Civil Rights

Just where does Florida belong? Is it America’s southernmost state or the northernmost outcropping of the Caribbean? Tallahassee, the state capital, lies just 20 miles from the Georgia border, but 500 miles from Miami.

The struggle for freedom has deep roots in Florida. It was here that Spanish missionaries defended Indian humanity and African slaves. The first free black community in America existed outside St. Augustine in the 18th century. But Florida was also a Deep South state.

James Weldon Johnson, A. Phillip Randolph, and the Rev. C.K. Steele were Floridians. One of the first martyrs in the modern civil rights movement, Harry T. Moore, was killed in Mims, Florida, in 1951. The Rev. Martin Luther King fought for civil rights in St. Augustine and St. Petersburg. The modern civil rights movement was fought along Florida beaches, downtowns, and courtrooms.