Newspaper Page Text
SOUTHERN SCHOOL NEWS—JULY, 1961—PAGE 9
Louisiana
ALABAMA
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(Continued From Page 8)
jj e p. Wellborn Jack of Caddo Parish,
0 f the most vociferous segrega-
^jjsts continuing to speak up after
Lfive special sessions and the fiscal
'ion of the legislature, said all-white
jjools as well as desegregated schools
;, oll ld be affected if their attendance
^pped to below 75 per cent of the
^vious year.
pg June came to a close, Davis de-
^ with unusually pointed language
jpt there are plans to call the legisla-
jue back into session anytime soon.
' Repeatedly, reports circulated in Ba
ns Rouge that another special session
jould be called, probably to initiate a
-institutional convention dealing with
^iiool finances and segregation.
The governor said previously he has
jo new plans to fight public school
Aggregation next fall.
Community Action
pTA Council Lauds
Open-School Policy;
Private Plan Pushed
The New Orleans Council of Parent-
Teacher Associations endorsed the Or
leans Parish school board’s efforts to
keep public schools open while a pri
vate citizens group pushed plans for a
downtown private school operated un
der the state’s grant-in-aid program.
PTA support for the school board
came in the form of a resolution en
dorsing the school board’s actions to
maintain public education.
The private school plan is that of the
Ninth Ward Private School Association,
which paid $62,000 for a site and an
nounced a new school would be under
construction in July.
The association is supported primar-
ily by parents who pushed the boycott
of McDonogh No. 19 and William
Frantz schools after they were desegre
gated in November. Funds for con
struction of the schools are being raised
by private subscription.
The purchase of the land came after
some 50 parents and children, organ
ized by leaders of the Ninth Ward
group, picketed William Frantz school
twice in June to illustrate that the
protests to desegregation continue.
Placards carried by pickets com
plained that white children of Frantz
bad been dispossessed when a Negro
child was assigned there and that their
rights were trampled by the federal
government.
★ ★ ★
At Baton Rouge, the East Baton
Ibouge Parish Citizens and Parents
Council was organized to unify efforts
I lor segregated schools.
C. A. Stockstill, chairman, said rep
resentatives of 12 schools began the or-
I ganization in the hope of forming pri-
| v ate school co-operatives in the event
°f desegregation. East Baton Rouge
^rash’s school board has received an
| all deliberate speed” order but no date
"as been set.
★ ★ ★
Another group, the First Educational
, or Poration, was formed at New Or-
e ans and announced it had entered
l °* 0 contract for purchase of land for
faction of a private, nonsectarian,
"''Profit school for boys and girls
° m grades one through eight.
-^lil c ellaneous
^AACP Criticizes
Mayor Morrison’s
^AS Appointment
y*bayor Chep Morrison’s appointment
.ambassador to the Organization of
v , erican States was criticized by the
o°nal Association for the Advance-
of Colored People, which said the
jj yor had a poor record in race rela-
T matters.
criticism was leveled two days
r ®®°wis° n named a Negro
^ti
Rev. A. L. Davis Jr., as race
u°ns officer for the city. The Citi-
tw Council criticized Davis’ appoint-
saying Morrison had picked a
p r , known to have participated in
n, sts against hiring practices in New
,Ss.
f,f 0 , "ymlman Victor H. Schiro Jr.,
, le council selection to fill Mor-
Fear* S 'Expired term of less than one
W _said the appointment of Davis
campaign commitment made by
■j?* 8011 - The job pays $350 a month.
t*tl 6 6 c *ty has had no one with the
°f race relations director before.
Patterson Says ‘Rides’ Hurt Race Relations
MONTGOMERY, Ala.
ov. John Patterson told the
National Conference of Gov
ernors that “freedom rides” into
the state, and the resulting vio
lence, damaged race relations in
the state.
While denouncing violence, Patter
son laid the blame on the riders them
selves and on the federal government’s
intervention and, he charged, prior en
couragement. He charged Attorney
General Robert Kennedy with “dem
onstrating a schoolboy’s innocence.”
Pickets protesting racial discrimina
tion greeted Patterson in San Francisco
and on his arrival for the conference
in Honolulu, Hawaii. He concluded his
lengthy statement to the assembled
governors with the observation:
“Like Hawaiians, the residents of
Alabama are basically friendly and good
natured. If left alone and not pushed,
I believe they will resolve the dilem
mas of our times. They will be solved
by men, not laws. I have confidence in
Alabama and faith in the South. De
spite our critics and enemies, we are
forging ahead to brighter tomorrows.”
Many observers agreed that the
statement was more restrained than
Patterson had made to date on the
overall race problem. It was a hard-hit
ting speech, they said, but also hopeful.
Denounced Marshals
Patterson denounced the sending of
marshals into the state as a flagrant
violation of the Constitution and one
which should concern other states as
well since it symbolized a trend in
which the states “will shortly be re
duced to the status of mere ‘counties’
in a federal system.”
He said the effect of the “race-bait
ing excursions” of the “freedom riders,”
whom he accused of seeking violence,
has been to set back “race relations in
general.” This is certainly true in Ala
bama, he said “and from my mail and
telephone calls, I believe it to be the
public opinion in many other states as
well.”
“I have no quarrel with anyone try
ing to better his station in life,” Patter
son said. “However I have serious doubt
that these groups from outside the
South planned their trips solely to pro
mote the legal or moral cause of the
Negro. . . . They went on a dare; they
announced they were coming; they an
ticipated trouble; and they envisioned
the glory that be theirs in the head
lines. Some of them were professional
agitators with long records of leading
other protest demonstrations. . . . They
created distrust and dissension. They
sought to pit race against race, section
against section. They played into the
hands of Moscow by creating an ideal
situation for communist exploitation.
They nettled deep-seated emotions and
feelings of the Southern people, and
they brought on shameful violence in
my state.”
As a direct consequence, Patterson
said, relations between Alabama and
the federal government have almost
reached an “impasse.”
Negro Progress
The governor ticked off the story of
Negro progress in the state—Negro
capital is building a new shopping cen
ter near Tuskegee Institute; successful
Negro insurance companies and other
businesses are prospering in the state;
Alabama Negroes have become lawyers,
bankers, doctors, dentists; many Negro
families in the state live in split-level
homes with two cars and hire their
own domestic servants; and, not least,
Negro teachers in the state public
schools draw higher average salaries
than white teachers.
“Like many other areas,” Patterson
conceded, “we have problems peculiar
Redmond and Judge Wright
Receive College Awards
Dr. James F. Redmond and U. S.
District Judge J. Skelly Wright, both
central figures in the school desegrega
tion battle of New Orleans during the
past school year, received college hon
ors in June.
Dr. Redmond, who resigned as public
school superintendent June 30, was
presented an award by St. Mary’s Do
minican College given annually to an
individual or foundation for distin
guished service to education, commun
ity and religion.
Judge Wright was presented an hon
orary doctor of laws degree from Yale
University for “performing the most
difficult of all tasks a judge must per
form ... to school the people in law
when this requires a change in their
prevailing customs.” # # #
Alabama Highlights
Gov. John Patterson told the Na
tional Conference of Governors,
meeting in Hawaii, that “freedom
rides” and the resulting violence se
verely damaged all race relations in
the state.
Patterson also charged that Jus
tice Department support of the rid
ers had brought federal-state rela
tions almost to an “impasse.” Accus
ing Attorney General Robert Kenne
dy of “demonstrating a schoolboy’s
innocence” in race relations, Patter
son called for a “return to reason on
the part of the federal government.”
His address, while characteristi
cally hard-hitting, was regarded by
many in the state as perhaps the
most restrained, in many respects,
that the governor has made on ra
cial matters. If left alone and not
pushed, Patterson said, Alabama
will “resolve the dilemmas of our
times.”
U.S. District Judge Frank M.
Johnson Jr. of Montgomery found
June 2 that leaders of the “freedom
riders” share responsibility for the
violence that erupted in Alabama in
May. The Montgomery judge issued
a temporary restraining order, later
dissolved on a technicality, against
CORE, other desegregation groups
and a number of individuals, includ
ing Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
The May bloodshed continued to
dominate the climate of racial opin
ion in Alabama—private as well as
official. Auburn University authori
ties acted to prevent future deseg
regation support by the student
newspaper, which had endorsed edi
torially the “freedom rides.”
to our section. Our people are striving
to overcome these problems, seeking
solutions in harmony, in sympathetic
understanding and in our own fashion.”
Patterson insisted the state did its
duty in protecting the “freedom rid
ers”: that a state investigator riding on
the bus burned near Anniston perhaps
saved many fives; that an armed escort
was provided for a later bus coming to
Montgomery, with air cover; that state
officers responded within seconds after
a call for help by Montgomery police
May 20 when the arrival of the bus was
greeted with violence; that the state
director of public safety personally res
cued several from the mob.
While noting that Montgomery po
lice, along with “freedom rider” spon
sors, had been enjoined by a federal
judge (See “Legal Action”), Patterson
said, “I do not believe anyone can
truthfully claim that the state govern
ment was derelict in its obligation to
enforce the laws of our state. . . . Had
we known that a riot was to break out
at the Montgomery bus station, we
would have taken action to prevent it.
I think the Montgomery city police
would have, too. Hindsight, of course,
is always better than foresight.”
Demands From Washington
Patterson said that during the rides
there were demands from Washington
to escort buses and guarantee protec
tion. While this was done within the
limits of what he said were his respon
sibilities, the governor said he could
not guarantee there would not be a
fight “when they are seeking one,” any
more than Attorney General Kennedy
“can guarantee that another young
mother is not going to be savagely at
tacked this week in the District of Co
lumbia.”
He was repeatedly critical of Attor
ney General Kennedy’s role: “The
handling of delicate state-federal mat
ters by long-distance telephone in the
middle of the night in an air of tension
and hysteria is . . . not the proper way
to conduct business between two gov
ernments.”
Patterson accused U.S. marshals, dis
patched to Montgomery after the May
20 bus station violence, of escorting Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. from the air
port as if he were the president coming
to town.
When marshals stood guard outside
the church the night of May 21, Patter
son said, their presence attracted
crowds. “As it developed, the marshals
were totally unable to cope with an
inflammatory situation they helped to
create . . .”
When the situation got out of hand,
Patterson said, he called out the Na
tional Guard, and “the marshals were
withdrawn that same night to the se
curity of Maxwell Air Force Base and
never again put to duty on the streets
of Montgomery.”
The governor called for a “return to
reason on the part of the federal gov
ernment in the field of race relations.”
Although the people of Alabama are
“firmly opposed to social integration,”
Patterson said, this alone did not ac
count for the violence: “The citizens
were aroused ... by the fact that
groups were coming into our state from
other areas to purposely defy our laws
and shatter our traditions. It was a cal
culated scheme to incite our people to
physical fury, and unfortunately it
worked.”
Discrimination doesn’t exist solely in
the South, Patterson said, with the ob
servation that there have been recent
“waves of racial unrest” in California,
New Jersey, Wisconsin, Illinois and
New York.
“The customs of generations are not
changed in a single year or perhaps in
decades,” Patterson continued. “The
only real solution comes with time, and
the process of change cannot be
rushed.”
Noting that one newspaper had won
dered editorially whether the marshal
invasion might forecast a forthcoming
federal showdown over desegregation
in the South, Patterson said:
“I say not, and I hope not. I must
admit, however, that the U.S. attorney
general is demonstrating a schoolboy’s
innocence in his actions in this field in
recent months.”
Out of it all, he said, “my deepest
concern, in retrospect, is the growing
encroachment of the federal govern
ment. Every time it gains, the states
lose."
Legal Action
U. S. District Judge
Enjoins Both Sides
In ‘Freedom Rides’
U.S. District Judge Frank M. John
son of Montgomery enjoined desegrega
tion groups and their leaders in a June
2 finding on responsibility for the vio
lence greeting “freedom riders” in the
state during May.
After a four-day hearing in Mont
gomery, Johnson issued a preliminary
injunction against the U.S. Klans,
Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Inc.;
Alabama Knights, Knights of the Ku
Klux Klan, Inc.; Alvin Horn and Rob
ert Shelton, rival Klan leaders; Thur-
mon E. Ouzts and Claude V. Henley,
both of whom were arrested for their
part in the May 20 violence at the
Montgomery bus terminal; Montgomery
Police Commissioner L. B. Sullivan;
Montgomery Police Chief Goodwin J.
Ruppenthal and their officers, agents,
employes and all persons acting in con
cert with them.
Johnson directed the Klan groups and
individuals to desist interfering with in
terstate travel and the police to pro
vide protection for travelers—protec
tion Johnson found had been withheld
May 20.
Over the protests of the Justice De
partment, Johnson also issued a tem
porary restraining order “to prevent
immediate and irreparable injury to
the free flow of interstate commerce
within this state” against: the Congress
of Racial Equality; the Southern Chris
tian Leadership Conference; Ralph D.
Abernathy, Montgomery Negro leader,
individually as an officer of CORE and
SCLC; the Montgomery County Jail
‘Oh, My Goodness, I Hope
There’s No Violence!’
Daniel, Knoxville Journal
Council (formed in jail by Abernathy
and others while they were there); the
Nashville Student Non-Violent Move
ment; Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., in
dividually and as president of SCLC;
Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, individually
and as executive secretary of SCLC;
the Rev. F. L. Shuttlesworth of Birm
ingham and the Rev. Solomon S. Seay
Sr. of Montgomery, individually and as
officers in one or more of the above
organizations; and all others acting as
their agents, members or employes or
acting in concert with them.
Johnson’s June 2 order, as it affected
the desegregation groups and individ
uals, concluded:
“Those who sponsor, finance and en
courage groups to come into this area
with the knowledge that such publi
cized trips will foment violence in and
around the bus terminals and bus fa
cilities are just as effective in causing an
obstruction to the movement of bona
fide interstate bus passengers as those
named in the government’s complaint
. . The court recognizes that this
sponsorship, even though it is agitation
(See ALABAMA, Page 13)
Kennedy Calls
For Strong
Law Backing
WASHINGTON
iting “tragic events” in Ala
bama, Attorney General Rob
ert F. Kennedy called for tough-
minded law enforcement on both
the local and federal levels.
“We cannot ex
pect that our
problems and dif
ficulties in con
nection with civil
rights in the
South will be
solved without
discord and dis
agreement,” Ken-
nedy told the
graduating class
of the FBI acad
emy June 7.
“But we do have
a right to expect
that local law en
forcement officers will do their jobs at
all times, that they will preserve law
and order.”
The attorney general expressed the
hope that “the lessons of Alabama will
be learned and learned well.”
“I hope,” he said, “that out of the
tragic events in Alabama there will not
again arise in this country of ours a
time when local law enforcement offi
cers will not do their duty to preserve
law and order no matter how unpleas
ant the job.”
At Editors’ Conference
Commenting on the Justice Depart
ment’s civil rights role, Kennedy said
at a conference of United Press Inter
national editors and publishers the
same day:
“Our basic position is that we intend
to meet our responsibilities. We intend
to perform the duties which we have
sworn to undertake—to enforce the
law, in every field of the law and in
every region of the country.
“Basically, we believe that we must
make progress in this nation toward
the goal guaranteed by the Constitution
that no one is denied opportunity or
discriminated against because of race,
creed or color.”
At a June 14 news conference in
New York City, the attorney general
said he did not believe continued “free
dom rides” into the heart of the South
make “a great deal of sense” in ad
vancing the cause of desegregation.
Kennedy said he would like to see
desegregation “settled in the courts, not
in the streets,” though he stressed that
he thought “freedom riders” had “a le
gal right to make these trips.”
‘Non-Intervention’ Policy
On June 15, Kennedy told the an
nual meeting of the National Associa
tion of Attorneys General that his de
partment follows a policy of non-inter
vention in civil rights disputes until it
has consulted with officials of the states
involved to “determine if the problem
can be resolved amicably.”
The Attorney General said it is his
duty to enforce such Supreme Court
rulings as those barring school segrega
tion, and added: “The Federal Govern
ment is not trying to thrust anything
down anybody’s throat, but we have
responsibilities and obligations.”
# # #
KENNEDY