Viola Liuzzo Biography

Viola Liuzzo was an American Unitarian Universalist civil rights activist. Despite being born white, Liuzzo had a deep sense of empathy and compassion for the African-Americans which was quite unique in itself as whites then seemed to abhor blacks. What initiated this empathy was the differential treatment meted out to African American despite living in the same country, same region and same city. Liuzzo came from a middle class background. Her family suffered from major financial crisis during the Great Depression. Despite being financially unstable and struggling in her life for a living, Liuzzo realized that the whites had certain essential advantages that were fundamentally not enjoyed by the African-Americans. Such racial discrimination and injustice was enough to stir the social activist inLiuzzo. She soon became politically and socially active, fighting for African-American community. She became a member of the Detroit chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Though Liuzzo knew the dangers involved, she did not back out and instead selflessly served the cause. On March 1965, she died while serving the cause. Posthumously, she was declared a martyre who died serving against racial injustice and discrimination. She was among the 40 civil rights activists honoured on the Civil Rights Memorial in Montgomery. She was also inducted into the Michigan Hall of Fame in 2006.