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PAGE 2—OCTOBER 1956—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS
Mississippi Will Conduct
Tour for New Englanders
JACKSON, Miss.
ississifpi’s first personal approach
in a planned program to acquaint
“outsiders” with its long followed seg
regation pattern and the “why therefor”
will be taken in October.
It will be in a state- and local com
munity-sponsored—and paid for—tour
of Mississippi by a group of New Eng
land editors and publishers for an on-
the-spot observation and study of its
racial situation. (See “Under Survey.”)
Co-sponsorship of the tour by the
1956 legislative - created State Sov
ereignty Commission for the purpose of
defending segregation through all avail
able lawful processes, created skepti
cism among some of those planning to
make the tour as to the objective of the
first-hand study.
However, Hal DeCell, public rela
tions director of the commission and a
former weekly newspaper editor who
extended the invitation to the news
men, gave assurance that the purpose
is not to “brainwash” them on segre
gation.
NO COVER-UP’
“This is our latest move to get the
truth about Mississippi to the citizens
in other parts of the nation,” DeCell
explained. “We will show them what
ever they want to see and not try to
cover up anything because we have
nothing to cover up.”
Asserting that “there is no attempt
and no thought on my part to sell them
segregation as such,” the commission
official said, “we simply want them to
see Mississippi first-hand and reach
their own conclusions rather than rely
on sensationalism in certain national
magazines.”
The tour was announced as the state’s
senior U.S. senator, three of its con
gressmen and governor spoke out for
“calmness” and a “firm stand” in the
peaceful maintenance of segregation.
(See “What They Say.”)
Meanwhile, amid the reported migra
tion of an estimated 50,000 Negroes an
nually to points above the Mason-Dixon
line, no activity was reported by the
NAACP seeking integration nor com
plaints made of the asserted application
of economic pressures on those favor
ing integration. (See “Under Survey.”)
These developments were noted as
the State Education Finance Commis
sion acted to speed up the $100 million
Negro-white public school equalization
program to bring the dual system on
a par at all levels. (See “School Boards
and Schoolmen.”)
OTHER EVENTS
Other developments included:
1) The White Citizens Councils “ded
icated to preservation of segregation”
observed its second anniversary with a
reported membership of 80,000 from a
beginning with 14 and a statement that
“inroads of the NAACP upon local Ne
gro sentiment have been severely
checked” and “school officials have been
bolstered considerably by the council
Developments
(Continued from page 1)
integration group meanwhile hinted at
court action in Greenville to get action
on a school entry petition initiated in
June, 1955.
Tennessee
Officials marked the tumultous Clin
ton incident “closed;” in Memphis 317
delegates to the National States’ Rights
Conference drafted a platform and
picked a Presidential slate; two Negroes
became the first of their race to enroll
in Vanderbilt University’s School of
Law.
Texas
Gov. Allan Shivers’ legal advisory
committee recommended new laws re
quiring districts to operate schools for
both races; a nineteenth tax-supported
college accepted Negro students along
with whites; an effort was under way to
bar the NAACP from activity in Texas.
Virginia
The General Assembly passed and
Gov. Thomas B. Stanley signed 23 bills
supporting the governors’ policy “un
yielding resistance” to the Supreme
Court decision, including authority for
the governor to take over a legally inte
grated school, reassign its pupils and
reopen it on a segregated basis.
West Virginia
Minor outbreaks were reported in
three southern counties as the state
moved ahead with a general desegrega
tion process affecting an estimated 75
per cent of the 25,000 Negro children en
rolled.
efforts in this direction, and by the cre
ation of a strong moral tone of unified
public resistance to the arrogant be
havior of the NAACP.” (See “Com
munity Action.”)
2) An address by Roy Harris, editor
and attorney of Augusta, Ga., before
the Indianola Citizens Council, who said
that “the Supreme Court’s outlawing
of segregation is throwing the South
into its second period of reconstruc
tion.” (See “Community Action.”)
PLAN CAMPAIGN
3) Opening of a state headquarters
for an active campaign by the state
Democratic executive committee for
the Stevenson-Kefauver ticket as plans
were completed for presentation of four
slates of electors in the November gen
eral election. (See “Political Activ
ity.”)
4) A Japanese woman lawyer visited
Mississippi and found no evidence of
mistreatment of Negroes in the South
but felt that “integration will come in
a matter of time.” (See “Community
Action.”)
An estimated 20 New England editors
and publishers are scheduled to begin
a week’s tour of Mississippi for first
hand observations of its racial situa
tion on Oct. 7. They will be given a
cross-section look-see and wind up on
the Mississippi gulf coast for a round
of entertainment.
The group will be guests at a Jack-
son barbecue the night of Oct. 7 at the
suburban lodge of the Mississippi Valley
Gas Company. Next morning they
leave by chartered bus for Kosciusko
and Columbus, then go to Grenada in
the northern section before arriving in
the heavily Negro-populated delta at
Cleveland. At the latter overnight point
they will be 12 miles from the all-
Negro town of Mound Bayou.
CLEVELAND DINNER
A dinner is planned at Cleveland at
the suburban lodge of the Mississippi
Power and Light Company, before
leaving for Itta Bena for a stop at the
Mississippi Vocational College for Ne
groes.
Vicksburg is an overnight stop and
next a boat trip down the Mississippi
River to Natchez, in the bosom of the
Old South. The bus then takes them
down to the Mississippi gulf coast.
J. Clark Samuel of Foxboro, Mass.,
president of the Massachusetts Press
Association, wrote tour-director De-
Cell that, “We all seem to be unani
mous that Mississippi is doing some
thing constructive in placing its view
points to northern readers from a grass
roots base.”
After one of the editors who had ac
cepted the invitation was assertedly
criticized stated he had gone to Russia
for a study “and I don’t see why I can’t
do the same in Mississippi,” Tour Di
rector DeCell said:
“Our aim is to show them Mississippi
so they can make an opinion from their
own observations and first-hand infor
mation rather than rely on certain na
tional publications which through sen
sationalism have misrepresented the
overall state of affairs in Mississippi.
We think they will get better opinions
of Mississippi than they get from read
ing certain national magazines.”
50,000 LEAVE
The statement that an estimated 50,-
000 Negroes leave Mississippi annually
was made by Dr. Robert C. Weems, for
mer dean of the school of business and
industry at Mississippi State College.
Percy Greene, editor of the Jackson
Advocate, weekly Negro newspaper,
attributed the migration to mechaniza
tion on the farms which has reduced
working time to about four months out
of the year for Negroes.
Tim Parker, chief of the Jackson,
Miss, bureau of the Associated Press
said “the motives are, partly, the same:
The hope for a bigger pay check in a
far away land of promise, the urge for
such things as a refrigerator and a gas
stove, a house you can look at and
like.”
Dr. Weems said in 1940 Mississippi
was about half Negro and half white,
and that in 1950 the proportion had
dropped to 45 per cent Negro and in
1952 to 42 per cent Negro.
ONE TO TWO
He said if the trend continues, there
will be only one Negro to two whites
in Mississippi by 1966.
Combined with the lack of activity
by the NAACP in its earlier announce
ments to seek integration has been the
asserted lessening of economic pressure
by white groups.
No reason has been given by Missis
sippi officials of the NAACP as to their
inactivity.
However, Gov. J. P. Coleman at
tributed the situation to “the thinking
colored people who have paid no at
tention to outside agitators who would
seek integration.” He said that is one
of the reasons for “continued racial
harmony in Mississippi.”
Restating his firm stand for segre
gation, Gov. Coleman said in a press
interview that “segregation in Missis
sippi will be permanently preserved so
long as the people want it.”
Other factors listed by Gov. Cole
man as contributing to the peaceful ra
cial condition included:
1) The firm policy adopted by the
state government and backed by the
people.
2) The policies of Mississippi are such
that those who would make trouble are
not able to get a toe-hold.
3) The people of Mississippi are not
in the frame of mind for agitation.
4) The fact that Negroes are being
allowed to have their own institutions
and teachers and their opportunities
are much better, especially with the
new public school equalization pro
gram.
Gov. Coleman attributed the “trou
bles” in Tennessee, Kentucky, and
Texas to “lack of planning.”
Speaking before the Oktibbeha
County Farm Bureau at Starkville, Sen.
James O. Eastland (D.-Miss.), chair
man of the powerful Judiciary Com
mittee, said, “if the South can stand
united, it can preserve our heritage.”
“The great danger, however, is the
precedent just set by Kentucky and
Tennessee where the National Guard
Dixie Forecast: Cloudy and
Threatening
—Jackson Daily News
has been used to enforce the integra
tion decision of the U.S. Supreme
Court,” he said. “If this pattern is to
be followed in other states, the South
is gone.”
The use of national guardsmen in
Kentucky and Tennessee was described
as “rule at the point of a bayonet” by
Rep. Thomas G. Abemethy of the first
Mississippi district in a speech before
the Houston, Miss. Exchange Club.
“I never thought I’d live to see the
day when a tank with 16mm guns, ma
chine guns and uniformed boys with
fingers on triggers, would roll up to a
southern school at the hands of a gov
ernor who says he’s not for integration
and not against it,” Congressman Aber-
nethy said.
‘ORGANIZED MINORITY’
Rep. W. M. Colmer of the Sixth Mis
sissippi district and member of the pow
erful House Rules Committee, said, “The
South must become an organized mi
nority so its voice, once so powerful,
may again be heard.” He said the
NAACP, with a “weaker voice but bet
ter organized,” has gained because
southern leaders have not stuck to
gether.
A “calm and cold-blooded” fight
against implementation of the integra
tion decision was called for by Rep.
Frank Smith of the Third Mississippi
district in an address before the Green
ville Lions Club and later before the
Greenville Rotary Club. “Arguments
based on emotions and prejudices hin
der rather than aid the South in its
fight,” he said. “Too often the opposi
tion to programs has taken on the
looks of a side-show.”
Nineteen of Mississippi’s 82 counties
have already reorganized their school
districts under the new Negro-white
equalization program to provide equal
but separate opportunities for both
races.
Under the program the 2,000-odd
school districts are being consolidated
into compact areas to provide better
facilities and teachers for both races.
Indicative of the changes, Chickasaw
County has cut its five white attend
ance centers to four, and its 25 Negro
centers to six by forming three dis
tricts in the county.
A $1 million bond issue election has
been called in Hinds County (Jackson)
for new schools to equalize Negro
schools with the whites. Greenwood is
also planning a bond issue for improve
ment of its segregated public schools.
The Mississippi Democratic commit
tee has set up headquarters in the Ed
wards Hotel at Jackson to carry the
state “with a larger majority than four
years ago (60 per cent)” for the Stev
enson-Kefauver ticket. Sam Wilhite,
administrative assistant to former Gov.
Hugh White, is in charge.
Gov. Coleman has said he will stump
the state for the ticket.
Two of the eight Presidential electors
named at the July state convention
have resigned for “political reasons.”
State Sen. Earl Evans Jr. of Canton,
president pro tem of the Senate, quit be
cause he is opposed to the candidates
as well as the national platform. He
said the platform is in “direct conflict”
with a statement of principles adopted
by the Democratic party of Mississippi
calling for segregation, states’ rights,
and state sovereignty.
NEW LEADER
Sen. Evans has emerged as the new
national leader of the States’ Rights
movement. That group is seeking inde
pendent electors in an effort to throw
the Presidential election into the U.S.
House of Representatives.
The other elector who resigned was
Enrollment Data For 1956
School Districts Children In
Districts Desegregated Integrated Situations Enrollment’
States
Total
Having
Negroes ’55
’56 Total
White
Negro
White
Negro
Ala. ..
... in
m
0
0
0
—
—
500,000
245,000
Ark. .
... 423
228
3
0
3
1.900
32
317,847
102,192
Dela.
... 104
63
13
1
14
20,730
4.100
52.961
10,993
D. C.'
1
1
1
0
1
38,500
71,500
38,500
78,500
Fla. ..
.. . 67
67
0
0
0
—
—
634 356
176,944
Ga. ..
... 202
202
0
0
0
—
—
626.680
290,585
Ky. ..
... 221
180
41
57
98
200,000
22,000
713,576
44.442
La. ..
.. . 67
67
0
0
0
—
—
375,000
225,000
Md. .
... 24
23
11
8
19
345,922
89.668
378.766
102955
Miss. .
971
971
0
0
0
—
273,722
268.216
Mo.' .
...3.600
244
114
70
184
—
59,000
677,500
67,000
N. C.
... 172
172
0
0
0
—
—
739,520
306,480
Okla.
.. .1,646
261
136
38
174
238,433
24,420
489.828
37,367
S. C. .
... 108
108
0
0
0
—
—
319,589
243,661
Tenn.
... 152
141
1
1
2
9,000
100
626,781
128.164
Tex. .
...1,802
714
73
30
103
500,000
25.000
1,691,790
248,661
Va. ..
... 114
114
0
0
0
—
—
564,818
185,257
W. Va.
.. 55
44
49
3
52
425,044
23,364
438,347
24 044
9,840
3,711
442
208
650
1,779,529’
319,184
9,459,581
2,785,461
1 The
District
of Columbia,
with
one
school board
and one
superintendent, will
hereafter be listed as one district in Southern School News tabulations. Heretofore,
169 school zones have been counted for D.C., of which 147 have been listed as having
mixed classes.
2 The number of white children in integrated situations in Missouri is unknown.
3 Enrollment figures for the region not being complete for 1956-7, the following
table includes estimated enrollments for the current school year in Alabama, Dela
ware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, and
North Carolina. Where current enrollment estimates are not available, enrollments
at the close of the 1955-6 school year are used, as in Maryland, Oklahoma, South
Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia. 1954-5 enrollment figures are the
latest available for Arkansas. For Kentucky and Texas 1956 school age population
census figures are used.
Sam Neill, a planter of Leland. He re
signed because he was asked to sign
an affidavit he would support the ticket.
He said he had “given my word” he
would so vote, and resented the re
quest for a “signed affidavit.”
Gov. Coleman said party leaders were
backing Sen. Estes Kefauver (D.-
Tenn.) even though Mississippi tried to
defeat his nomination, because the Ten
nessean won the nomination “fair and
square.”
“It’s a question whether we are Dem
ocrats when we please or just Demo
crats,” the governor said. “As for me,
I am a Democrat.”
Three other slates of electors will
appear on the November ballot. They
are:
1) All-white Mississippi Republican
party headed by E. O. Spencer, hotel
executive of Jackson.
2) Bi-racial Republican faction
headed by Perry Howard, Negro attor
ney of Washington and Jackson, which
is presenting an all-white slate of elec
tors. His wing had to register in Mis
sissippi as the “Grand Old Party” since
only one group can acquire a party
name.
3) Independent, unpledged, States’
Rights electors. Although unpledged,
the electors have said they are in ac
cord with actions of the recent Mem
phis National States’ Rights convention.
The Association of Citizens Councils
of Mississippi observed its second anni
versary with a reported membership of
80,000. It claims chapters in 65 of the 82
counties. The first chapter was organ
ized by 14 men at Indianola.
The second annual report stated:
“We have proven to our Negro citi
zens that the NAACP is a left-wing,
power-mad organ of destruction that
cares nothing about the Negro. We have
the support of the thinking, conserva
tive Negro people who believe in seg
regation and who have pride in their
race. We want to help them develop ra
cial pride in a segregated society.”
Addressing the “mother” chapter of
the Citizens Council at Indianola, Ed
itor Roy Harris of Georgia said:
“Like our Confederate veteran
grandfathers, we are being confronted
with carpet-baggers, renegades and
scalawags who are trying to force the
same kind of civil rights that were
promised the ex-slaves nearly 100
years ago.”
He called for “this same kind of
courage and defiance of decrees not
based on law to curb the power of the
liberal leftwing element of our govern
ment.”
Colleges
(Continued from Page 1)
year) and East Tennessee State College
(one last year). Two white graduate
students enrolled this fall at Tennessee
State University, predominantly Negro.
No Negro applicants for the senior class
have been received at any of the state
white schools, although the court-ap
proved gradual desegregation plan ex
tends to that level this year.
Texas — Of the 46 predominantly
white public colleges and universities,
five senior colleges and 14 junior col
leges accept Negroes this year. Enroll
ment estimates place at 125 the number
in senior colleges (including 100 at the
University of Texas) and 150 in junior
colleges. Opened by court action since
March were Lamar State College of
Technology at Beaumont (five Negroes
in a student body of 4,500), and North
Texas State College at Denton (one
Negro in a student body of 5,000). Also
open this fall by policy decision is Cisco
Junior College (five Negroes in a stu
dent body of 200).
38 ENROLLED IN VIRGINIA
Virginia—Four of 10 institutions of
higher learning operated for white stu
dents have Negroes on campus this fall-
Eighteen are at the University of Vir
ginia; 11 at the Medical College of Vir
ginia; five at Richmond Professional
Institute; and four at Virginia Poly
technic Institute. The College of Wil
liam and Mary which had one Negro
enrolled last year, has none this faff
Negro applications have been received
at Mary Washington College but have
not been pressed.
West Virginia—Negroes last year at
tended seven of the eight formerly all-
white public colleges and universities
in this state which has set non-segrega
tion policies for all its institutions. As
estimated 150 Negro students were en
rolled in predominantly white schools
last year, and about 460 white students
were in predominantly Negro schools-
However, pre-enrollment estimates this
fall indicated there may be a decline is
the number of students attending schools
in which the other race predominates-