A personal reflection on visiting Montgomery, Alabama and the sites associated with Bryan Stevenson's Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), including the Legacy Museum and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice. The article discusses the author's apprehension about returning to the city amidst current social and political turmoil, but also expresses hope for a better future.
to Montgomery , Alabama , wasn’t my first visit. I had previously explored the city and the sites associated with Bryan Stevenson ’s Equal Justice Initiative in 2019, in what turned out to be a pivotal moment — after Donald Trump’s ascent to power, but before the Covid-19 pandemic brought the world to a standstill. It was also before the 2020 killing of George Floyd sparked widespread protests and a year of reconstruction.
So, despite my reservations, or maybe because of them, I returned to Montgomery to be saved from my anxieties and to receive, Lord willing, some fresh measure of hopefulness. You can get to the park by boat via the muddy waters of the Alabama River, which once trafficked enslaved Africans. Another route is via a shuttle that crosses railroad tracks laid by the enslaved, and which also served as delivery networks for human cargo.
EJI’s sites are outgrowths of its work providing free legal representation for people on death row. EJI is financially independent, with some of its earliest seed money coming from Stevenson’s own MacArthur “genius” grant in 1995. The nonprofit has attracted generous support in the years since from people who believe in Stevenson’s mission.
“It gives you a sense of the climate of Montgomery, that there was hostility and reluctance to address a marker that draws attention to elements of the city’s past,” Robinson says. “If we don’t talk about it, we wouldn’t be honoring those who made the sacrifices to get us where we are” is how one student put it after their visit.
The inclusion of Simpson’s work, and that of other Indigenous artists, shows the park’s ethos — a commitment to telling the full, complex story of America, inclusive of all its voices and perspectives. “These spaces were not ideal,” Saar says, “but they were a refuge for a lot of people that were trying to somehow survive outside of the horrors of colonialism.”
The final sculpture is the soaring National Monument to Freedom, which lists “over 122,000 surnames that nearly 5 million Black people adopted in 1870.”Civil Rights Movement history is another current running through the city. Both Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. emerged as movement leaders from the Montgomery bus boycott, which began in 1955 and culminated in 1956 in the desegregation of public transportation throughout the country.
Montgomery Alabama EJI Bryan Stevenson Legacy Museum National Memorial For Peace And Justice Freedom Monument Sculpture Park Reflection Hope Social Justice
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