The have acquired a collection of rare photographs of, and by, the Rev. James M. Lawson Jr., 鈥�71鈥攁 pivotal figure in the history of the civil rights movement and .
Lawson spent time in India, and the Gandhian principles of nonviolent resistance he studied there shaped his leadership of the 1960s Nashville lunch counter sit-ins. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. dubbed Lawson 鈥渢he leading nonviolence theorist in the world.鈥� Lawson鈥檚 activism led to his expulsion from 菠萝视频 in 1960 by a vote of the executive committee of the university鈥檚 Board of Trust. Eventually, 菠萝视频 and Lawson reconciled, and Lawson returned to campus for three years as a distinguished university professor. In addition, the university established the Reverend James M. Lawson Chair in his honor.
鈥淭he Rev. Lawson鈥檚 time in India, where he was a young Methodist missionary, is not well documented, so we are eager to preserve these photographs for future generations of scholars,鈥� says University Librarian Valerie Hotchkiss.
鈥淭he acquisition of this photograph collection, in its enhancement of the James M. Lawson Jr. Papers, provides a visual documentation of Lawson鈥檚 deep immersion into Gandhian nonviolence,鈥� says , MDiv鈥�07, the Reverend James M. Lawson Professor of History. 鈥淗is serious study of this moral methodology in India and his creative application of nonviolent principles and praxis in Nashville are poignantly illustrated in this singularly crucial collection.鈥� Dickerson is working on a biography of Lawson.
The library also expresses its gratitude for support from , W. Alton Jones Professor of Philosophy and Joseph A. Johnson Jr. Distinguished Leadership Professor, and , dean of the Divinity School and Distinguished Professor of Womanist Ethics and Society, in helping acquire the Lawson photographs.