Audio Transcription
Audio 3
Truth to Power
Bishop Hubbard:
Boy, she really was an extraordinary woman. She was not well educated. She had a large family. And she was living in one of the deteriorating blocks in the city of Albany. And at that point in time, black people were just gaining their voice. And for someone to speak the truth to power, took a great deal of strength and determination and courage. And for someone with little education and with little economic worth, for her to go out on a limb and become a spokesman for her brothers and sisters in that neighborhood, when it could have meant a lot of intolerance and scorn and perhaps retaliation, I thought was tremendously courageous and admirable on her part.
She, although not well educated, was a born leader. And when she was able to get skills in terms of community-organizing, that was provided to a great degree through an organizing project out of Trinity Institute, she was able to come into her own. And she became a spokesperson for her community. She was willing to talk to church groups; she was willing to talk to civic organizations; she was willing to be interviewed with the newspapers and use her name, not hiding behind anonymity. And she was willing to go up and sit down across the table from the Mayor or from the Commissioner of Social Services or from a Committee of the New York State Legislature and tell it how it is at the local level in a way that was forceful, but also dignified and respectful. I mean, while she knew the language of the streets and could speak that language when she had to, she could also speak from her heart and with compassion borne of her own lived experience of poverty, of injustice, of subjugation. And she did it with a great deal of integrity and a great deal of dignity. And her willingness, at the risk of personal retaliation, to stand up like she did is something I’ll never forget.
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