Abernathy, Ralph (1926–1990)

Born in Linden, Alabama, on March 11, 1926, Ralph David Abernathy was the 10th child of W. L. Abernathy, a farmer, and his wife Louivery. Abernathy became a close friend and partner of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. and worked to carry on King's legacy as head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

Abernathy received a religious upbringing within the Baptist church. After serving in the army during World War II, he entered Alabama State University in Montgomery in 1945 and there decided to become a minister. He was named pastor of Montgomery's First Baptist Church in 1952, and Martin Luther King, Jr., then pastor of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, soon became a good friend. With King, Abernathy was instrumental in the foundation of the Montgomery Improvement Association and in the yearlong boycott of the city's buses after Rosa Parks was arrested in 1955 for refusing to comply with segregation laws.

Abernathy and his family relocated to Atlanta in 1961, and he became pastor of West Hunter Baptist Church. King had also moved to Atlanta, and both men were prominent within the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), a civil rights organization founded in 1957. As the civil rights movement escalated, Abernathy was by King's side during its most important battles, including Albany, Georgia, in 1962; Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963; Selma, Alabama, in 1965; and Chicago, Illinois, in 1966. Abernathy was intimately familiar with nearly every tactic that has since made the civil rights movement exemplary. He raised money to release jailed activists, participated in voter registration, helped craft desegregation agreements, and was the southern coordinator for the 1963 March on Washington.

When King was murdered in April 1968, Abernathy—who was with him at the time and identified his body—became president of the SCLC. That summer, Abernathy set up Resurrection City near the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., to continue the Poor People's Campaign King had started before his death by publicizing the condition of the poor. Abernathy also sustained SCLC involvement in direct action protests, marching with striking hospital workers in Charleston in 1969, supporting César Chávez's United Farm Workers Union, and helping the FBI and Native American activists reach an agreement at Wounded Knee in 1973.

Abernathy left the SCLC in 1977 and ran unsuccessfully for Congress. Disillusioned with the Democratic Party, he campaigned for Ronald Reagan in 1980 and became vice president of the conservative American Freedom Coalition in 1987. He published an autobiography, And the Walls Came Tumbling Down, in 1989. Abernathy died on April 17, 1990. His life encompassed both the successes of the civil rights [Page 2]movement and the challenges of sustaining its influence after the 1960s.