A pioneer in civil rights litigation will be the keynote speaker for Mississippi State’s Black History Month events.
Morris Dees, a co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center in Montgomery, Ala., will lecture at 7 p.m. Thursday at The Union ballroom.
Dees has a thorough understanding of the civil rights movement in the United States, said Holmes Cultural Diversity Center director Aretha Jones-Cook.
He began working in the courts for minorities in 1967 and co-founded the Southern Poverty Law Center with Joseph Levin in 1971. He has filed many civil rights-related lawsuits since.
Dees was invited to speak because of his leadership in promoting civil rights for all, Cook said. He has served as a lawyer who works toward justice for minorities and the poor, demonstrating his passion for aiding those in need, she added.
The main goal of the program, she said, is to inform and educate students to make intelligent decisions. Cook said these issues need to be addressed, and Dees will provide a perspective of past and present injustices and hope for the future.
Cook said Dees, whom she first heard speak in the 1980s, has titled his speech for Thursday night’s event “Justice for All.”
Civil rights means fairness and justice for all; everyone is born with these rights, Cook said. Dees has worked to bring this fairness to individuals on the personal and employment level, she added.
Some disagree with Dees and his practices, though.
Matthew Robinson, chairman of the Robert E. Lee branch of the Mississippi League of the South, said his organization will be on campus to protest Dees’s visit.
The league will not be protesting Black History Month or what it celebrates, he said, but they will set up a table and hand out educational literature describing the ways they believe Dees is not standing for the appropriate values.
A press release from the league listed “two specific things that are of particular importance for the good people of Mississippi to understand about Morris Dees and the SPLC.” The items listed include Dees’s challenge of public schools that use Internet filters to restrict access to Web sites containing gay and lesbian information and resources and the law center’s legal actions against Alabama Judge Roy Moore for displaying the 10 Commandments in a public building.
Black Student Alliance president Eric Wesley said he thinks it will be good to hear Dees’s side of this story and gain an objective perspective on the controversy. Students can gain a better understanding of Dees, Wesley said, and then they can judge whether the SPLC is beneficial or just for Dees’ financial gain.
If his beliefs are real, Wesley said, then the SPLC is a great thing.
The protest could draw a larger crowd to the event, because people will want to know why there is such a controversy, he added.
“His visit will be an educational experience for all students, of any race, gender, or age, because of the controversy surrounding it,” Wesley said.
Dees has been featured in two movies, “Ghosts of Mississippi” and “Line of Fire,” and has written three books, including an autobiography.