A PLACE IN THE SHADE
We’ve always had a place in the sun down South.
Now I reckon some of us would like a little of
the shade too.--_An Unidentified Negro_
Throughout the segregation-integration controversy white leaders have
rarely attempted to discover what the Negro thinks on the matter.
Instead they have arbitrarily declared that the overwhelming majority
of South Carolina Negroes have no desire for integrated schools. This
claim is made almost without exception. A writer in the _Morning News_
noted that while Southern governors and attorneys general had held
conferences to consider the objectives of Negroes, they had never
called a biracial meeting at which the latter could voice their aims.
On no occasion had white leaders asked Negroes to state their position;
the aspirations of Negroes were always specified by white men. Such
a situation, it was observed, might well result in “brash action”
by “sincere white people, who, alarmed by white men’s statements of
Negro aims,” were girding for war without waiting to hear the Negroes
themselves.[231] A perusal of public pronouncements by Negro leaders
and groups reveals that a misconception in regard to Negro aims and
desires exists among the white people of South Carolina.
The goal sought by the overwhelming majority of South Carolina Negro
leaders is an immediate end to legal segregation. They recognize
that for many years to come _de facto_ segregation will continue to
exist. But on the point of legally enforced segregation, there is
no compromise. Dr. Benjamin E. Mays, a native South Carolinian and
president of Morehouse College in Atlanta, told a meeting of the
Florence County NAACP that the immediate concern of the Negro was
not for integration but desegregation. Desegregation, he said, meant
“to destroy segregation based on law.” Likewise A. J. Clement, Jr.,
president of the Charleston County NAACP chapter, said South Carolina
Negroes wished an opportunity to make their “best contribution” to the
development of the state, an objective that could be realized only by
ending segregation.[232]
At this point a more complete picture of the aims and aspirations
of South Carolina Negroes is in order. As already has been noted,
white political leaders constantly have stated that the majority of
the state’s Negroes oppose desegregation. Only on occasion is it
acknowledged that the Negro might, after all, want desegregation. The
_News and Courier_ believed that “the average Southern Negro” would
accept as much mingling “as the white man would allow.” It did not
think, though, that the Negro was “willing to risk a great deal to
attain it.” This “moderate attitude” by Negroes was in keeping with
“good citizenship as well as good race relations.” The recognition
of “conditions as they exist,” according to the Charleston paper,
should be neither “humiliating nor degrading for Negroes.” Writing in
_Harper’s_ in early 1956, Thomas R. Waring, editor of the _News and
Courier_, admitted that “it would not be hard to believe that, given a
choice, a Negro naturally would prefer all restrictions to be removed.”
But “a firm and positive stand by people everywhere,” he held, would
put an end to “the race agitation that has plagued our country these
last several years.”[233]
A more positive statement of this attitude was made by W. D. Workman,
Jr., the _News and Courier_ correspondent. Writing in late 1955,
he observed that too many white South Carolinians were laboring
“under the dangerous delusion that Negroes of the state do not want
integration.” In truth, he maintained, “a large percentage” of Negroes
“and an even greater percentage of their leaders very definitely do
want integration of the races, and as soon as possible.” The failure
of the state’s leadership to recognize this situation involved “the
tactical error--which could prove disastrous--of underestimating the
enemy.” Assessing the extent to which Negroes desired integration,
Workman noted that educational, religious and civic leaders seemed
overwhelmingly “determined to press for integration.” He reported a
division amongst Negroes with “some genuinely and sincerely” opposing
any integration and others who doubted the practicability of the
“current rate” of integration. But among Negro leaders he found
“increasingly open and avowed agitation for integration.”[234] In
substantial agreement, the _Record_ termed the belief that a majority
of Negroes favored segregation a “head-in-the-sand theory.”[235]
It is hardly possible to evaluate with exactness, of course, the
attitude of the rank and file of South Carolina Negroes toward
segregation. In early 1956 the Gallup Poll asked people throughout the
country their opinion on the Supreme Court decision. No results on a
statewide basis were announced; however, the poll indicated that 53
percent of Southern Negroes (13 states) approved the decision while
36 percent opposed it and 11 percent were undecided. For comparison
only 16 percent of Southern whites approved the decision, 80 percent
disapproved, and four percent were undecided.[236] The vehement
opposition of Southern whites to integration, reported the Gallup
organization, caused many Negroes “to view with misgivings the possible
repercussions” of race mixing. However, the report noted “a common
desire” on the part of Southern Negroes “to give their children the
best possible education and obtain for their race the treatment which
they consider to be in keeping with the ‘American way of life.’” In a
survey of the status of race relations in South Carolina in early 1956,
the _New York Times_ noted that, while Negroes were “more cautious”
in expressing views than whites, nonetheless, there was “little or no
question that literate, articulate Negroes generally” desired an end
of legal segregation. These groups, reported the _Times_, resented
being “officially classed” as “an inferior race and as second class
citizens.”[237]
Despite an understandable reluctance of Negroes to express themselves
on segregation, news reporters on occasion have been able to obtain
revealing statements. In the summer of 1956 an Associated Press writer,
interviewing Negroes in Clarendon County, sought the opinions of the
family of William Hilton, a tenant farmer. Several of Hilton’s 13
children spoke out forthrightly:
I’d like to go to school with white children, said
Henrietta Hilton, 13. I just don’t like to segregate myself
because of my color or hair. I’d like to be able to pick
friends on another basis. I think I’d enjoy being friends
with some white girls. Maybe they’d enjoy being friends
with me.
I never wished I was white, said Morgan Hilton, 16. I just
wished many times I was treated like the whites.
In the movies, said Leroy Hilton, 19, we got to go up to
“Buzzards Roost” (the Jim Crow Balcony). When there’s
a good picture, we’ll be standing up there even though
there’s empty seats downstairs. My feeling is we pay as
much, we ought to be able to sit anywhere. Every time I go,
I get mad, but I don’t say anything.
I feel insulted every time I got to sit in the back of a
Jim Crow bus, said Henrietta. I feel insulted every time
I go into the drugstore for ice cream or a soda. All the
booths are for whites. We got to have our ice cream out on
the hot street. I just wonder what makes them think they’re
superior. Sometimes, you walk down the street and white
people just look at you scornful. You can feel it.[238]
Statements made by individual Negro leaders and resolutions adopted
by various Negro groups reveal a willingness of Negroes generally
to follow anti-segregationist leaders. The Progressive Democratic
Party, the state’s leading Negro political group, stated that the
question was no longer segregation or integration but rather “how
best” to accomplish desegregation. The party proposed creation of
an inter-racial commission to handle such problems as would arise
during the period of integration. The Palmetto Education Association,
representing approximately 7,000 Negro public school teachers, adopted
a resolution in 1955 hailing the Supreme Court decision of May 17,
1954, as “consistent with the Association’s belief” in democracy.
The Association offered to cooperate in “discussing, outlining, and
implementing plans for universal public education” in the state “within
the framework of the recent ruling of the United States Supreme
Court.”[239] The Association’s stand is particularly noteworthy since
there is general agreement that many Negro teachers would be eased out
of their jobs should integrated schools become an accomplished fact.
The Richland County Chapter of the South Carolina Citizens Committee
(Negro), in an unusually strong statement, declared that it stood
“solidly for the respect and observance of all laws.” The chapter
wished it “clearly understood” that this included the Supreme Court
decision of May 17, 1954. “To circumvent or to defy the law is
rebellion and to join others in so doing is criminal conspiracy which
could lead to anarchy.” The chapter concluded that the Negro’s struggle
was “neither temporary nor futile” since its ultimate objective was
“the proper evaluation of each individual and the proper regard for
human dignity.” The Clarendon County Civic League, which backed the
school suit, attacked segregation as “un-Christian, undemocratic,
unscientific, and asinine.” Statements to the effect that Negroes
favored segregation, according to the League, revealed “a deep-seated
racial prejudice that has warped the intellect, the sensibilities and
the wills” of white people. According to State NAACP president James
M. Hinton, “Negro parents only want their children taught by competent
teachers and in integrated schools, where children of both races can
learn to study and learn to live as citizens.”[240]
Opposition to school integration has arisen from isolated Negro
individuals and groups. More than 100 “patrons” of a Negro school
in Mullins signed a petition urging continuation of segregation and
“opposing integration of the Caucasian and Negro schools.” A similar
petition was signed by Negro parents in North Augusta. This group
feared integration “might disrupt progress now being made” in the
Negro school program. A Negro school principal in Ehrhardt, in Bamberg
County, thought integration would result in Negro teachers and pupils
being “thrust into a most peculiar situation” which would be beset
“with many perplexing problems and grave consequences.” Educational
opportunities of Negro children under integration, he feared, would
“suffer for the next 50 years.”[241] A Negro delegate to the Horry
County Democratic Convention said that he wanted his children “to go
to as good a school as any man’s children,” but “to the same school
they go to now.” Dr. Ben J. Armstrong, prominent Mullins Negro,
believed it would take “a thousand years” for the races to get ready
for desegregation. The Reverend Webster McClary, a “preacher” from
Kingstree, praised the Citizens Councils as being composed of “smart
steady men” who “mean business” and declared that Negroes did not
desire mixed schools any more than whites.
I can say this to any Negro who has it sticking in his craw
that he can’t be happy without trying mixed schools [said
McClary]. All you have to do to get your heart’s desire is
buy a ticket to Philly or other points North where they
are already mixed. Nobody has to tell you that colored
children don’t learn books as fast as whites. But see for
yourself how pitiful your big colored children will look in
the same grades with smaller white children. Have you got
enough money to dress your brood in clothes they won’t be
ashamed of? Go ahead and try it if you must. But don’t be
fool enough to slam the door in your white friends’ faces
before you go. You might want to come back like I did after
I lived up there awhile. How if you came home and find the
door locked?--Will the NAACP give you a handout? Laugh,
folks, laugh.[242]
The _News and Courier_ considered McClary’s statement to be “moderate
in tone and sensible in approach.” The _Independent_ thought it “timely
advice” for Negroes. A letter to the editor of the _News and Courier_
nominated McClary for the Pulitzer Prize “for the most enlightening
and constructive” comment on the race problem “made to date.” The same
writer opined that McClary and eight other men “equally as intelligent”
should be appointed to the United States Supreme Court.[243]
Pro-segregation statements by Negro leaders have become less frequently
heard as attitudes toward the problem have hardened on both sides.
Pressure for conformity has worked within both the Negro and white
communities, though probably less effectively so among Negroes.
The attitude of Negro church groups is of especial significance in
light of the church’s undeniably great influence within the Negro
community. The number of ministers and prominent laymen among Negro
improvement and advancement groups is unusually high. Statewide Negro
church associations almost without exception have endorsed the Court
decision and have called for the ending of racial segregation. The
Progressive Democratic Party claimed that as early as 1951 “religious
denominations and groups administering to more than 600,000 of
the state’s 850,000 colored citizens” made voluntary statements
and declarations which urged the removal of racial segregation in
public places. The South Carolina conference of the Central (Negro)
Jurisdiction of the Methodist Church, in endorsing the struggle of
the Negro for equality of treatment, approved all organizations
which sought “the full participation of all American citizens in the
responsibilities and privileges of this nation.” Bishop Frank Madison
Reid expressed the attitude of the state’s African Methodist Episcopal
Church in late 1955. In suspending the Reverend James Vanwright for
opposing integration and the court decision, Bishop Reid asserted:
“No minister in our church can openly declare or write anything that
attacks the scriptural belief in the equality of all men.”[244] Dr.
G. G. Daniels, president of the Negro Baptist State Convention, in
supporting efforts to end all legal racial discriminations, stated
that the Negro was seeking only those human rights guaranteed by the
Constitution.[245] A manifesto of the Columbia Interdenominational
Ministerial Alliance, a Negro group, declared that there could be “no
first-class citizenship in a segregated society.” Full participation
of the Negro in the life of South Carolina would come only after the
removal of such barriers as “racial segregation, discrimination,
Jim Crowism and economic pressure.” The Alliance recognized the
difficulties involved in the process of desegregation. “Things cannot
be changed overnight,” the Reverend J. Arthur Holmes, Alliance
president, told this organization in 1956.[246]
The attitude of individual Negro ministers conforms to the same general
pattern. The Reverend William L. Wilson, pastor of a Spartanburg
Baptist Church, told a newspaper reporter that he was sometimes
“ashamed” of his white colleagues. “They tell me privately,” he said,
“that segregation is wrong, but they will say nothing publicly.” The
Reverend Giles G. Brown, a Methodist Minister of Charleston, referring
to proposals for church integration, said that there was only “one
human family.” The brotherhood of that family was ordained by God. Any
movement that furthered this brotherhood would eventually succeed but
in some areas this would come only after a “long, long time.”[247]
Negro leaders were restrained in commenting on the Court decision.
James M. Hinton said that “Negroes, though happy,” were “most mindful
of the seriousness of the decision” and would cooperate fully with
state leaders in its implementation. “There is no place in a democracy
for segregation,” he declared. Bishop Reid called for “a special day
of thanksgiving at this hour when the Supreme Court has answered the
challenge and call of democracy.”[248]
A small minority of Negro religious spokesmen opposed the decision. The
Reverend Hydrick Strobel of St. George, a black-belt town, urged his
congregation to “be well pleased and thank God for equal but separate
schools for our colored children, where they can learn to take pride in
their own race, instead of being ashamed of it.”[249]
A staff writer for the _Record_, analyzing the reaction of Clarendon
County Negroes to the decision, stated that “there is not much
rejoicing, even among the colored people of this district, over the
way their case has turned out. They hold their heads a little higher
and they seem to have a little more confidence in themselves, but they
are concerned about the future of the schools.”[250] In like manner
an Associated Press writer noted the difficulty of determining the
opinion of the majority of Clarendon Negroes. “Some say that they want
segregation to continue as long as facilities are equal,” he reported.
“Some are against it. Many won’t say either way.”[251]
White South Carolinians in maintaining that Negroes desire segregation,
customarily quote Negro “hands,” domestic servants or others who had
said they favored segregation. In evaluating these pro-segregation
statements by Negroes, the whites rarely distinguish between the
uneducated, economically dependent Negro and recognized Negro
leadership. Such a mistake results naturally from the Booker T.
Washington tradition that the Southern white man is the only true
friend of the Negro and has always stood ready to give him assistance
and advice in meeting the challenges of the white man’s civilization.
Whereas Yankees might mouth pious platitudes about all men being
created equal and having equal rights, the Southerner is the true
benefactor of the Negro on the individual level.
Indications are that in some quarters this attitude is changing as a
result of the segregation controversy. James M. Hinton spoke of the
rise of a “new Negro” in the South, one whom “traditional” Southerners
had difficulty in understanding. A few white spokesmen have admitted
that the “new Negro” was difficult to comprehend. W. D. Workman, Jr.,
spoke of the “incapacity of the white man to fathom the thinking of the
Negro.” In a similar vein the _Record_ editorially observed that “no
white person can know what the Negroes are thinking. For ordinarily a
Negro tells a white man in the South what he thinks that white person
wishes to hear. It may not be and frequently is not what the Negro
actually thinks.”[252]
Despite such evidence the state’s political leaders continue to
assert that Negroes favor the _status quo_. They possess, in short, a
superabundance of William James’s “will to believe.” In his inaugural
address, Governor Timmerman asserted that “most Negro parents” did
not want their children “to mix with large groups of white children.”
Lieutenant Governor E. F. Hollings, characterizing segregation as a
“natural thing,” maintained that “a majority of Negroes” were no more
enthusiastic about mixed schools than white persons. Senator Marion
Gressette told a Bamberg audience that “thousands of Negroes” were
fighting with the whites to preserve segregation.[253]
Newspaper editorialists also generally agree that the majority of
Negroes oppose integration. The _News and Courier_ thought that
“except for the NAACP and a few other zealots,” Negroes were not
willing “to disrupt harmonious race relations for a goal that many of
them view with indifference.” The _Independent_ believed public school
integration was opposed “not only by white people but by thinking Negro
leaders and the patrons of Negro schools.” The _Morning News_, after
James A. Rogers replaced Jack H. O’Dowd as editor in August, 1956, felt
that the majority of Negroes did not regard “with sympathy the efforts
of some of their contemporaries to force an unnatural mixing of the
races which would create unbearable tensions and inequalities.”[254]
White spokesmen only rarely can see any reason for the Negro’s
“agitation” for the abolition of segregation. Under segregation, said
the _Morning News_, the Negro had “opportunities for racial development
unparalleled anywhere else in this country.” Segregation was “not an
evil scheme” to keep the Negro in subjection but a high road along
which he could achieve “maximum development in an atmosphere without
tension or ill-will.” An excellent example of the “separate-but-equal”
argument appears in the following editorial statement from the _Morning
News_:
We believe that an integrated school system would deepen
the Negro’s inferiority complex, that it would magnify
his sense of being a second class citizen, that he would
not develop normally under the tensions and inequalities
of integration. We believe that his finest opportunities
are with equal segregated facilities. We believe that
he is entitled to equal facilities, that he, like his
white brother, is entitled to all the benefits of being
an American citizen, but for the sake of his race, its
potential, its integrity, its development, he should
demand segregation in the public schools as offering the
only normal, natural atmosphere in which to work for
maximum racial development. Furthermore, we believe that
the majority of Negroes themselves who view the problem
objectively are of the same opinion.[255]
Segregation by such reasoning is less a benefit for the white than for
the Negro.
Segregationists seem totally unable to understand the failure of
Negro leaders to support the _status quo_. “The finest thing that
could happen to the Negro race,” declared the _Morning News_, “would
be the emergence of leadership that would crusade for voluntary
segregation with the same vigor and persistence that the NAACP has
crusaded for integration.”[256] That such leadership has not been
forthcoming allegedly has been due to the “reign of terror” which the
NAACP has instigated against Negro moderates. Lowcountry Negroes,
like lowcountry whites, noted the _News and Courier_, were “largely
conservative,” an attitude expressed in their “reluctance to agitate
for racial change.” These moderates were loath to speak out because
they would be “penalized by the extremists.” Although such moderates
had “strong support” among Negroes in the state, they were largely
“silent.” Negroes who spoke out in favor of segregation, concluded the
_News and Courier_, were the “truly heroic” element in the segregation
controversy. “It would be well,” Senator Gressette said, “for us to
encourage the members of the Negro race with these [pro-segregation]
views,” so that they in turn could “discourage the few whites and
colored, from within and without the state,” who were advocating
integration. State Senator Marshall Williams would extend such
encouragement to all Negroes. “We should talk with the colored people
we employ, and can influence,” he said, “give them the benefit of
what we know, explain how they are being duped by the NAACP and other
outsiders and convince them that it would be better to live at peace
among their white neighbors in a segregated society.” White advice,
then, is for the Negro to return to the “sound counsel” of Booker T.
Washington.[257]
White leaders are certain that they and not the Negroes themselves
best realize the latter’s true needs. “Unless the Negroes come to
their senses and cast out the false leaders,” warned the _News and
Courier_, they might find that they had been led “down a primrose path
to misery and disaster.” “Respectable Southern white people” are the
Negro’s best friends.[258] Running concurrently with this refrain is
the frequently stated belief that nowhere on earth have Negroes been so
fortunate as in the South. “Segregation has been a success,” especially
from the standpoint of the Negro, proclaimed Dr. E. E. Colvin, a white
Baptist minister of Orangeburg.[259] The South had “none of the ‘isms’
and tensions of the Northern cities,” asserted Gilbert Wilkes of Mt.
Pleasant in a letter to the _News and Courier_, echoing the century
old philosophy of George Fitzhugh and John C. Calhoun. “As far as race
relations go,” the Negro lived “a much freer and happier life” in the
South. Another letter writer, Alford W. Atkins of Charleston, stated
that in the North in contrast to the South, one did not see among
Negroes “the smiling or solemn dark faces ... filled with content or at
least joy in living and the happiness that comes from it.” Negroes in
the North “looked strained and dissatisfied with life.” The _News and
Courier_ said that “apparently” integration was not bringing happiness
to Northern Negroes. Instead “contentment, freedom from worry and
a pleasant disposition” which have been the “prize possessions” of
Southern Negroes disappeared with the end of segregation.[260]
As will be shown subsequently in greater detail, the segregation
controversy has played a major role in state politics in the period
following the May 17, 1954, ruling by the Supreme Court. The constant
political concern with the subject explains in part the inability of
the two sides to get together and calmly work out a mutually agreeable
_modus vivendi_. Negro leaders see politicians using the issue as
a political football for personal benefit. Contributing to this
situation has been the failure of the Negroes to register and vote in
sufficiently large numbers to cause politicians to fear their influence
at the polls. Absence of an effective political pressure action group
has not helped the Negroes. The Progressive Democratic Party, the only
real Negro political organization in the state, has been practically
moribund from 1948 to 1958. Efforts of Negro political spokesmen have
been hampered because a large majority of the state’s Negroes are
ideologically Democrats in the national sense while Negro leaders
receive no consideration from state Democratic leaders.[261]
Negroes have attempted to make the pressure of their votes felt in
the state and not without some success in presidential elections. On
the state and local levels, however, they are completely frustrated.
They can not, for example, find candidates who will campaign on even
a “moderate” platform with regard to the race issue. Consequently the
Negro has only the choice of the lesser of several evils. The Negro
vote, moreover, is most ineffective in areas where it is potentially
the strongest, that is in heavily Negro populated low country counties.
In such counties the number of Negro voters was less than in those
where the Negro population was lower percentagewise.
Leading Negro political spokesmen have been John H. McCray, chairman
of the Progressive Democratic Party, and the Reverend James M. Hinton,
president of the state NAACP. McCray’s party sent a delegation to
the national Democratic convention in 1956 to challenge the regular
slate headed by Governor Timmerman. One of its purposes was to secure
official recognition by the convention in the event the regular
delegation walked out over the civil rights issue.[262] The presence of
the Negro group probably had little if any influence on the decision of
the regulars to remain in the convention.
The actual influence of the Negro vote in the state is difficult to
assess. Until 1958 voter registration has omitted any mention of race
and ballots by whites and Negroes have not been cast separately. Also
various groups, white and Negro, have made claims and counterclaims
for political purposes. McCray maintained his party delivered 85,000
to 95,000 votes to the Democratic Party nominee in 1952 and was thus
responsible for the Democratic victory. A similar claim was made for
1956. Anti-Negro politicians, especially among the Independents of
1956, agreed with these claims. They hoped thereby to stigmatize the
Democratic Party.[263]
In late 1954 the Palmetto State Voters Association was formed to
organize Negro voters for the purpose of electing to public office
candidates sympathetic to the Negro. It has had little, if any,
success, in part because many of the leaders of other groups, including
the NAACP, oppose isolating Negro voters in a separate group. Such
action, it is argued, is inconsistent with the professed aim of the
Negro for full integration into the state’s political activities.
“Racial bloc voting,” said A. J. Clement, Jr., was “out of order,
out of style” and did not provide the advantage of a system that was
interested in the whole as against a particular part.[264]
The organization primarily responsible for the giant steps taken by
Negroes toward the goal of full participation in the responsibilities
and benefits of American citizenship is the National Association for
the Advancement of Colored People. The South Carolina conference has
chapters scattered throughout the state with headquarters in Columbia.
The state organization, headed by the Reverend James M. Hinton,
claimed 22,000 members in South Carolina in early 1956.[265] Though
membership rolls are not made public, it would appear that the major
portion of NAACP spokesmen are from middle class and professional
groups. A disproportionate number of the organization’s leaders are
ministers. The NAACP generally represents the best in the state’s Negro
leadership. The state conference, though virtually autonomous, works
closely with the national headquarters in seeking to end all racial
discriminations based on law. According to the official Civil Rights
Handbook published by the national headquarters, the NAACP is “not a
legal aid society” for supplying assistance to every needy colored
person. Its intervention in legal suits is limited to three categories:
(1) Legal defense of innocent colored persons who are victims of
injustice solely because of race, (2) Assistance in legal cases
involving colored persons where fundamental civil or constitutional
rights are involved, and (3) Affirmative legal action to establish
principles of law of benefit to colored persons generally.[266]
Working within these boundaries and in conjunction with the national
headquarters, the state conference has secured several notable
victories, the most spectacular being the Clarendon County school case.
The NAACP also assisted in the cases which resulted in pay equalization
for white and Negro school teachers and in the destruction of the white
primary in South Carolina. In other less publicized cases assistance
has also been given. “The litigious NAACP,” the _Record_ complained,
“has been behind every one of the suits to mix the races in the public
schools, the colleges and universities, in transportation and in state
parks and other recreation areas.”[267]
The degree to which South Carolina Negroes agree with the NAACP
and its aims and objectives is evidenced by the widespread support
given the drive to end segregation by church, professional and other
groups. Many organizations have gone on record as supporting an end to
segregation without giving a specific endorsement to the NAACP. But the
general public directly associates the NAACP with leadership in this
fight. Typical of the expressions of support given the NAACP was the
resolution adopted by a portion of the student body and faculty of the
Negro college at Orangeburg when the state legislators were planning
an investigation of NAACP activities at the institution. The NAACP was
regarded “as simply one organization” which gave “vitality” to the
furtherance of the constitutional rights of the Negro. The students and
teachers disavowed “any knowledge of information that that organization
represents any more than the maintenance of law and order in the
determination of and in the protection of the constitutional rights
involved.”[268]
The NAACP is not without Negro opponents in the state. One of the most
outspoken is P. B. Mdodana, a school principal at McBee. Mdodana,
a native of South Africa, has spent most of his life in the United
States. He charged that Negroes were “losing their Constitutional
rights to a loud-speaking, scheming minority” which did not hesitate
to employ coercion to achieve its “scheming and radical demands.” No
exponent of logical consistency, Mdodana praised passage of a state law
which forbade employment by state or local governments to members of
the NAACP. Another NAACP opponent is George A. Elmore, whose lawsuits
resulted in the ending of the white primary in the state. Significantly
Elmore had broken with the NAACP after his failure to secure an office
with the organization. He maintained that the NAACP was “interested
in the little man only when the little man could be used to serve the
organization’s interest.” On other occasions, said the frustrated
Elmore, the association was concerned “only with college people and
‘big shots.’”[269]
Following the Supreme Court decision in the Clarendon case, the NAACP
was obliged to consider formulation of a program that would not
compromise the Negro’s legal position and yet take cognizance of the
intransigence of white Southerners. No concrete policy could be set
forth until the Supreme Court handed down its implementing decree and
the district court subsequently applied it to the Clarendon case. These
actions were taken in May and July, 1955. Consequently not until late
summer of that year did the NAACP begin sponsoring such “overt acts” as
petitions for the ending of school segregation.
Shortly after the original Court ruling, Hinton announced that the
NAACP would exhaust “local remedies” before again resorting to the
courts.[270] Petitions filed with school officials at the time of the
original ruling would be held in abeyance until announcement of the
Court’s implementation policy. Meantime the NAACP concentrated on
a program, notable for its utter and complete failure, of inducing
state political leaders voluntarily to accept both the letter and
spirit of the decision. National NAACP Chairman Dr. Channing H. Tobias
called on Governor Byrnes to accept his “responsibility of influencing
implementation” of the decision “in the light of the present
international situation, rather than in the light of local prejudice
or political expediency.” “The pioneer role of our Association in
South Carolina,” he continued, had “focused world attention upon this
state.”[271] The plea of Dr. Tobias fell on stone deaf ears.
Following the district court ruling in July, 1955, enjoining Clarendon
and Summerton school officials from refusing admission of any pupil
to a school solely on the basis of race, the NAACP and Negro parents
were faced with a difficult decision. A meeting of Negroes, attended
by Thurgood Marshall, was held in Clarendon. Though not indicating
his future course of action, Marshall was given a rousing vote of
confidence by “virtually 100 percent” of those present. With the
district court ruling on their side, the next move was up to the Negro
leaders. Clarendon school authorities bluntly stated that under no
conditions would the schools be kept open if a single Negro pupil were
admitted to white classrooms. In light of this threat, Negro leaders
and parents decided to postpone further action. Negro students would be
the biggest losers should the schools be closed.[272]
In the summer of 1955 the NAACP began sponsoring a number of petitions
asking local school boards to “reorganize the public schools” on a
“non-discriminatory basis.” The petitions were scattered throughout the
state. Most were similarly worded, indicating that the movement had
statewide direction. White South Carolinians reacted to these petitions
by the organization of Citizens Councils.
The petition presented the Florence County Board of Education was
typical. Signed by twenty-four Negro parents, it reminded school
authorities of the Court rulings of May 17, 1954, and May 31, 1955,
and asked that Florence school officials “take immediate steps to
reorganize the public schools” on a “non-discriminatory basis.” Pupils
could no longer be “denied admission to any school solely because of
race and color,” asserted the petitioners. “The time for delay, evasion
or procrastination” was past. School officials were “duty bound to take
immediate concrete steps leading to early elimination of segregation
in the public schools.” They were assured of the willingness of Negro
parents “to serve in any way ... to aid ... in dealing with this
question.”[273]
These petitions invoked the displeasure of many moderate whites and the
wrath of extremists. The _Morning News_, one of the few South Carolina
papers then not unsympathetic to the Negro, thought the petitions “most
unfortunate” following as they did “so closely on the heels of the
Supreme Court’s integration decree.” Their presentation was a “shock”
to South Carolina. The _News and Courier_ asked:
Who are these people [who signed the petition]? How many
of them have children in the public schools? Who persuaded
them to sign? (Some people can be persuaded to sign a
petition for almost anything.) Do they realize what they
are signing? Do they understand that they may be helping to
break down the public school system and even friendly race
relations?
White citizens should study carefully the list of names
in the newspapers. If they are acquainted with any of the
Negro signers, they might ask them some of the questions
propounded here and others of their own. These are
legitimate questions. Anyone seeking to upset conditions as
they are should be willing to explain his reasons....
White people have been educating Negroes for centuries.
They now need to undertake a new educational program in
race relations. The right of petition belongs to Negroes
as to any citizens. So does the right to question the
wisdom of the petitioners. If enough white people take it
on themselves to talk with Negroes about these matters,
the result may be better understanding on the part of both
races.[274]
As a consequence of economic pressures brought to bear against the
petitioners by the Citizens Councils, many of the former asked that
their names be withdrawn. They frequently maintained that their
signatures had been obtained through misrepresentation. Usually they
claimed they did not realize that the petitions were asking for
integration. Some said they had understood the petitions as simply
requesting interracial talks on the subject of integration. The number
of those asking their names be withdrawn was large, in some cases more
than half the number of signers. In one case, Elloree, fourteen of the
original seventeen signers asked that their names be struck from the
list.[275]
The NAACP recognized this problem and also the fact that for the
time being little could be done about it. “Names being struck from
petitions” was understandable, said Roy Wilkins, executive secretary
of the NAACP. He did not believe, however, that the signers failed
to realize what their signatures meant. He blamed withdrawals on
“pressures” operating on the Negro. The Sumter chapter of the NAACP
gave a similar explanation for the withdrawal of several signers
of a local petition. The signers “knew very well the content and
intent of these petitions,” said a statement issued by the chapter.
No “coercion, persuasion or pressure” had been used to secure
signatures.[276]
As of the early spring of 1958 no school board has acted favorably on a
petition for school integration and no Negro petitioner has resorted to
the courts to secure affirmative action.
The NAACP has born the brunt of the opposition to the desegregation
drive. Until white South Carolina recognized the extent of the
“threat” represented by the NAACP, its opposition to the organization
had not been particularly bitter. The hardening of attitudes was the
result of the NAACP’s increased pressure for racial integration and
occurred relatively late. For instance, when the NAACP was holding its
annual conference at Charleston in 1953, J. Walker Evans, executive
vice-president of the Charleston Chamber of Commerce, was “happy
to extend a cordial and sincere welcome” to the organization and
hoped that its deliberations would be “fruitful,” “pleasant,” and
“most profitable.”[277] But after the segregation decision all this
changed. Even white “moderates” felt obliged to deprecate the NAACP.
Editor O’Dowd of the _Morning News_, who had frequently defended the
association against irresponsible charges such as communist-front
action, stated that the organization was doing nothing more than
“paying lipservice to the idea of Negro advancement.”[278]
The attack on the NAACP has taken many different forms but basically
the association is pictured as a radical organization responsible
for the “climate of recalcitrance” in the South by insisting on its
“pound of flesh” and refusing to adopt a “moderate” attitude. The
NAACP refused to “barter or compromise,” complained the _Morning
News_, and instead had adopted a program of “absolutism” which only
made the problem more difficult. New assaults by the NAACP against
“the traditional citadels of Southern society,” the Florence paper
asserted, were “lacking in good sense and good taste.” According to
the _Independent_, “responsible Negroes” knew that NAACP’s “radical
agitators” had done “far more harm than good” in the school crisis.
The _Record_ argued that the NAACP was acting “neither wisely nor
tolerantly, preferring neither understanding nor cooperation.”[279]
The same papers choose to overlook the fact that the dominant white
community has offered no basis for compromise or conciliation within
terms of the Supreme Court decision.
As a result of the NAACP’s “radical” stand, i.e., its refusal to accept
segregation indefinitely, an attack has been made on all fronts to
discredit the organization in the eyes of both whites and Negroes.
The goal is to create an atmosphere in which any program, policy or
pronouncement by the association will be condemned automatically,
without regard to its merit. “If there’s one thing against our way of
life in the South,” announced Lieutenant Governor Hollings, “it’s the
NAACP. And if the U. S. Supreme Court can declare certain organizations
as subversive, I believe South Carolina can declare the NAACP both
subversive and illegal.” In the Lieutenant Governor’s home town the
_News and Courier_ proclaimed that the NAACP was “not genuinely
devoted to the advancement of the colored people,” but rather ignored
the real need of the Negro in its “search for headlines and racial
martyrs.” The _News and Courier_ believed that the association was not
interested in Negro “rights” but “that whites be forced to associate
with Negroes.”[280] The paper regretted that so many Negroes would
swallow the “unwholesome and impractical poisons” of the NAACP. The
_Record_ declared the Association was interested in cases of violence
against Southern Negroes solely for their fund raising value. “The
NAACP would have been disappointed” if the slayers of Emmett Till had
been brought to justice because the case provided the occasion for the
raising of vast funds. The Reverend E. R. Mason, a retired officer
and minister of the white South Carolina Methodist Church, termed the
NAACP a “militant” and “vicious” minority group interested only in the
“prominence of the front page and money.”[281]
A favorite tactic in this campaign of vilification is to equate the
NAACP’s desegregation aims with the communist conspiracy against the
United States. Attorney General T. C. Callison told the Columbia
Rotary Club that the NAACP was led by “meddlers” who were “playing
directly into the hands of Communism.”[282] The leadership of the
Citizens Councils has given especially strong emphasis to this phase
of the attack. Henry E. Davis, a Florence attorney, speaking at the
organizational meeting of the Lake City Citizens Council, announced
that “the NAACP is financed by Russia.” On another occasion he indulged
in anti-Semitism, a tendency which has become increasingly open in
the Citizens Council movement. Davis referred to the NAACP as “a
communist-front organ,” which was “in reality a Jewish organization
with financial backing from the Communists” purporting “to aid the
advancement of the Negro while stirring up disorder.” G. L. Ivey,
a leader of several white supremacy groups in Florence, including
the Citizens Council, described the NAACP as “the radical Negro
organization dominated by communist-front leaders.”[283] Stanley F.
Morse, one of Ivey’s many Charleston counterparts, noted that the
objectives of the NAACP coincided “strangely with the aims of the
American communist party.” He declared that the policies of the NAACP
were “dictated by white radicals rather than Negro patriots.” In 1954
the bellwether _News and Courier_ did not believe the “aggressive
race movement among Negroes” was communist-dominated. But a year
later, the same paper intimated to its readers: “We believe the NAACP
represents only a small but belligerent group of people. (In Russia
only a small number of Russians belong to the Communist Party yet they
rule the rest.) We aren’t saying the NAACP is Communistic. We are only
pointing out how much power can be wielded by a noisy and energetic
minority.”[284]
The charges of communism are accepted by the state NAACP as merely one
of many “brainwashing” devices used by the whites. President Hinton
answered with the following statement: “The NAACP is an American and
legitimate organization, and not once has it been even thought of by
right thinking people as a subversive organization. It has never done
more than go into the courts, and fight the issues out before white
judges using white men’s laws.”[285]
The NAACP, of course, has defended itself against such attacks. It
claims, with much truth, that instead of being a communist-front
organization it is in reality responsible for the fact that the
communists have been unable to make any headway among American Negroes.
The _Record_, however, has taken issue. The real reason why communists
were so unsuccessful in winning over American Negroes, said a _Record_
editorial, was the fact that most of them lived in the South “and were,
like their friends among the Southern whites, conservatives.” They
were not members of the Negro “intelligentsia” where, according to the
capital city paper, communism had made its only headway among Negroes,
and were by every sign “generally content [and] a happy race” and
therefore “anything but a fertile ground for communist wiles.”[286]
A new device against the NAACP became popular in 1957, one which
can be used against both the NAACP and labor unions. This is the
so-called “permit system” under which counties and municipalities might
require “any organization, union or society of any sort” that charged
membership fees to obtain permits to sign up new members. Applications
can be denied in the interest of “peace and good order.” Florence and
Abbeville counties have led in requiring the permits. Several other
localities have followed suit.[287]
The attacks on the NAACP contain many other phases. Among these are the
following:
(1) The NAACP is pictured as the Negro counterpart of the white Ku
Klux Klan. Such an association would discredit the NAACP, for the
attempts to revive the Klan are decried by all except the most radical
fringe of white supremacists. White conservatives are determined not
to allow the opposition to the Negro to be taken up by radicals who
would not only endanger their own dominant position but also completely
discredit the white South in the eyes of the nation. A good example
of associating the Klan and the NAACP was a statement issued by
Federal District Judge Ashton H. Williams when the Edisto Beach case
was pending before his court. The two organizations, he said, were
“the real enemies to any progress” in the segregation controversy.
No progress could be made by South Carolina until both were “wholly
eliminated” from the picture. In a severe condemnation of the NAACP,
interesting because he might be called upon in the future to hear civil
rights cases sponsored by the NAACP, the Judge said:
It must be kept in mind that the rights given to Negroes by
the Supreme Court are personal, and no one has a right to
persuade them by unlawful threats or otherwise to exercise
the rights given them by the Supreme Court. If the Negroes
wish to accept segregated schools, or segregated beaches,
parks and so forth, it is legally wrong for anyone, by
misrepresentation, undue influence, or threats, to force
them to seek personal rights given under the Supreme Court
decision.[288]
(2) Personal and abusive attacks are made on NAACP leaders. In addition
to questioning the sincerity and honesty of purpose of persons
prominent in the association, a vicious racism has crept into many of
the most extreme attacks. G. L. Ivey referred to Thurgood Marshall
as the “mulatto chief counsel for the NAACP.” The writer of a letter
to the editor of the _Morning News_ advised the South to “get rid of
the NAACP and the ‘halfbreeds.’” “History tells us,” he wrote, “that
‘halfbreeds’ have always been trouble makers. The Bible says that
a bastard cannot enter the kingdom of heaven, even unto the tenth
generation.”[289]
(3) Blame for originating the state’s race problem is placed solely on
the NAACP. W. D. Workman, Jr., stated that responsibility for beginning
a “cold war” between the races in the state rested “with the titular
Negro leadership, national and state,” by which he meant the NAACP. The
_Record_ said the NAACP’s “appeal to the force of the courts to compel
the elimination of segregation” created a climate in which “racial
cooperation” could not exist.[290]
(4) The NAACP is presented as an enemy of the Negro, existing only on
its ability to coerce. The purpose here is to alienate the Negro from
the NAACP. Eldridge Thompson, a _News and Courier_ writer, insisted
that the Association’s progress was based on “the weapon of fear.” The
Negro who did not subscribe to the NAACP was “afraid to be identified,”
he claimed. The grip of the Association over the Negro community was
so great that opposition could not be organized successfully against
it. The reporter concluded that the rank and file Negro had more to
fear from the NAACP than the white man. S. Emory Rogers told a Lake
City Citizens Council that “our fight is not with the Negroes, they’re
our hope, but we’ve got to get them under the correct leadership....
The NAACP is our chief enemy.” State Representative Charles G. Garrett
of Greenville County, in supporting the bill to bar NAACP members from
state employment, declared that “the NAACP should no longer be allowed
to prey upon the Negro people of South Carolina” who are paid by the
taxpayers.[291]
(5) The NAACP is pictured as an organization alien to Southern
traditions. According to the _Record_, it was “not a local or
indigenous organization.” It was “foreign to every one of the Southern
states” and therefore owed no loyalty to them. Governor Timmerman
stated that the NAACP was “largely sponsored and financed by white
people who are professional Southern haters and alien to the South.”
Therefore it was the “duty of every responsible Negro to repudiate the
false leadership of the NAACP.”[292]
The NAACP has been the victim, not only of a propaganda campaign, but
also of a program of action designed to harass and intimidate its
leaders to the point of discouragement and thus stop the pressure for
the end of segregation. The most effective portions of this effort have
been those undertaken by the state government (discussed in Chapter
VII) and the economic boycott popularized by the Citizens Councils. The
remainder of the “ranting and panting and wringing and twisting of the
South Carolina white professional rabble rousers”[293] has a nuisance
value only for the whites and merely postpones the inevitable question
facing the state: education or segregation?
In view of the many pronouncements by Southern whites to the effect
that the NAACP is a “radical” organization, a brief examination of the
association along these lines is necessary. In the last analysis, the
labeling of any organization as “radical” depends upon the light in
which it is considered. If the premise is accepted that segregation
of the races in the public schools is a positive good and that the
abolition of this policy would result in disaster, then the NAACP is
“radical.”
However, there are many indications that the organization was and is
not radical when viewed with detachment. Neither the leadership nor the
membership of the association, noted Myrdal, were “recruited from the
ranks of radicals.” Both its program and tactics were “well within the
bounds of respectability” and its policy was based on the “acceptance
of the fundamentals of the ‘American way’ of life.” An examination
of the specific objectives of the NAACP upon which this observation
was made reveals such “radical” aims as anti-lynching legislation,
enfranchisement of the Southern Negro, abolition of all legal
injustices based on race or color, equitable distribution of funds for
public education, abolition of inequalities in employment opportunities
based on race or color and the general abolition of “segregation,
discrimination, insult and humiliation” in other areas based on color
or race. In only one important respect, the abolition of public school
segregation, had the NAACP altered its objectives between 1940, when
the above goals were outlined, and 1954, when the Supreme Court ordered
an end to school segregation. One of the main sources of strength
of the NAACP in pursuit of its goals has been a willingness to work
within the framework of constitutional legality. Still another has been
a policy of compromise or opportunism--adapting its tactics to meet
local situations. National NAACP headquarters directed local offices to
“secure at least equal rights and accommodations for colored citizens”
in cases where race discriminations were “too strongly entrenched to be
attacked” directly.[294] In the post-World War II period there has been
a hardening of this attitude and greater emphasis has been placed on
securing integrated facilities.
The policy of the NAACP has been essentially one of moderation in
areas where progress is being made toward its goals. The more extreme
demands have been necessitated by absolute refusal of white leaders
to allow any “advancement” in such areas as school integration. In
opposing various proposals for “gradualism,” which appear to be little
more than an indefinite maintenance of the _status quo_, Roy Wilkins
has driven to the heart of the matter. He pointed out that the Negro
was the only American who was being advised “to take his citizenship
on the installment plan.” Two weeks later, however, he stated that “a
plea for understanding [by white Southerners] based on consideration of
timing is understandable. A plea for understanding based on defiance of
constitutional government is a plea for anarchy and secession.” A. J.
Clement, Jr., a prominent Charleston NAACP leader, was in substantial
agreement. “No one concerned with this problem,” said Clement, “likes
to be identified as being a ‘gradualist’ but, we who are ‘realists,’
have got to understand that long established customs and habits, no
matter how erroneous or abhorrent, will not suddenly be cast aside.
Some individuals are able to adjust themselves to change much quicker
than others. My chief concern is that there be no ‘backward steps,’ no
‘marking time.’”[295]
That the NAACP’s policy is essentially moderate has been demonstrated
by its willingness to compromise its position in the face of threats
to close public schools. The _Record_ reported that Marshall and other
attorneys for the appellants in the Clarendon case agreed orally
to forego a showdown in the face of a “blunt” warning by school
authorities that segregation was more important to them than education
and that schools would be closed if one Negro applied for admission
to a white school. Marshall, of course, denied this report but it is
significant that, although given virtually a free hand in the case, he
chose not to force the issue.[296] State authorities, however, have no
guarantee as to how long Negro leaders will be willing to compromise
their legal position in face of the irreconcilable attitude taken by
whites.
Throughout the entire controversy on the school issue neither Governor
Timmerman nor any other responsible political official in South
Carolina has ever offered to sit down at a conference table with Negro
leaders and to discuss the question. They have blandly taken the
position that there is nothing to discuss. The lines of communication
between the white and Negro populations of the state have completely
broken down. But in point of truth, as North Carolina pundit Harry
Golden has sagely observed, what these same politicians fear is that
the Negro leadership might be so reasonable in its requests that
such could hardly be refused without making the official policy of
South Carolina seem even more ridiculous than it already is. Governor
Timmerman and his advisers know only too well that the Negro leadership
would accede to the most gradual of gradualist programs provided it
was proposed in good faith. But to yield an inch on “principle,” a
word historically dear to South Carolinians, has literally become an
impossibility even for the best intentioned of the state’s political
leaders. They are the prisoners of the morally bankrupt policy of
“massive resistance.”