Let’s rebuild the Bronx coalition -- it’s what MLK Jr. would have wanted

Praying with my legs. That’s what Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel called it when he walked with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. during the 1965 in Alabama from Selma to Montgomery.

Nearly a dozen rabbis were in that march and African Americans wore yarmulkes in honor of the Jewish clergy who joined them. State and local police used billy clubs, whips and tear gas to attack the civil rights activists who participated on that day.  Firefighters turned water hoses on them.

Twenty years later, on the morning of my 18th birthday, I walked into the kitchen. My mom wished me a happy birthday and handed me a voter registration card. I guess the disappointment showed on my face.

Her next words were, “People, both Black and white, died for you to have the right to vote. You owe it to them to vote and to always be a part of the solution.”

I knew what she was referring to. In June 1964, the Ku Klux Klan murdered three young men who had traveled to Mississippi to register Black voters. Their names were Michael Schwerner, James Chaney and Andrew Goodman. Schwerner and Goodman were Jewish.  Chaney was Black.

The history of Black and Jewish people fighting side by side for civil rights in the U.S. is a powerful story of solidarity, mutual respect and support. From the start of the NAACP in 1909 (whose founders included Henry Moskowitz, the Executive Director of New York’s Broadway League, Lillian Wald and Rabbis Emil G. Hirsh and Stephen S. Wise) to advocacy by individuals like Albert Einstein -- this history shows a deep alliance between these two peoples who were often used as scapegoats and experienced unspeakable horrors. We have both experienced discrimination and violence.

Unfortunately, history seems to be repeating itself. But if we remember our shared legacy of collaboration and broaden our coalition to include all the ethnic enclaves of the Bronx -- Irish and Italian Americans, Latinos and Asians -- then decency and goodness will win over hate and divisiveness. That’s what Martin would have wanted.

Danielle Herbert-Guggenheim is running for New York City Council to represent the 11^th District.