By Joseph Green- Bishop
Texas Metro Correspondent
Dr. Roslyn Pope, a former chairman of the Humanities Department at Bishop College, who while a college student co-authored an influential civil rights manifesto that defined the objectives of the civil rights movement has passed.
Dr. Pope, who died January 19th, was eighty-four years old and lived in Arlington, Texas, according to her family.
A former chairperson of the Humanities Department at Bishop College, Dr. Pope wrote the manifesto while she was a college student at Spelman College in Atlanta where she was student body president.
The manifesto outlined grievances that students at Spelman and other academic institutions had. Inspired by Black student activism in the south in the early 1960s, the document harshly criticized segregation, substandard housing, racism in healthcare, police bias and the lack of equitable employment opportunities for African Americans.
“Every normal human being wants to walk the earth with dignity,” it stated. “…..and abhors any and all proscriptions placed upon him because of race or color.”
Assisted in the writing of the document by former NAACP President Julian Bond, who was a student at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Dr. Pope wrote that sit down demonstrations at segregated lunch counters throughout the nation were an example of the aspirations of Black people.
The manifesto, titled ‘An Appeal
For Human Rights’, was well received in the national civil rights community, particularly in organizations founded and led by young people.
It received national attention when it was published in newspapers in Georgia and in the New York Times. It was also entered in the Congressional Record by a member of the United States Senate.
Dr. Pope was born in Atlanta. Her father, Rogers, was a union activist while working for the United States Postal Service. Her mother, Ruth, was a homemaker.
Her parents assisted Dr. Pope in the distribution of the manifesto.
An enthusiastic and academically superior high school student, Dr. Pope won a scholarship that allowed her to study music and French in Paris during her junior year.
She also participated in a national Girl Scouts convention where she was the only African American in attendance. Additionally, she was an accomplished piano player.
An active participant in civil rights demonstrations while a college student, Dr. Pope earned a masters degree from Georgia State University in Atlanta, and a doctorate from Syracuse University in New York.
After teaching at Penn State University, she returned to the South where she joined the faculty at Bishop College which closed its doors in 1988.
Dr. Pope, who once worked in advertising sales for Southwestern Bell, is survived by two daughters, Rhonda and Donna; one brother, Webster; two grandchildren and one great-grandchild.
