SENATE BILL 2006
By Oliver HOUSE BILL 2230
By Love AN ACT to amend Tennessee Code Annotated, Title 15,
Chapter 2 and Title 49, relative to the Reverend Kelly Miller Smith, Sr. Week of Service.
WHEREAS, the Reverend Kelly Miller Smith, Sr., born October 28, 1920, was a preacher, author, and prominent activist in the Civil Rights Movement, who arrived in Nashville in 1951 and served for decades as the pastor of First Baptist Church, Capitol Hill; and WHEREAS, Reverend Smith and twelve other African Americans challenged segregation in Nashville's public schools through a federal lawsuit filed in 1955; and WHEREAS, Reverend Smith served as the president of the Nashville chapter of the NAACP, helped establish the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and founded the Nashville Christian Leadership Council, which worked to nonviolently desegregate lunch counters, hotels, and theaters; and WHEREAS, Reverend Smith opened the doors of First Baptist Church, Capitol Hill for workshops led by Reverend James M. Lawson that trained Nashville students such as John Lewis, Diane Nash, C.T. Vivian, and Bernard Lafayette about nonviolent protest; and WHEREAS, Reverend Smith served as an assistant dean of the Vanderbilt University Divinity School from 1969 until his death in 1984; and WHEREAS, Reverend Smith was a member of the Alpha Rho Chapter of Alpha Phi Alpha at Morehouse College; and WHEREAS, Reverend Smith was a member of the Sigma Pi Phi Fraternity; and was a Freemason; and WHEREAS, it is altogether fitting and proper that we honor Reverend Smith by following his example of tireless community service; now, therefore,
HB2230
011992
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BE IT ENACTED BY THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF TENNESSEE:
SECTION 1. Tennessee Code Annotated, Title 15, Chapter 2, is amended by adding the following as a new section:
The calendar week that includes October 28 is observed as the Reverend Kelly Miller Smith, Sr. Week of Service. Residents of this state are encouraged to perform works of community service during the week.
SECTION 2. This act takes effect upon becoming a law, the public welfare requiring it.
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