It was June 21, 1964, when Ku Klux Klan members in Neshoba County, Miss. killed three young civil rights workers, who were in Mississippi participating in Freedom Summer, an intensive voter registration drive aimed at breaking Mississippi’s resistance to civil rights for African Americans.
The three men were investigating the burning of a black church when they were arrested by a county deputy, held for several hours and then disappeared.
On Aug. 4, 1964, the bodies of the victims were found in an earthen dam after investigators got a tip from an informant. The case was dramatized in the movie “Mississippi Burning.” Even though the identities of the killers were known in the area, they were never brought to justice under state law. Eventually, federal authorities convicted several men of violating the civil rights of the victims and obtained prison terms, although several other defendants were acquitted.
In September 2009, United States Congressman Bennie Thompson (D), who represents Mississippi’s second congressional district introduced H.R. 3562 to designate the new Federal Bureau of Investigations building located at 1220 Echelon Parkway in Jackson as the “James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner and Roy K. Moore building. On Sept. 30, 2010, President Barack Obama signed the legislation into law.
The naming dedication ceremony took place 47 years to the date of the deaths of the three civil rights workers.
Family members of two of the workers and Moore, the FBI agent who headed the investigation of the workers gathered under sunny skies to witness Mississippi righting a wrong. “I think this in a real sense rights a wrong and shows that justice in the end really does prevail,” said Thompson. “When this bill passed both houses of Congress without opposition, it was a great day in America and a major milestone for Mississippi.”
Angela Lewis, just 10 days old when her father James Chaney was killed addressed the more than 400 gathered in Jackson. “We have services to commemorate 9-11 and the hard work of our soldiers, but when a family gets recognized for its services, there doesn’t need to be a building named or a service, because we never forget. Sometimes there is grieving among family members and sometimes there is a celebration of love, but the fact that you are doing this this morning shows that you remember,” Lewis said. “On behalf of my daddy and the Chaney family, I’m honored and grateful.”
David Goodman, Andrew Goodman’s brother told the audience that he was 17 when his brother was murdered.
“There are always some bad people in any place, but basically we’re a great nation full of great people, and the state of Mississippi has shown the rest of the country what you can do positively,” Goodman said. “Having my brother’s name on an FBI building is beautiful and a little ironic, I must admit, because the FBI did crack this case, but the whole country, not just Mississippi, was racist to a greater or lesser extent. It wasn’t just in one state, or two or three or five.”
In July 1964, Moore opened Jackson’s first FBI office with his main task: finding out who killed those three civil rights workers.
In 1967, seven men were convicted of conspiring to violate the civil rights of the three murder victims.
On June 21, 2005, the 41st anniversary of the killings, Edgar Ray Killen, the mastermind of the crime was convicted and sentenced to three 20-year terms. He is 86 years old.
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