A social worker and Unitarian Universalist minister, James Reeb (1927-1965) was severely beaten by a group of white men in Selma on March 9, 1965. Reeb died of head trauma two days later in a Birmingham hospital. His death shocked the nation and was referred to in a press conference by Pres. Lyndon Johnson, who then asked Congress in a national address to pass the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Reeb entered Princeton Theological Seminary in Princeton, New Jersey, and also served as chaplain at Philadelphia General Hospital in nearby Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. After graduating in 1953, he continued working at the hospital and also volunteered with inner-city youth through the Philadelphia YMCA. He was granted fellowship as a Unitarian Universalist minister in 1959 and moved to Washington, D.C. to become assistant minister at All Souls Church, located in a poor black neighborhood. There, Reeb organized the University Neighborhood Council to address the growing social needs of the neighborhood surrounding the church and soon dedicated the majority of his time to social issues. Leaving the pulpit to pursue social ministry, Reeb moved to Boston to work for the Quaker-run American Friends Service Committee, settling with his wife and four children in an economically depressed black neighborhood in Dorchester against the advice of his contemporaries. He took up the cause of low-income housing, launching a public campaign for new safety and building codes in early 1965.

The out-of-town clergy who had answered King's call, together with hundreds of local African American citizens, demonstrated that afternoon at the site of the Bloody Sunday attack. After prayer in the evening, activities ceased until the following day. Reeb, Olsen, and Miller then headed to a Selma cafe for dinner. Leaving on foot after their meal, the three inadvertently walked onto a side street in the all-white part of town. Passing by the Silver Moon Café, an all-white establishment, and easily identifiable as outsiders associated with the voting rights march, the three ministers were attacked by men with clubs, one of which cracked James Reeb's skull.
Requiring medical attention and likely to be denied treatment by physicians at Selma's all-white hospital, Reeb was taken to Burwell Infirmary, the town's medical facility for African Americans. The head of the infirmary, D. W. Dinkins, immediately determined that treatment from a team of neurologists was necessary to deal with Reeb's injuries, care that could be obtained closest in Birmingham, 100 miles away.
As physicians in Birmingham were alerted about Reeb's condition, an ambulance from a black funeral home transported Reeb, Miller, Clark, Dinkins, and an attendant to the University of Alabama at Birmingham (UAB) hospital. However, en route to Birmingham, the mixed-race group had to deal with a flat tire and delayed aid from law enforcement, which had pledged assistance in getting the victim to Birmingham as quickly as possible. By the time Reeb arrived at UAB, word of his life-threatening injuries at the hands of white supremacists in Alabama had made headlines across the country.

Reeb lingered on life support for a day and a half after surgery at UAB. Reporters from throughout the nation kept vigil outside the hospital, and Marie Reeb was interviewed by television reporters on Wednesday evening, March 10. She explained to them that because he believed in the aims of the civil rights movement, almost nothing could have stopped her husband from going to Selma, though he knew the risks associated with doing so. On the morning after that interview, Reeb was taken off life support and passed away. He was 38 years old.
Upon learning of Reeb's death, groups nationwide staged demonstrations in support of the civil rights movement and in memory of the young minister considered to have given his life to the cause. A formal memorial service was held at Brown Chapel AME Church in Selma, at which King, flanked by ministers of all faiths, gave a rousing eulogy entitled, "A Witness to the Truth." Elsewhere, an estimated 30,000 gathered for a service in his memory in Boston, and memorials and marches also were held in Washington, D.C.; Northfield, Minnesota; Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; and Princeton University.

In the wake of the attack on James Reeb, four Selma men were arrested and charged with murder, but they were immediately released on bond. A few months after Reeb's death, an all-white, all-male jury in Dallas County acquitted Elmer Cook, Stanley Hoggle, and O'Neal Hoggle of all charges; the fourth individual left Alabama for Mississippi and the judge declared he did not have to stand trial.
Reeb was cremated and his ashes scattered in Wyoming. The James Reeb Unitarian Universalist Congregation in Madison, Wisconsin, was named in his honor in 1993.
Additional Resources
Garrow, David. Protest at Selma: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978.
Additional Resources
Garrow, David. Protest at Selma: Martin Luther King, Jr. and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1978.
Howlett, Duncan. No Greater Love: The James Reeb Story. New York: Harper & Row, 1966.
Kent, Martin. Free at Last: Civil Rights Heroes. VHS video. Beverly Hills, Calif.: World Almanac Video, 1999.