The Cabinet included Gov. Charlie Crist in his final quarterly meeting with the Executive Clemency Board, Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink, Attorney General Bill McCollum and Commissioner of Agriculture Charles S. Bronson.
The proclamation
Crist read a proclamation that recognized the events of 1963 and 1964 that "played a pivotal role to our nation's Civil Rights movement, culminating in the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964."
State Sen. Tony Hill, D-Jacksonville, had lobbied for the records to be expunged as well as the Wednesday re-enactment of the signing of a bill establishing a state Civil Rights hall of fame.
Hill was aided in that by State Rep. Alan Williams, D-Tallahassee.
Dr. Robert B. Hayling of Lauderhill, a former U.S. Air Force officer and a successful St. Augustine dentist, became NAACP leader here because no one else wanted to do it.
Hayling was effective, but suffered a beating after Klansmen caught his car on a dead-end street, pulled him and another man into a field and beat them severely.
The thugs broke Hayling's fingers deliberately so he couldn't practice dentistry any more.
Hayling, nodding and smiling as Crist read the proclamation, said, "As a native Floridian, born and bred in Tallahassee, I feel as if I have come home. This is an honor we did not anticipate."
Hill said Hayling was instrumental in galvanizing and inspiring the demonstrators.
"Some people see a crack in the wall and do nothing. Dr. Hayling saw a crack in the wall and did something to fix it," Hill said.
Coming on faith
Many of the dozens of people who came to Tallahassee for this said the event was possible only because of Sen. Hill's efforts. But Hill shared credit with Jane Tillman and Will Kendrick of the Florida Parole Commission, who first suggested it.
Hill said the arrangements for the proclamation were not finalized until Wednesday.
"We called you all here on faith," he said.
After the Cabinet voted 4-0 to pass, both men and women left the Cabinet Meeting Room with tears of joy in their eyes.
Freedom Fighters stepped into "center stage for (their) historical role of struggling for freedom and equality of opportunity," Crist said. "They suffered beatings and the jailing of residents, night riders and teens arrested and put in reform school. Many still have arrest records on file today."
He referred to a 2008 proclamation where the state passed a resolution apologizing for slavery.
This proclamation "absolves any wrongdoing," he said. "These records will forever serve as a living viable testament to the demonstrators' courage and bravery in 1963 to 1964." Jackson said she had worked for Florida Memorial College at that time and had been "threatened to be put out of school (because of the arrest). But teachers at Florida Memorial delivered my books and assignments to me every day in jail. I did not miss any school. I was determined to pass."
She later cooked a meal for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. when he came to St. Augustine.
A historic milestone
St. Johns County Commissioner Ken Bryan attended to give support to the delegation.
"It's a huge milestone for our history. It's time to put this behind us and move forward as a people," he said. "It is part of the healing process to bury the hatchet."
Also attending was Florida writer emeritus Stetson Kennedy of St. Augustine, who, according to his wife, Sandra Parks, was working as a reporter for the Pittsburgh Courier, the leading African American newspaper at the time, as well as working as director of development for FMC.
After the meeting, Hill met with the foot soldiers, Freedom Fighters and their supporters in the Senate Office Building.
Barbara B. Allen, 75, of St. Augustine, told about coming to the city from New York in 1964 for what she thought would be 10 days.
"I felt strongly that I was being treated as a second-class citizen," she said, adding that she was arrested at the St. George Pharmacy on St. George Street. She later earned two doctoral degrees.
"I don't see enough being done for our kids," she said. "The movement is still going on. I don't want anybody to think it's over. Things are not going to change unless you do it. We have a responsibility to ourselves and a responsibility to our history."
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