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PAGE 6—MARCH I960—SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS ALABAMA Governor Is Challenged on Closings; King Arrested on Income Tax Charge MONTGOMERY, Ala. ov. John Patterson’s posi tion that the state’s public schools should be closed before yielding to even token integration has been challenged. Writing in the Birmingham Post-Herald, John Temple Graves said that while token integration would be objectionable, it would not be intolerable and the South should accept it rather than de stroy its school system. In the resulting controversy, Gov. Patterson expressed alarm over this kind of thinking. He has said repeated ly that he would close all the schools before seeing a “single Negro child” go to a white school. Joining the controversy, the Mont gomery Advertiser said Patterson “is spoiling to close the schools of Ala bama.” But, the Advertiser asked, “what then?” (See “What They Say.”) A Negro woman was bludgeoned on a downtown Montgomery street February 27 following a three-day series of demonstrations by Negro students from Alabama State College. (See “Com munity Action.”) The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. left Montgomery Feb. 1 to move to Atlanta. Two weeks later, the Negro leader was arrested in the Georgia capital on Ala bama charges of falsely swearing to state income tax returns. (See “Legal Action.”) Warning that “token integration re sults either in chaos and violence or full integration,” Gov. Patterson denounced a column by Birmingham Post-Herald writer John Temple Graves as “alarm- ing. In early February, Graves wrote: “If keeping schools open requires to ken but not massive integration, I say— and Charleston’s Editor Tom Waring and many other southerners are saying —the South should accept it, no matter how many politicians are committed to a bitter-end fight.” This seemed directed at Gov. Patter son, who has repeatedly voiced his “bit ter-end” sentiments, arguing that re sistance must be total or mass integra tion is inevitable. The Graves column, which provoked considerable discussion, continued: “With massive integration out, token integration would still be objectionable but not intolerable. Not so intolerable as closed schools. And the ‘tokens’ would be face-saving martyrs, increasingly unhappy, hard to replace, meaningless, and not worth the NAACP’s while. They would dwindle from near nothing to nothing . . . “We find in the top court’s repeated acceptance of placement laws clear hope that it begins to see massive integration won’t work. My own hope goes further. I believe the court may not even require tokens where they would bring the psy chological evils named in the Alabama criteria for assignment . . . “If the court’s decisions assure against massive integration, I believe that even though the tokens are still to be resisted with all our power they are not worth closing the schools. And if they save face for the Supreme Court of my coun try ... I am happy that the face of the court can still be saved in spite of what has been done to it by the court’s own folly, politics and unconstitutionalism.” PUBLIC DISCUSSION The column, reprinted over the state, precipitated public discussion of a ques tion usually reserved for private con versations. Some agreed, others dis agreed with Graves. Patterson disagreed strongly. “That’s all they want,” the governor said in immediate response to the col umn. “Let one Negro in and they’ll all come in. Bolting before the fight begins is not for me.” Later, Patterson conceded that he had no “crystal ball” to foresee develop ments after school closing. Replying to an editorial in the Montgomery Adver tiser, Patterson said: “I wish I could solve the problem in advance and turn the solution over to (the Advertiser’s) editor. But I can’t.” As for what would happen after clos ings, Patterson mentioned private schools. “They’re doing it in Farmville, Va.,” he observed. Private schools failed in Little Rock because of a “split in opinion,” he said, but added that this would not happen in Alabama because there is no difference of opinion on the point. To advocate to ken integration, he said, is a “sign of weakness.” Experience has shown, he said, that “token integration results either in chaos and violence or full in tegration.” The Advertiser editorial he referred to said Feb. 7: “Every public statement Gov. Patter son has made indicates that he is spoil ing to close the schools of Alabama. Re peatedly has he said he would close every school . . . rather than see ‘one Negro child’ in a white school. But nev er has he thrust through to the heart of the issue. That is, what happens after the schools are closed? “How long will they remain closed? A semester, year or forever?” The editorial also raised the question whether military installations in the state would stay in Alabama with no public schools for military dependents to go to. KING LEAVES The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., tak ing his leave of Montgomery Feb. 1, told his people that they should institute more boycotts but none that would “humiliate or defeat the white man—we cannot hope to attain first-class citizen ship by using second-class methods.” King resigned as pastor of Dexter Avenue Baptist Church to move to At lanta, where he now heads the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and is co-pastor with his father of the Eben- ezer Baptist Church. He was arrested in Atlanta Feb. 17 after being indicted in Montgomery for falsely swearing to state income tax re turns. (See “Legal Action.”) In his farewell address to his Mont gomery church and to the Montgomery Improvement Assn., which he led through the bus boycott, King promised that if needed in Alabama in future boy cotts, “I will come back from Atlanta and help you carry them out.” The Rev. Uriah J. Fields, a Negro leader who split with the Improvement Assn, after being an officer in it during the early part of the bus boycott, re sponded to King’s urging for future ac tion: “We believe that boycotts bring dis harmony and are damaging to both boy- cotters and boycotted. And we do not agree with anybody who orders boy cotts.” Fields now heads the Montgomery Amelioration and Restoration Assn., which has frequently been at odds with King’s MIA. Fields also is author of a recent book about the bus boycott, The Montgomery Story. MORE DISSENT Another Negro leader, E. D. Nixon of Montgomery, dissented from remarks attributed to King in Charleston, W. Va. King was reported as telling a church group there that the “vast majority” of his race would prefer Vice President Nixon, if he is the GOP presidential candidate, to a man like Sen. Lyndon Johnson (D) of Texas. King was also quoted as saying Sen. John F. Kennedy (D-Mass.) would be unacceptable be cause of his apparent support by south ern conservatives. Nixon, former president of the Alabama NAACP and now president of the Montgomery division, Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, disagreed. King’s views “do not meet the general approbation of Negroes,” Nixon said. “There will be Negroes who will sup port the Democratic nominee.” Gov. Patterson signed extradition pa pers Feb. 19 to return King to Alabama to face trial for perjury. King is charged with falsely swearing to his 1956 and 1958 state income tax re turns. Indicted by a Montgomery Coun ty grand jury for allegedly failing to report $27,000 in income for the two years, he was arrested in Atlanta Feb. 17. It is charged that King reported his 1956 income as $9,150 when it was $16,162, and his 1958 income as $25,348 instead of $45,421, which the indictment said he received. In Atlanta, King said, “There just isn’t any $27,000 and the state of Ala bama knows it.” However, King said he would not fight extradition: “I have nothing to hide. I can honorably go back to Alabama to face trial.” Montgomery Circuit Sol. (Prose cutor) William Thetford said the case originated with the State Department of Revenue and had been referred to the capital city grand jury “in a routine matter.” AIRPORT PETITION A petition filed in February by Mont gomery Negroes demanded that the Civil Aeronautics Board order integra tion of airport facilities at Montgomery’s Dannelly Field. In Washington, a spokesman for the board said it had no such authority, a view previously expressed by Alabama Atty. Gen. MacDonald Gallion. Violence erupted briefly in Mont gomery Feb. 27 as a white man clubbed a Negro woman with a ball bat in an altercation in a Saturday afternoon shopping crowd. The incident followed three days of demonstrations by students from Ala bama State College, located in Mont gomery. Some 25 Negro students ap peared in the county courthouse Feb. 25 requesting service at the basement snack bar which is operated privately for whites only. The room was closed and the Negroes ordered outside. On Feb. 26, about 200 students marched from their campus and lined the corridors for a short time. One spokesman for the group said the sec ond appearance was a protest over the case of a student who had been charged with falsely swearing to a voter regis tration application. The second demonstration, like the first, was peaceful. The Negroes pa raded back to the campus and held a rally. Some threatened to try to enroll at the University of Alabama and Au burn University if Gov. Patterson suc ceeded in forcing the expulsion of the first-day ring leaders. Patterson had ordered college Presi dent H. Council Trenholm to expell all students who participated in the dem onstration. Trenholm said he had “no alternative” but to comply. The gov ernor threatened to cut off state funds unless immediate action was taken. Shortly after noon Feb. 27, another group of Negro students headed for town but stopped short of the downtown area. Some 25 white men, most of them armed with small ball bats, patrolled downtown streets. Christine Stovall, a Negro about 20, was clubbed and her scalp badly cut by a white man. She said she was not a student. Police made no immediate ar rests. Three other Negro women reported that they had been slapped by white men during the afternoon and a 14- year-old Negro boy said two white men hit him in the face that night. In Macon County, the same day, 300 students from Tuskegee Institute pa raded around the city square carrying placards reading “strike out color in voting” and “to be free is to vote.” The record school budget adopted by the 1959 Legislature ran into trouble when collection of taxes earmarked for education fell far below estimates, especially in sales tax receipts. The result may be proration of funds, although educators and state revenue officials disagree on the imminence oi that possibility. The Legislature raised the school budget from 120 million dollars to 148 and a half million—the increase to be provided principally by removing state sales tax exemptions. But so far, sales tax collections have increased only seven percent. They must climb 30 per cent to fulfill expectations on which the budget was based. Other education taxes are falling below pre dictions too. Collectively, their increase has been only half the anticipated revenue. The steel strike has been one factor. State Supt. of Education Frank Stewart said that, for the third consec utive year, it may be necessary to prorate school funds: “Local schools, which were already in the red when the school year began, have borrowed money to pay their teachers and bus drivers in expectation of this increased revenue. “So far the increase is only 14.39 per cent and we still have four months to go before the schools close in May. . . We are in one hell of a mess.” State Revenue Commissioner Harry Haden, while refusing to say that pro ration will be necessary, blamed the situation on a fundamental defect in the state’s tax structure. It is too dependent on “unstable” taxes, he said, primarily income and sales taxes which are vul nerable to economic changes. Only 20 per cent of the revenue comes from relatively stable taxes, such as the property tax, he said. In the “stable tax ratio,” Haden said, Alabama ranks at the bottom of the nation. Ideally, there should be a 50-50 ratio, he said, while conceding that this seemed unlikely in the immediate fu ture. Haden, a former University of Ala bama law professor, accepted his ap pointment to the job with one over riding ambition—to force equalization of property taxes over the state. Under fire during the search for school revenues, he retreated from his pro gram. Alabama’s national Democratic com- mitteewoman for the past 20 years, Mrs. Nanna Thomas of Montgomery, has an nounced that she will not run for re- election. Her announcement came on the heels of criticism by Gov. Patterson who said: “The only woman in Alabama I know of who is for Sen. Lyndon John son of Texas is Mrs. Nanna Thomas.” Last year Patterson announced his support for Sen. John Kennedy ID- Mass), but has not been so vigorous in his support of Kennedy since Protestants denounced the election of a Catholic as a threat to the separation of church and state. Mrs. Thomas also had been rebuked by Sam Englehardt, chairman of the State Democratic Executive Committee, who accused her, by implication, of de fending National Party Chairman Paul Butler. Butler is currently in disfavor in Ala bama, as in some other southern states. Englehardt has approved withholding funds from the national party “until Paul Butler and other party leaders get the idea Alabama is still in the union and entitled to some consideration in party affairs.” SENATOR’S RACE Sen. John Sparkman will be opposed in the May Democratic primary by re tired Adm. John Crommelin, friend of segregationist John Kasper and long time critic of the “Jewish-communist conspiracy,” which he says is behind integration efforts. Crommelin was retired by the Navy in 1950 after his attack on Pentagon policies. He ran as an independent against Sen. Lister Hill that year, against Sparkman in 1954, Hill again in 1956, for the gubernatorial nomination in 1958 and for mayor of Montgomery last year. He lost all contests, never receiving more than a sprinkling of votes. Patterson, Hill and Sparkman testified in Washington in February against pro posed bills to establish federal controls over voter registration. Grand Dragon Bobby Shelton of the Ku Klux Klan in Alabama says he was fired by B. F. Goodrich Co. because of his Klan activities. Shelton’s name figured prominently in the news in 1958 because of his support of candidate John Patterson. It was charged during the governor’s race that Shelton promoted Klan backing for Patterson. Last year his company received a one-million-dollar tire contract with the state and Shelton was the salesman. The Patterson administration scoffed at charges of “pay-off,” pointing to the low bid Goodrich made and the money saved by the state. Shelton said company officials called him on the carpet about his Klan ac tivities, explaining to him that after 13 years with Goodrich he had a bright fu- Memphis Area Private Schools Show Growth MEMPHIS, Tenn. EMPHIS HAS BECOME the hub of private school education in the Tri-State area since the U.S. Supreme Court desegrega tion ruling of six years ago. The count stands at nine major schools, mostly denominational, all running at peak enrollment. Until Little Rock schools were re opened in September, the Mem phis schools reported heavy en rollments of Little Rock students. One of the major private schools that was started after the Supreme Court action, Memphis University School, re cently launched a $350,000 campaign to expand. The non-denominational school, with plant facilities worth one million dollars and with an enrollment of 250, hopes to enroll 350 students by next September. SPENDS HALF MILLION The Church of Christ has spent over $500,000 developing Harding Academy of Memphis as a branch of its acade my on the campus of Harding College at Searcy, Ark. The Memphis academy includes grades one through 12. Among other private schools that have appeared on the scene are Grace- St. Luke’s Episcopal Day School, now building a new educational building; St. Mary’s Episcopal School; St. George’s Episcopal School, started last September; Memphis Hebrew Acade my; Presbyterian Day School; St. Dominic’s School for Boys; and the Lutheran Day School. As the integration picture now stands in Memphis, only one previously all- white institution has Negro students. Memphis State University enrolled eight Negroes without incident, in Sep tember, after losing a five-year court fight. Neither public nor parochial schools have integrated their student bodies. Catholic schools of Memphis remain segregated with Negroes attending St. Augustine and Father Bertrand schools. Christian Brothers High School and Christian Brothers College, also Cath olic, remain segregated. # # # ture if he would sever KKK connec tions. Shelton said he refused and was notified later that his services were no longer needed because of a cutback in personnel. Shelton said he had learned from “reliable sources” that Jewish organ izations had threatened to boycott Goodrich because of his activities. Asked what he is now doing, Shelton replied: “I’m kluxing.” He said he has traveled extensively in the North and Midwest meeting with KKK officials in those areas. In Akron, Ohio, Goodrich officials denied Shelton’s version of his release. The company spokesman said an em ploye’s outside activities are of no consequence as long as his work is satis factory. FLOGGING REPORTED A Columbiana Negro told authorities he was taken from his home Feb. 18 by a band of white men, stripped, tied to a tree and flogged. Junior Buie, 28, said he was forced to walk naked through woods to his home after the beating. He was treated for facial cuts. Buie said the men accused him of hauling illegal liquor. This is the latest in a series of incidents in the area in the last year and a half. # # # Statement Opposes Closing of Schools DENTON, Texas HIRTY-THREE SOUTHERN educators, meeting in Denton, Texas, issued a statement predicting “collapse” of dem ocratic society if public schools are closed. If the South reverts to private schools, said the group composed mostly of teachers college deans, it would mean that “the great majority would find themselves unable to provide educa tional opportunities for their children.” Abandonment of public schools and compulsory attendance laws, they said, would increase juvenile delinquency and unemployment, reducing communi ty economic standards. # # #