This is fresh air. I'm Terry Gross. In his second term, President Trump has been trying to erase

parts of American history that he considers corrosive ideology or disparaging to other Americans

alive or dead. He ordered the Secretary of the Interior to take down sculptures, markers,

and displays in federally funded places like the National Parks.

So down came references to slavery, Jim Crow segregation, lynchings, and other forms of racism,

brutality, and inequity. At the same time, my guest, Brian Stevenson, has been doing the opposite.

He was opening an exhibition on the history of the civil

rights movement and the violence and degradation faced by black people that led to the movement.

The exhibit begins in 1955 with the boycott of Montgomery's segregated buses and ends 10 years

later with the marches from Selma to Montgomery for voting rights.

The third of those marchers, the one that was successfully completed,

arrived at its destination, Montgomery Square, 61 years ago today.

Montgomery Square is both the location and the name of the new exhibit.

It's part of the legacy sites, which includes sites in public

places in Montgomery about slavery, lynching, and Jim Crow, as well as the Legacy Museum. The larger

intent is truth and reconciliation by facing the past. The project was founded and is led by

Stevenson, the founder and executive

director of the Equal Justice Initiative, a non-profit legal organization, founded with the

mission of representing children and adults, unfairly convicted, unfairly sentenced, subjected to

brutality in prison or facing execution. He's argued six cases before the

Supreme Court. You may know him through the movie adaptation of his memoir, Just Mercy, in which he was

portrayed by Michael B. Jordan, who just won an Oscar earlier this month for his role in sinners.

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