[Congressional Record Volume 156, Number 117 (Wednesday, August 4, 2010)]
[Senate]
[Page S6730]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                        REMEMBERING ROBERT HICKS

 Ms. LANDRIEU. Mr. President, it brings me great sadness that I 
come to the Senate floor today to reflect upon the passing of Robert 
Hicks, a lion in the Louisiana civil rights movement whose legal 
victories helped topple segregation in Bogalusa and change 
discriminatory employment practices throughout the South, passed away 
Tuesday, April 13, in his home at the age of 81.
  Born in Mississippi, but moved to Bogalusa at a young age, Robert 
Hicks was the youngest of three children born to Quitman and Maybell 
Hicks in 1929. He graduated from Central Memorial High School, where he 
played on the school's State champion football team. He later played 
offensive guard on The Bushmen, an all-Black semipro team.
  Mr. Hicks began his civil rights work as a member of the local NAACP 
before working with the Voter and Civic League. He helped organize 
daily marches to protest racial discrimination by merchants and city 
government in a crusade that thrust Bogalusa into the national 
spotlight. The Hicks family opened their home to White civil rights 
workers and national figures. Because of this, the family was targeted 
by the Ku Klux Klan, which in turn motivated the formation of the 
Deacons for Defense and Justice, an armed band of African-American men 
who stood guard at the Hicks' home and protected civil rights workers 
in the city. The 2003 Showtime movie ``Deacons of Defense'' was loosely 
based on the group.
  As fellow civil rights worker Peter Jan Honigsberg wrote in his 
memoir recalling his experience volunteering in Bogalusa in the summers 
of 1966 and 1967 about Hicks, ``Even today I still think of him . . . 
He was determined to do what he had to do to change the South.'' Mr. 
Hicks filed a landmark lawsuit against the city and police department 
of Bogalusa, obtaining a Federal court order requiring the police to 
protect protest marchers, and a lawsuit that overturned officials' 
refusal to allow protest marchers. In 1967, Mr. Hicks filed a suit 
against the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing, which resulted 
in the prohibition of the construction of public housing in segregated 
neighborhoods in Bogalusa.
  Mr. Hicks began working at Crown Zellerbach, the local paper mill, at 
a time when few Black people were employed there and eventually he 
served as president of the Brotherhood of Pulp, Sulphite and Paper Mill 
Workers. After fighting Crown Zellerbach for years in Federal court, 
Mr. Hicks became the company's first African-American supervisor, a 
position he held until his retirement.
  Mr. Hicks and his wife Valeria had six children during their 62-year 
union. With his wife, Mr. Hicks traveled the country, spreading the 
word about the conditions for Black people in the South and encouraging 
people to travel to Bogalusa and other Southern cities to campaign for 
civil rights. Besides his wife, thoughts and prayers go out to his 
survivors, including a daughter, Barbara Maria Hicks; three sons, 
Robert Lawrence, Gregory Vince, and Darryl Hicks; a sister, Grace 
Berry; 17 grandchildren; and 14 great-grandchildren. The work of Robert 
Hicks will be forever remembered by the Bogalusa community, which is 
renaming a street and holding a ceremony in his honor.

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