James Patterson for The New York Times
The federal courthouse in Meridian, Miss., built in 1933, is scheduled to close. The post office in the building will remain open.
MERIDIAN, Miss. — Across the street from a barbershop and upstairs from a post office sits a big empty room where Mississippi once began to face up to itself.
Even on a steamy humdrum Thursday afternoon, this city's stately federal courtroom looks like the kind of place where momentous things could happen, as they once did. The legal campaign to integrate the University of Mississippi got under way here in May 1961, and it was here that a local posse of Klansmen who murdered three civil rights workers faced justice at the hands of their neighbors, the first time that had happened in Mississippi.
The court has remained in use over the decades since, though with a lower profile. Soon, however, it will be shut down for good, a victim of its quietness and the fiscal urgencies of Washington.
Since 1996, the Judicial Conference of the United States, a group of senior judges who set policy for federal courts, has periodically culled the network of federal courthouses around the country, determining which nonresident courthouses, those without a sitting judge, are no longer worth maintaining.
Facing a growing budget crunch — one that could become much worse if a deal to avert the $100 billion in automatic spending cuts known as sequestration is not reached by Jan. 2 — the conference announced last week that six such courthouses would be shut down, mostly in small towns in the Southeast. The conference estimates that the closings will save around $1 million.
The courtroom here, where cases in the easternmost counties in Mississippi's Southern District are tried by visiting judges, was on the list.
The 79-year-old building itself is not closing. Meridian's main post office still takes up the ground floor, and residents would not let that go without a fight. But as in so many downtowns throughout the country, the central outpost that once reminded everyone that there was a federal government at work has over time been stripped of its purpose.
"Used to be all the federal agencies were here," said Charles Braddock, who works in maintenance for the Postal Service.
Now on the second floor, where the only light comes in through frosted-glass windows and a thin chain cordons off the doors to the courtroom, it is almost eerie.
On a recent morning, there was no one on the floor but a man in a camouflage hat.
"I don't suppose the F.B.I.'s going to be around today?" he asked. There is an F.B.I. field office on the floor, but no one was there. The man left.
Tina Poole, who works cleaning the building, opened the courtroom doors. The beauty is not lost on anyone who works here: the lofty and painted ceiling, the craftsmanship in a wooden eagle and the sunburst that surrounds it, the holding cell with the intricately carved wooden benches, and the plush gravity of the judge's chambers. Parts of the building seem haunted.
"You know about those three civil rights workers?" Ms. Poole asked unprompted. "Their bodies were kept downstairs in the basement where we now have our credit union."
It was about 30 miles north of here, in the town of Philadelphia, that the civil rights workers James Earl Chaney, Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman were jailed, released and shot point-blank in an ambush on a country road on June 21, 1964. The Klansmen who were part of the conspiracy, or most of them, at least, were put on trial here three years later.
Stanley Dearman, 80, covered the trial as a local reporter. He had broken stories in this room before: in 1961, acting on a tip from a court clerk, he was the first to report that a suit had been filed here on James Meredith's behalf to desegregate the University of Mississippi.
Three years later, Mr. Dearman went to work at The Meridian Star early one morning and was told by his editor that Mr. Schwerner had gone to Neshoba County with two others the day before and had not come back. Roscoe Jones Sr., 65, remembers as well. He had been invited to join the trip to Philadelphia, but he had an appointment with a church youth group. "I would have been dead as anyone else," he said. He went to the trial, every day of it.
By IAN AUSTEN 18 Sep, 2012
-
Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/18/us/mississippi-courthouse-with-rich-civil-rights-past-set-to-close.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
--
Manage subscription | Powered by rssforward.com
Anda sedang membaca artikel tentang
Mississippi Courthouse With Rich Civil Rights Past Set to Close
Dengan url
http://ishappyhealthy.blogspot.com/2012/09/mississippi-courthouse-with-rich-civil.html
Anda boleh menyebar luaskannya atau mengcopy paste-nya
Mississippi Courthouse With Rich Civil Rights Past Set to Close
namun jangan lupa untuk meletakkan link
Mississippi Courthouse With Rich Civil Rights Past Set to Close
sebagai sumbernya
0 komentar:
Posting Komentar