Diane Nash was involved in most of the major civil rights demonstrations of the 1960s. Active in the Nashville student movement, she became a founding member of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) before working alongside Martin Luther King, Jr. in the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). King referred to Nash as “the driving spirit in the nonviolent assault on segregation at lunch counters.”
Born 15 May 1938, Nash grew up in a middle-class Catholic family on Chicago’s south side. After graduating from high school, she attended Howard University for a year before transferring to Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee. Anxious to combat the racial injustice of the South, Nash adopted nonviolence as both a tactic and lifestyle under the tutelage of Reverend James Lawson. "A lot of things started making sense to me through the learning of nonviolence as well as the practice of it. And I developed it as a way of life.” In 1960, as chairperson of the Student Central Committee, she helped to organize the first wave of student sit-ins. She then attended the first SNCC meeting in February 1960.
In February 1961, Nash and eleven other protesters were jailed for a month in Rock Hill, South Carolina. By refusing to pay bail, they became the first of the civil rights activists to transform a jail term into a form of nonviolent resistance. Following her release, Nash was instrumental in coordinating the Freedom Rides. After proving herself an effective coordinator and liaison, Nash was chosen to head the direct action division of SNCC in August of 1961.
That same year, Nash married fellow civil rights activist James Bevel and settled with him in Albany, Georgia. Both Bevel and Nash worked for SCLC, where they helped organize the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom and the Selma campaign. In 1965, the couple received SCLC’s highest honor—the Rosa Parks Award.
As the fervor of the civil rights movement waned, Nash continued her organizing work. During the late sixties and early seventies, she was active in the anti-war and feminist movements. Nash currently resides in Chicago, where she has participated in tenant organizing, housing advocacy, and welfare support.