JFK Assassination a Reminder: The Struggle Continues

By Carl Snowden

The year was 1963. It started off as just another beautiful day. I was in class at Annapolis Elementary School on Green Street. Suddenly, my homeroom teacher came into our classroom. She was crying. She told us that we were dismissed and could go home early.

We shouted in joy and in unison. It was a Friday and we were getting out of school early.

I lived in downtown Annapolis at the time. I was a walker. As I joined with my friends in taking the short walk from Green Street to Pinkney Street, I noticed that all of the adults were either crying or agitated. I had no idea why.

When I reached my home, my family had surrounded a small black-and-white television set. Some of them were crying. As I looked at the television screen, I saw a reporter, who said, "President Kennedy has been shot."

Some people in my family pontificated that this happned because President John F. Kennedy was trying to help African-Americans. Others thought he was killed because of his ideology.

Even though, I was just a youngster, I instinctively knew that something serious had taken place. The assassination of President Kennedy was my first recognition that America had lost its innocence.

I have been an eyewitness to history. I have seen bullets and not ballots change the course of history.

I lived through the assassinations of President Kennedy, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King Jr. and Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, all in one decade. The places in Dallas, Harlem, Memphis and Los Angles where each of these men were gunned down are stark reminders of what a bullet can do and how dreams can be shattered. 

How different America might have been had any of these leaders lived longer. President Kennedy's call to action -- when he said, "My fellow Americans, ask not what you country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country" – inspired a whole generation, including me.

I saw firsthand that people responded to his call of service. Students marched for peace and civil rights. Leaders advocated racial equality. Environmentalists worked to preserve the Earth. There was a sense that we were part of a great movement for social change.

Then the unthinkable happen -- one assassination after another.

I wept when Malcolm was murdered. I prayed when Martin Luther King Jr. was gunned down. And after the assassination of Bobby Kennedy, it took me a long time to believe that change could come from ballots and not bullets.

On this 53rd anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination and looking ahead to the inauguration of a president-elect who became more famous for advocating building walls than building bridges, my faith is unshaken. I have faith in the future.

I know that there is a power in the universe that put wetness in water and blue in the sky, and that allows birds to fly. I know that history is replete with examples of progress being made against great obstacles. I know that every knock-down is not a knockout.

Every now and then, it is important to reflect on the words of President Kennedy when he said, "Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind." It was the Rev. King who said, "Only when it gets dark enough can you see the stars."

I believe that our best days are ahead of us. In the words of Frederick Douglass, "Where there is progress, there is struggle."

On the anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination, it is in that spirit that I say A Luta Continua, which in Portuguese means the struggle continues.

Carl Snowden is a longtime civil rights activist from Annapolis. Contact him at carl_snowden@hotmail.com.