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Audio feature: Evers-Williams' speech excerpt—Beyond 'We Shall Overcome.'

Understand the deep history of America’s civil-rights movement then seize current opportunities to extend its legacy of justice and equality further today, Myrlie Evers-Williams told more than 300 people gathered in the University Center at the College of William and Mary on Jan. 24.

Evers-Williams, the widow of slain civil-rights leader Medgar Evers and former chairwoman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, called on members of the audience to look backward, “not in anger, not in hatred, but in an historical way—to look backward so we can build the future.”

During her lecture, which was sponsored by the College’s Office of Multicultural Affairs as part of the annual commemoration of Martin Luther King, Evers-Williams suggested that a lack of understanding of the history of civil rights could result in a reversal of gains that were realized. “Once you break down the barriers, it takes the same amount of energy to keep the doors of opportunity open,” she said. She expressed impatience with young people who have told her they do not vote because they believe that one vote does not count. King would emphasize, over and over again, the need to seize the rights of citizenship, she said.

“You no longer have to do what my generation did, to be downsized to nothing to go sign up to register,” she said. She talked about individuals who were beaten, who were dragged behind cars, who had their names published in newspapers leading to their mortgages being called in because they sought to exercise their franchise. “Because a few stood up, we are where we are today, where a person can say I won’t vote because I don’t believe my vote will count,” she said.

Throughout her speech, Evers-Williams extolled the sacrifices made by unnamed individuals of all races to further the civil-rights agenda. King repeatedly acknowledged them. “He was gracious. He realized these changes could not have taken place without the participation of everyone who felt the same way about equality and justice,” she said. She compared herself to King’s wife, Coretta Scott King, whom she said was a driving force behind King’s ascendancy as a civil-rights leader. In contrast, she admitted that she wanted Medgar Evers to distance himself from the movement and move his family out of Jackson, Miss., where they could have a more normal life. “I was afraid that what happened would happen,” she said, referring to the fact that her husband was assassinated near the front door of his home with his three children witnessing the tragedy in 1963.

Evers-Williams revealed that she would be 75 years old in March. She vowed to continue fighting for the cause of equality and an end to prejudice in the United States, although she said she doubted it would come about in her lifetime. “I want to be an old-lady hell-raiser,” she said. She challenged students at the College to work toward the same end in an effort to reassert America’s reputation in the world as a place where idealism concerning justice and freedom meet reality.

Referencing the evening’s program, which was scheduled to end with a rendition by the College’s Ebony Expressions Gospel Choir of what has become a de facto civil-rights anthem, “We Shall Overcome,” Evers-Williams said she hoped to sing a new song, “We Have Overcome.”

“I pledge to do my part,” she said, and she encouraged others to join with her in writing a new chorus of accomplishment and freedom. “What you dream can be if you go to work for it,” she said.