On Thursday, Sept. 20, thousands of black Americans gathered in the small town of Jena, Louisiana to support the teenagers who have come to be known as the Jena Six. The scene was reminiscent of a 1960s freedom march and included many of those old-school leaders, including Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton.

But there were also some new faces. Young faces. All excited to play a part in making sure injustice is stopped in its tracks. The Jena Six may have unwittingly sparked the next big youth movement in the African-American community. And it’s about time. We have been waiting for more of our young people to get active.

The Jena Six are a group of black teenagers who have been arrested and charged with crimes related to their alleged involvement in the assault -- many say it was no more than a high school fight --  of a white teenager in
December of last year. The fight was one of many racially charged events that occurred in the town after white students hung three nooses from a tree on the Jena High School campus. Those white students only received three days of in-school suspension.

The six are accused of beating and knocking a white teen unconscious. The teen was treated at the hospital and later that evening attended an event at the high school.  Five of the students involved in the alleged
attack -- Robert Bailey, Jr., Mychal Bell, Carwin Jones, Bryant Purvis, and Theo Shaw, all of whom were 17, adults under Louisiana law -- were initially charged with assault. Jesse Ray Beard was 14 at the time and was charged as a juvenile. The district attorney later increased the assault charges to attempted second degree murder.

Many of the town’s black residents, and many across America, believed the increased charges were  disproportionate to the crime and were racially motivated.  In June 2006, on the first day of Mychal Bell’s trial, the district attorney reduced the charges. Despite conflicting witness accounts on whether or not he was involved in the attack, Bell was found guilty. On Sept. 14, Bell’s conviction was overturned when a Louisiana court decided he should not have been tried as an adult. Though charges stand against the others, they have also been reduced.

If not for the intense and consistent public outcry against the biased treatment these six young people were receiving, Mychal Bell may have received a sentence of up to 20 years on Sept. 20. Instead, our people -- young and old -- traveled to Jena and put the town on notice: Black American youth will stand up and fight for justice.

There are many reasons why our young people haven’t been as active or as conscious as they should have. Perhaps they believed no good would come of it. Conditions for many are the same today as they were 40 years ago. Or, maybe they thought the old-guard wouldn’t accept them. Many of our more established leaders have been reluctant to pass the torch. 

Whatever the reasons, the demonstration in Jena shows us that a new day is dawning. Young black people played a key role in promoting the march and rally on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace. They sent emails and text messages to their friends, clueing them in on every development in the case. Their organizing style may not look that of years past, but it is real, and it is effective. Let’s hope it continues.

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Judge Greg Mathis is national vice president of Rainbow PUSH and a national board member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.