[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 158 (2012), Part 1]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page 25]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                   THE LEGACY OF BISHOP L.M. MITCHELL

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                           HON. PHIL GINGREY

                               of georgia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Friday, January 13, 2012

  Mr. GINGREY of Georgia. Mr. Speaker, the Civil Rights exhibit, ``The 
Road to Freedom,'' honors the legacy of Bishop L.M. Mitchell and the 
leadership exemplified by great faith and courage.
  As a successful entrepreneur himself, he exposed black 
entrepreneurship to Rome, Georgia. He taught practical principles to 
the church, inspiring the followers to open a pathway for some type of 
business of their own.
  Lattace Mack Mitchell was born December 18, 1872, in South Carolina, 
the son of a former slave. He joined the Fire Baptize Church in his 
early teens, and organized his first church on October 23, 1912, in a 
shoe shop with three members. He attended Gammon Theological Seminary 
in South Carolina, and due to the depression, he had lived in New 
Hampshire and New York before moving to Atlanta, Georgia. He came to 
Atlanta in May 1919, and organized the Overcoming Church of God. He 
placed a tent on the corner of Ira and Bass Street in Atlanta, and 
preached night and day without fear or favor. From this, the Overcoming 
Church of God was organized and grew throughout the Southeast and 
Northeast parts of the United States
  He was led to Rome, Georgia, in 1921. The most memorable anecdote was 
a racial incident--as told by Bishop Mitchell--that when he and his 
partners came from Atlanta to Rome for the first time and attempted to 
go South on Broad Street, somewhere between Sixth Avenue and the Cotton 
Block, he was followed by a police car. While approaching the Etowah 
River Bridge, he was stopped by a white officer from the Rome City 
Police and asked where he was going. As a native of Atlanta, he had 
been put in jail many times for speaking out on injustices, and when 
the officer spoke to him, he proceeded getting out of his car; showing 
no fear. He was a black man driving a 1921 Black Cadillac. He was 6'6'' 
and he wore a size 15 shoe. He pointed ahead and looking down on him, 
he told the officer, ``Do you see that bridge? I'm going to cross that 
bridge, but I don't know what the condition of it will be, when I 
return.'' He was letting the officer know that he was not afraid of 
whatever might happen to him. He knew it was a possibility that the 
bridge might be impassable when he needed to cross back over. Yet he 
had no fear in addressing a white officer during a segregated time in a 
small rural town in 1921. Bishop Mitchell said the officer looked up 
and told him to get back into his car and proceed across the bridge.
  He continued coming to Rome and became a resident. He found a handful 
of saints worshiping under the leadership of Mother Ricks. He began 
preaching, day and night, at 200 Nixon Avenue. At that time, the church 
was in financial trouble. He helped the church get out of debt, and 
afterwards, it was completely renovated. The church was named New Hope.
  Bishop Mitchell was an entrepreneur, investing in rental property 
throughout the Rome community. He understood the disadvantages of being 
a black businessman in the South, but that did not stop him from 
reaching his goals. No matter what the opposition, the success of the 
church can be attributed to the zeal and honesty of the man who is 
credited with founding the New Hope Overcoming Church in Rome, Georgia. 
He lived at 500 Wilson Avenue and served as leader of the Church of God 
for forty-six years, until his death in 1966. He was the first to be 
buried in the Shadyside Memorial Gardens, a cemetery located in South 
Rome. He was highly respected by his peers, who gave honorable remarks 
at his funeral services: Rev. J.L. Vaughn (Lovejoy Baptist Church), 
Rev. Clarence Tuggle (Thankful Baptist Church), Rev. G.P. Bowman (Mt. 
Calvary Baptist Church) and Rev. J.W. Baxter (Solomon Temple).

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