Viola Fauver Liuzzo (née Gregg; April 11, 1925 – March 25, 1965) was an American civil rights activist. In March 1965 she drove from her home in Detroit, Michigan to Alabama to support the Selma to Montgomery march for voting rights. On March 25 she was shot dead by three members of the Ku Klux Klan while driving activists between the cities.

An FBI informant, Gary T. Rowe, was involved in her death. His role in this and other events was not revealed until 1978. To deflect attention from the FBI, its head J. Edgar Hoover made defamatory claims about Liuzzo.

In 1983, after learning about the FBI's activities related to the Liuzzo case, her family filed a lawsuit against the FBI for not preventing her death and for damages because of false accusations. The suit was ultimately dismissed. Liuzzo was given many honors posthumously; her name was inscribed on the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama. Her grandson set up a scholarship in her honor.

Early life and education

Viola Fauver Gregg was born on April 11, 1925, in the small town of California, Pennsylvania, the elder daughter of Eva Wilson, a teacher, and Heber Ernest Gregg, a coal miner and World War I veteran. Her father had taught himself to read as a child and left school in the eighth grade. Her mother had a teaching certificate from Southwestern Pennsylvania Normal School (later California University of Pennsylvania and currently Pennsylvania Western University, California). The couple had a second daughter, Rose Mary, in 1930.

Heber lost his right hand in a mine explosion when they were living in Georgia. It was during the Great Depression, and the Greggs became solely dependent on Eva's income. She had difficulty finding anything other than short-term teaching positions. Struggling with poverty, when Viola was six the family decided to move from Georgia to Chattanooga, Tennessee, where Eva found a teaching position.

The family was very poor and lived in one-room shacks with no running water. The schools Liuzzo attended did not have adequate supplies, and teachers had little time to deal with the many children in need. Because the family moved so often, Liuzzo usually began and ended the year in different schools. Having been poor in Tennessee for much of her childhood and adolescence, she was close to the racially segregated nature of the South. This would have a powerful influence on her activism.

Michigan

In 1941, the Gregg family moved to Ypsilanti, Michigan, where her father sought work to assemble bombs at the Ford Motor Co. Viola dropped out of high school after a year and eloped at the age of 16. Her marriage did not last, and she returned to her family.

Two years later, the Gregg family moved to Detroit, Michigan, which was segregated by race. Tensions between whites and blacks were very high as they competed for jobs and housing in a city with many new residents, including immigrants. In the early 1940s there was violence and rioting between ethnic groups. Viola Gregg witnessed some of these, which influenced her later civil rights work.

Marriage and family

In 1943, she married George Argyris, the manager of a restaurant where she worked. They had two children, Penny and Evangeline Mary. They divorced in 1949. They had three children together: Tommy, Anthony Jr., and Sally. They also raised her first two daughters.

In 1964, she began attending the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Detroit and joined the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

That night, a white group beat and murdered civil rights activist James Reeb, a Unitarian Universalist minister from Boston, who had come to Selma for the second march. Many other clergy and sympathizers from across the country had also gathered for the second march.

On March 16, Liuzzo took part in a protest at Wayne State. She decided to do more. She called her husband to tell him she would be traveling to Selma to respond to Rev. King's call for people of all faiths to come, saying that the struggle "was everybody's fight." Leaving her children in the care of family and friends, she drove to Selma.

There she contacted the SCLC and was put to work delivering aid, welcoming and recruiting volunteers, and transporting volunteers and marchers to and from airports, bus terminals, and train stations. She volunteered the use of her car,

On March 21, 1965, more than 3,000 people began the third march. They were blacks, whites, working-class people, doctors, nurses, priests, nuns, rabbis, homemakers, students, actors, and farmers. Many notable civil rights leaders participated, including Martin Luther King Jr., and his wife Coretta Scott King, Ralph Abernathy, Ralph Bunche, and Andrew Young. It took five days for the protesters to reach their goal of Montgomery, the state capital. Along the way, other protesters joined and by the last day, some 25,000 marchers entered Montgomery. The event received widespread media coverage.

Liuzzo marched the first full day and returned to Selma for the night. On Wednesday, March 24, she rejoined the march four miles from the end. A celebration took place that night with national entertainers. Liuzzo helped at the first aid station. On Thursday, Liuzzo and other marchers reached the state capitol building, which still flew a Confederate flag together with the state flag. Rev. King Jr. addressed the crowd of 25,000, calling the march a "shining moment in American history."

Assassination

After the march, Liuzzo, assisted by Leroy Moton, a 19-year-old African American, continued shuttling marchers and volunteers from Montgomery back to Selma in her car. James Orange, an SCLC veteran, warned her that it was very dangerous and she should not drive to Montgomery.

As Liuzzo and Moton were driving along Route 80 to Selma, a car tried to force them off the road. After dropping passengers off, she and Moton headed back to Montgomery. While getting gas at a local filling station, they were subject to abusive, racist comments by other customers.

Liuzzo was stopped at a red light when a car with four white men pulled up alongside. When they saw the white woman and black man together, they followed Liuzzo as she tried to outrun them. They overtook the Oldsmobile and shot directly at Liuzzo, mortally wounding her twice in the head. The car veered into a ditch, crashing into a fence. The men were found to be members of the local Ku Klux Klan, including Gary Thomas Rowe, an FBI informant. The Ku Klux Klan had been active in Detroit in the early 20th century, but had declined after scandals in the early 1920s. This was one of their signs for intimidation.

The four Klan members in the car—Collie Wilkins (21), FBI informant Gary Rowe (34), William Eaton (41), and Eugene Thomas (43)—were quickly arrested. President Lyndon Johnson announced the arrests within 24 hours on national television. He focused on the positive work of FBI agents' solving Liuzzo's murder. The government wanted to divert scrutiny from the fact that one of the men, Gary Thomas Rowe Jr., was an FBI informant.

Wilkins, Eaton, and Thomas were indicted on April 22 in the State of Alabama for Liuzzo's death. FBI informant Rowe served as a witness. Rowe testified that Wilkins had fired two shots on the order of Thomas.

The Department of Justice charged the three defendants with conspiracy to intimidate African Americans under the 1871 Ku Klux Klan Act, a Reconstruction civil rights statute. The charges did not specifically refer to Liuzzo's murder. On December 3, the trio was found guilty by an all-white, all-male jury, and were sentenced to ten years in prison, a landmark in Southern legal history.

Wilkins and Thomas were free on bail while appealing their cases. They were each arrested and convicted of firearms violations, and sentenced to jail for those crimes. During this period, the January 15, 1966, edition of The Birmingham News published an ad offering Liuzzo's bullet-ridden car for sale. Asking $3,500, the ad read, "Do you need a crowd-getter? I have a 1963 Oldsmobile two-door in which Mrs. Viola Liuzzo was killed. Bullet holes and everything intact. Ideal to bring in crowds."

After all three defendants were convicted of the federal charges, state murder cases proceeded against Eaton and Thomas. Eaton, who had not previously been jailed, died of a heart attack on March 10.

The jury acquitted Thomas of the state murder charge after 90 minutes of deliberations.

On April 27, 1967, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans upheld the federal convictions of the surviving defendants. Thomas served six years in prison for the crime. Wilkins served seven years.

Due to threats from the Klan, both before and after his testimony, Gary Thomas Rowe went into the federal witness protection program. He died in 1998 in Savannah, Georgia, after having lived several decades under several assumed identities.

While attempting to hide the fact that an FBI informant was in the attack car, the FBI wanted to ensure that the agency was not held responsible for permitting its informant to participate in violent acts, without FBI surveillance or backup. Rowe had been an informant for the FBI since 1960. The FBI was aware that Rowe had participated in violent acts with KKK members. These included an attack on the Freedom Riders in 1961, and having a role in the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham in September 1963. During the investigation, the FBI did not test Rowe’s gun or the bullet casings for his fingerprints.

Legislation and subsequent lawsuits

thumb|200 px|Memorial to Viola Liuzzo in Lowndes County, Alabama

Liuzzo was condemned at the time by different racist organizations for having brought her death upon herself. Her decision to be part of such a dangerous undertaking was seen by some as controversial for a married mother of five.

Rowe was indicted in 1978 and tried for his involvement in the murder. The first trial ended in a hung jury, and the second trial ended in his acquittal.

In August 1983, the FBI was awarded $79,873 in court costs. These costs were later reduced to $3,645 after the ACLU appealed on behalf of the family.

Legacy

The Walter P. Reuther Library of Wayne State University contains original archival material related to Liuzzo and her case. The 'Viola Liuzzo Papers' contain documentation of the events of the murder, the resulting investigation, and the later legal actions taken by the Liuzzo Family.

The papers also contain FBI murder investigation files and completed Freedom of Information and Privacy Act (FOIPA) requests for the release of documents that documented the FBI's involvement with the Ku Klux Klan. Several documents are also related to the FBI, informants, and the Freedom Riders.

Laura Nessler wrote the play Outside Agitators (2014), based on Liuzzo. It premiered at the Prop Theater in Chicago, Illinois, on September 20, 2014.

Liuzzo was played by Tara Ochs in the 2014 film Selma.

Honors

Viola Liuzzo Park is located at Winthrop and Trojan in Detroit.

Liuzzo's name is inscribed on the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama, created by Maya Lin.

In 2011, the Viola Liuzzo Ethics Scholarship was started at Adrian College by her grandson, Joshua James Liuzzo.

In 2015, Wayne State University bestowed its first posthumous honorary doctorate degree to Liuzzo.

In 2019, a statue which honors Liuzzo was unveiled in Detroit.

In 2021, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson ordered the re-issue of the 1965 Winter/Water Wonderland license plates, in homage to Liuzzo; one was on her car when she drove from Detroit to Alabama. Secretary Benson said she had started her career in Montgomery, Alabama, and was moved by Liuzzo's advocacy to try to gain the vote for all people.

See also

  • James Reeb
  • William Lewis Moore
  • Murders of Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner
  • List of unsolved murders (1900–1979)
  • Lynching in the United States
  • Selma to Montgomery marches

Notes

References

  • Blake, John. Children of the Movement. Chicago Review Press, 2007,
  • Entin, Jonathan. Viola Liuzzo and the gendered politics of Martyrdom. Chicago Harvard Women's Law Journal, 2000, Volume 23, p. 249
  • Ingalls, Robert P. Hoods: The Story of the Ku Klux Klan. New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1979.
  • May, Gary. The Informant: The FBI, The Ku Klux Klan, and the Murder of Viola Liuzzo.. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005.
  • Siegel, Beatrice. Murder on the Highway: The Viola Liuzzo Story. Simon & Schuster. 1994.
  • Stanton, Mary. Vindicating Viola Liuzzo: murdered by the Klan, demonized by the FBI, and disgraced by the press, Viola Liuzzo sacrificed life and legacy for civil rights. Alabama Heritage, 1998.
  • Stanton, Mary. From Selma to Sorrow: The Life and Death of Viola Liuzzo. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1998.

Further reading

  • Viola Liuzzo biography at the Dictionary of Unitarian & Universalist Biography
  • Viola Liuzzo article, Encyclopedia of Alabama
  • (from the Detroit News web site)
  • FBI file on Viola Liuzzo
  • Short video slideshow created by Viola Liuzzo's daughter
  • Historical Marker Database – Viola Liuzzo
  • Details of Rowe's prosecution
  • Killed For Taking Part In 'Everybody's Fight' from NPR's Codeswitch