Alabama Government Apologizes to Last Surviving Victim of 1963 KKK Bombing

Written By @cabbagepatchgrl

In 1963, in Birmingham, Al., the Ku Klux Klan ripped through a 16th Street Baptist Church basement.

Sarah Collins Rudolph was just 12 years old when the explosion went off inside the basement.

Rudolph survived the bombing, but she lost an eye and was hospitalized for months. Her sister and three other young girls were not fortunate enough and died in the blast. Since that violent Sunday night, she has been haunted by the medical bills and the trauma.

Rudolph has made multiple pleas to get an apology and compensation. But finally, On Tuesday, the Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey tried to make amends for the hateful crime that happened over 57 years and 15 days ago.

In a letter, Governor Ivey wrote, “There should be no question that Ms. Collins Rudolph and the families of those who perished — including Ms. Collins Rudoloph’s sister, Addie Mae, as well as Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson and Carole Denice McNair — suffered an egregious injustice that has yielded untold pain and suffering over the ensuing decades.” She continued, “For that, they most certainly deserve a sincere, heartfelt apology — an apology that I extend today without hesitation or reservation.”

Weeks before, Rudolph went through her lawyers to press the governor to offer her restitution for the years of physical and emotional pain she has faced.

On September 14, Her lawyers sent a letter to the governor on behalf of “the fifth little girl,” stating that the KKK bombing was encouraged by state leaders. The white supremacist group was specifically “inspired and motivated by then-Gov. George Wallace’s racist rhetoric.” The letter then adds that Wallace and other state leaders during that time “played an undisputed role in encouraging its citizens to engage in racial violence.”

Wallace was known to be in support of segregation throughout the South. Right before the bombing, during his gubernatorial inauguration month, he delivered the line, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever!”

Later in that year, he wanted to end the integration of students at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa by blocking the auditorium’s doorway on the school’s campus to stop two Black students from entering.

In 1965, the FBI built a case against KKK members, but “witnesses were reluctant to talk, and physical evidence was lacking.” No charges were ever filed, and the bombers of the 16th Street Baptist Church escaped immediate prosecution.

In 1970, the case was reopened by Alabama State Attorney General Robert Baxley. Seven years later, Klansman Robert Chambliss was sentenced to life in prison for McNair’s murder.

In 1995, the FBI reopened their own investigation, which led to the convictions of Thomas Blanton in 2001 and Frank Bobby Cherry in 2002.

In 1994, the fourth KKK member, Herman Cash, died of cancer, so he was never charged.

In 2013, the four girls who were killed in the bombing received posthumous Congressional Gold Medals days before the 50th anniversary.

Meanwhile, Rudolph has been trying to seek financial restitution at the state and municipal levels for decades. She has been working two jobs for most of her life as a cleaner and factory worker without any health insurance. “I still shake. I still jump when I hear loud sounds,” she told NPR in a 2013 interview. “Every day I think about it, just looking in the mirror and seeing the scars on my face. I’m reminded of it every day,” she said.

In October of 2013, Rudolph reached out to the Birmingham City Council for financial assistance, but Mayor William Bell said that now was not a good time to cut her a check. But according to Rudolph’s lawyers, now is the right time for “long overdue justice.”
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However, Governor Ivey feels that they are not sure that they can hold the state accountable for the violent attack on the church. She wrote, “Having said that, there should be no question that the racist, segregationist rhetoric used by some of our leaders during that time was wrong and would be utterly unacceptable in today’s Alabama.”

Governor Ivey has agreed to sit down with attorneys from her office, the state legislature, and Rudolph’s lawyers to discuss race and her latest demands.

However, Ivey says that she will not be committing to any type of financial restitution. She wrote that starting a conversation “without prejudice for what any final outcome might produce” could be part of her administration’s efforts “to foster fruitful conversations about the all-too-difficult — and sometimes painful — topic of race, a conversation occurring not only in Alabama but throughout America.”