Fighting the new fight
BY ANDREA JAMES
Medill News Service

CHICAGO -- The fight isn't over for freedom rider and civil rights leader the Rev. James Bevel.

Bevel brought worldwide attention to the Civil Rights Movement in 1963 when he organized the children's march in Birmingham, Ala. Police unleashed fire hoses and dogs on the children, shocking the world.

He served as a key lieutenant on the front lines of the Civil Rights Movement. When President Lyndon Johnson signed the historic Civil Rights Act on July 2, 1964, it was a direct result of the movement led by the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his team of activists, which included Bevel.

Forty years later, Bevel continues the movement in Chicago. The fiery spokesman and former chief strategist for King serves as an associate minister at New Life Baptist Church at 11026 S. Indiana Ave.

After the Civil Rights Movement changed U.S. law, Bevel said he realized the next step was to change the way blacks interact with society and each other. The realization stems from two verses in the New Testament book of Matthew, where Jesus describes what Bevel calls the science of government and marriage.

"Our responsibility is to perfect the American Revolution," he said.

"These rights don't come from the state, they come from God himself."

An eloquent orator, Bevel still awes crowds. He holds revivals and workshops, and speaks on the radio. New Life Baptist Church in Chicago sponsors many of the programs he runs. And he's often invited as a speaker at events nationwide, where he speaks about the new fight.

When he speaks, he points out four battlefields in the new fight for equality: murder, the "mis-education" of children, economic exploitation and sexual perversity.

His statements may raise an eyebrow or two, but he has never been concerned about judgmental people.

One of Bevel's key messages is that infidelity cuts into the fabric of life by taking people away from what they should be doing.

"Just like you prosecuted your white brothers on segregation, you've got to prosecute yourself on fornication," is his advice to the black male. "God said, 'I delivered you right? Now I got something for you, too. I'm demanding that you treat sisters the same way. Is that too much to ask?'"

As for Bevel, he is married to his fourth wife. He explains, "The lie I had in me was that female was for my sexual pleasure. I needed a female that will serve God and God only."

Bevel said he realized that his lust came from eating meat, because, according to Genesis, the first book of the Bible, God mentions plants, not animals, as food.

"Should I study agriculture, biology and chemistry or go out and kill animals?" he demanded. "I done turned myself into a wolf and a buzzard."

Despite his decorated civil rights background, he has come under fire for supporting characters such as Lyndon LaRouche and James Earl Ray.

In 1992, Bevel ran for vice president under Lyndon LaRouche, a political activist and economist who was convicted for mail and tax fraud and illegal fund-raising practices.

When LaRouche first asked Bevel to run for vice president, he declined.

"I said, 'No, too many folks throwing rocks at you,'" Bevel joked. "I said, 'Look at you, you're a convicted felon and you're running for president. Your name is on every ballot in the country. A Negro smoke one reefer and he can't even vote.'"

Eventually, Bevel agreed to the vice presidential run and they received less than 1 percent of the popular vote.

Bevel also spoke out on behalf of James Earl Ray, who confessed to murdering King and later took back his confession.

After visiting Ray in jail, Bevel publicly stated that Ray deserved a trial.

"You would have thought I had been caught raping Mrs. King the way black folk treated me," Bevel said. "We don't have to like him, but if we are Americans, we have to see to it that he gets his day in court."

Bevel's reasoning for all his alliances, no matter how incongruous, is the same: "If you don't stand up for another man's rights, you're going to lose your own."

Lest anyone forget his role in the 1960s, around Bevel's neck hangs a round, silver pendant, engraved with a man looking at a hand and the words: "I have a dream."

Bevel has a knack for communicating with the public, especially youth, according to the Rev. Charles Koen, director of United Front Inc., a carpentry school that trains students to become members of the carpenter's union.

Bevel serves as minister of education for United Front.

"He understands thoroughly the American system and what the forefathers meant for America to be. He has been able to break them down into everyday language that people can understand," Koen said. "I'm confident that one day America will exhort his greatness in terms of service to the people of America and specifically to black people."

Bevel's energy comes from his faith, Koen said.

"I think that he's just a spiritual man and the spirit of God gives him that drive," Koen said.

Bevel received that faith as a boy, when he realized that his calling was the ministry. He was born in Mississippi in 1936, and after briefly serving in the U.S. military, he enrolled in the American Baptist Theological Seminary in Nashville, Tenn.

In 1957, the Rev. Martin Luther King called for intelligent and courageous leadership from the black community. Bevel, a college freshman, joined the cause.

Despite being Baptist, Bevel has close ties to the Nation of Islam.

When asked how he reconciles the belief systems, he laughed and said, "Ain't but one God. If there were 15 gods, then we could have a debate."

Bevel's administrative assistant, Lorenzo Melton, 39, is a member of the Nation of Islam and also a disciple student at Bevel's University of Civilization, a school that applies faith to the battleground in the new fight for equality. Melton, formerly a disillusioned Cleveland schoolteacher, heard Bevel speak at a Cleveland mosque a few years ago, and became hooked.

"Here's this Baptist preacher teaching the fundamental principles of Islam," Melton said. "I discovered how the '60s movement was nothing more than Christian ministers applying theological principles. That really moved me."

Now Melton helps Bevel with his many programs, including the 9th Ward/43rd Precinct Family Association, an unofficial "governing council" with a mission statement of promoting marital fidelity and "serving the health, interest, rights and needs" of citizens.

The association has gained the interest of local aldermen.

"I've gotten to see the things he's interested in and those things seem kind of positive," said Ald. Michael Chandler (24th.) "It's kind of difficult to organize people. It's a tough task. I think over the past, history says he has been good at organizing people."

Bevel's clinics and programs aren't just for black people, and he is never one to let talk center too much around race.

"I'm calling you a white this and you're calling me a black that, but here, the dishes on the table need to be washed," he explained.

Although he has a blunt sense of humor, Bevel takes his life's calling very seriously.

"Working on America is as serious to me as working on a man to know Christ," he said. "If these things do not get done, I will have failed as a man on Earth."