NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT C««RDINATING COMMITTEE 197| AUBURN AVENCB ATEMTA, GEORGIA 688-§331

<2

ATLANTA, Ga,, March 22 - A series of nation-wide demonstrations was held this week, protesting the arrests of three members of the Stu- dent Nonviilent Coordinating Committee in Baton Rouge, LgufiiFITIa• -^ The three, SNCC Field Secretaries Dion Diamond: and Robert Zell- :d SNCC Chairman Charles McDew, have all been fiminal anarchy." Diamond was arrested on February 1 when he went to the campus of Southern University to fullfill a speaking engage- ment, and Zellner and McDew were arrested when they visited Diamond on February 16 in the Baton Rouge jail* The nation-wide demonstrations began in Viaehington, D. C, on February 28, when members of the Nonviiolent Action Group (NAG) picketed the home of Senator Allen J* Ellander (D-La*) protesting "cruel and inhuman treatment of Negro students" in Senator Ellender's home state. Later the NAG group presented a petition bearing 1,154 names to the Justice Department, asking tham to investigate the Baton Rouge arrests. On March 13, members of SNCC and NAG staged a sit-in in the office of Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy* After conferring with Justice Department officials, the group waited in the Attorney General's office until it closed* On March 16, another group of demonstrators was bodily removed in wheelchairs from the Attorney General's office* That same day in Nov; York's Foley Square, an integrated group of 100 persons picketed the Federal Court House in protest of the Louis­ iana anarchy charges. The New York demonstrations were sponsored "by CORE, SNCC, and Students For a Democratic Society. Other demonstartior were scheduled for Chicago, San Francisco, and Los Angeles* -30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE for release 135. AUBURN AVENUE, ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA 488-0331 Monday, June 18, 1962

ATLANTA, GEORGIA - RepregjfgraSiyes "oTSttie Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee

(SNCC) have charged that Mississippi state officials are "framing" Negroes who try to enroll in "white" schools in th>^tate,

In a letter to Representative Adam Clayton Powell (D-N.Y.), SNCC Chairman

Charles McDew cited the cases of Clyde Kennard and James Merideth as examples of

Negroes "suffering intimidation and failings from state officials because they tried to enter white schools."

The student anti-segregation group asked Powell "to investigate the circum­ stances surrounding Kennard's conviction in I960 and Merideth's arrest in Jackson last week." FQWKII is Chairman of the powerful House Committee on Education and

Labor,

Kennard, a chicken farmer in Hattiesburg, Mississippi., applied to Mississippi

Southern University in I960. Immediately after his application was filed, local mer­ chants refused to givehim credit. Policemen filed charges of possessing illegal liquor after searching his car and producing a bottle, but when these charges failed to stick, they charged him with possessing stolen property. Kennard's neighbors, afraid of reprisals, told SNCC representatives in secret ..that the Army veteran had been framed. He could have escaped being convicted on the charge, they said, by revealing that several friendj had purchased food and grain for him, but he did not wish to expose them to further intimidation.

He was sentenced to seven years in jail, and remained in the Forrest County jail until November, 1961, when he was transferred to Parchman Penitentary, He be­ came seriously ill this spring and was taken to the University Hospital in Jackson, where he has reftgived 14 blood transfusions. SNCC representatives in Mississippi have learned that none of the time he is spending in the hospital will be counted against his ssntenos. Both Kennard and Merideth are veterans. Kennard has written to his mother, tellingher not to visit him but to think of him as if he were still in the army.

On June 13, Merideth was scheduled to be tried on charges of swearing falsely that he was a legal resident of Hinds County, In his suit against the University of

Mississippi, he stated that he was a resident of Attala County, state officials say.

The 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans has ordered state officials not to hear the case until his desegregation suit is settled. He is currently a student at Jackson State College for Negroes,

-30- NEwS RELhrtSE

STUD JIT NOJVIQLJMT COORDINATING COIlilTTEE 135 AUBURN nVJJUE, ASUBTJ* 3, GEORGIA July 4, 1962 688-0331

SAVANNAH, GEORGIA - A ;-ember of the Savannah Youth Strategy Connittce has complained to the Interstate Connerco Commission that he received "verbal and physical" abuse fron an attendant at the Rcidsvillc, Georgia Southern Trailways Bus Station*

Janes Alexander, Special Projects Director of the Youth Strategy Committee - the Savannah student anti-sogregation organization - said that he was called a "nig- gor" and "other names I cannot mention" and was forcibly ejected from the front or

"white" waitin^ room.

In a letter to Everett Hutchinson, ICC Chairman, Alexander said that he entered the station, purchased a ticket to Savannah, and took a seat to wait for his bus to arrive. Although the station displayed an ICC poster prohibiting discrimination as is required by law, the station attendant told the youth that he could not remain in the main waiting room because he was a "nigger." When Alexander refused to leave, the attendant shoved him outside.

Alaxander asked the ICC to act promptly on the natter, for he "intends to return to this station soon."

The Youth Startegy Committee is an independent student group, affiliated with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Atlanta. SNCC Chairman Charles

McDew said that his organization received noti«e from the ICC two weeks ago that an

Atlanta bus station restuarant was now serving all customers without regard to race.

"It is deplorable that American citizens must resort to Freedom Rides, letters, and personal appeals to Washington to enjoy Constitutionally guaranteed rights" McDew said. He cited a trip Albany, Georgia Negroes made to seek relief from Government officials in Washington last week as an example of the difficulty American Negroes face in enjoying civil rights.

-30- 2 of 2.

On July 2, Cairo *e Mayor refused to let SNCC Field Secretary McCollum enter

a meeting of church and civic leaders gathered to discuss integration of the city.

Miss McCollum said that the CNFC had proposed that Cairo become an "open city," but when city officials saw her, they refused to let her enter the meeting, Cairo stu­

dents refused to hold the meeting without her. Peyton Burgess, former State's Attor­ ney in Cairo, said "The quicker we get rid of her (Miss McCollum) the better of we'll

be."

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee is an independent student anti-

segregation organization headquartered at 135 Auburn Avenue in Atlanta, SNCC Field

Secretaries work in hard core areas of the deep South with local citizens and groups in an attempt "to bring true democracy to America", the Atlanta SNCC office said,

-30- NEWS RELEASE

STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA ^uly 4, 1962 688-0331

CAIRO, ILLINOIS - An exchange of telegrams and telephone calls between Illinois Gov­

ernor Otto F. Kerner, the militant Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

in Atlanta, Cairo's Chief of Police, and the head of the Illinpis Commission en Hu­

man Relations highlighted a week of anti-segregation demonstrations in this Southern

Illinois town.

On Juno 26, SNCC officials in Atlanta had asked tovernor Kerner to protect stu­

dents from nearby Southern Illinois University and the city of Cairo who were being

"pushed and shoved" as they demonstrated before a segregated restuarant here.

Later that evening, SNCC Field Secretary Mary McCollum was slashed by a member

of a mob of whites who gathered at a later demonstration, SNCC officials in Atlanta

tried to call Governor Kerner at the Executive Mansion in Springfield, but were told

by an unidentified State Trooper that the Governor could not be disturbed, SNCC

Chairman Charles McDew then wired the Governor and asked that he "call out the Na­ tional Guard to hold down mob violence in your state,"

On the following day, Roger N, Nathan, Director of the Illinois Commission On

Hunan Relations called the Atlanta SNCC office and "pledged his full coopora.txnu in

investigating and following through on complaints of discrimination," according to

SNCC Executive Secretary James Forman, Illinois law prohibits restuarant from re­

fusing to sorve customers on the basis of race* but on June 27> a Cairo rostuarant

owner turned a water hose on a group of Negro high school students who tried to en­

ter his restuarant.

On Juno 28, members of the newly formed Cairo Nonviolent Freedom Committee

wcro turned away from a swimming pool open to whites, and were refused admission to

/a restuarant that displayed a large "closed" sign, although white persons were ser­

ved. On June 29, six CNFC members wor~ arrested by local policemen for "tresspass­

ing" - one while the manager of a restuarant under fire bold him until police arri­

ved. To date, Miss McCollum's assailant has not been apprehended, nor have the men

who roughed up students in Tuesday's demonstrations or those who showered them with

water-filled baloons.

Following the arrests, the Atlanta SNCC office announced that it has dispat­

ched two more Field Secretaries into the area, and warned Cairo Police Chief Elnoe

Jones that "you •annot end segregation by arresting students. If you continue to

arrest innocent students," SNCC Chairman McDew told hin, "the Student Nonviolent

Coordinating Committee will try to fill the jails," (more) NEWS RELEASE

ST'JDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE July 11, 1962 135 AUBURN AVENUE, ATLANTA J>, GEORGIA 688-0331

JACKSONl MISSISSIPPI -Jxwo veteran sit-inners were able to celebrate Independence

Day here by really being freed. They are Jesse Lee Harris, 20, and Luvaghn Brown,

17, who were released on July 3rd from the Hinds County Prison Farm after they spent more than 4^ days in jail.

The two youths, both from Jackson, were sentenc d on May 21 when they re­ fused to move from a bench reserved for whites during proceedings against Mrs, Diane

Nash Bevel. Mrs. Bevel, a Field Secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee (SNCC), is facing charges of "contributing to the d.linquincy of miners" after she gave Mississippi youngsters instructions in nonviolence last summer. She also spent 10 days in jail for refusing to move to a 'colored' section of the court­ room.

Brown and Harris faced beatings and intimidation as soon as they left the courtroom. While enroute to a cell in the county jail, a deputy sheriff called Ha­ rris a "damn nigger" and beat him about his head with his fists,

fit the county farm, they were singled out as Freedom Riders, and made to dress in striped uniforms, unlike the other prisoners. Fellow prisoners were forbidden to associate with them. While at the farm, they were beaten twice by guards. When prison officials learned that Harris had been arrested priviously while testing Mississippi's segregation laws, a guard named Keith ordered other prisoners to hold him while the youth was whipped with a length of hose. Threatening "Nigger,

I'll kill you," Keith later struck Harris repeatedly with a stick when the youth was unable to move a heavy log while workingon a road gang. That night, Harris was hand­ cuffed and removed to the county jail where he was placed in a torture chamber called a "sweat box" on a bread and water diet for 30 hours,

Luvaghn Brown was twice beaten with heavy sticks by Guard Douglas Wright.

On Both occasions, he was held by fellow prisoners.

Both the youths are members of the Jackson Nonviolent Movement, an anti- segregation organization headquartered here. The Nonviolent Movement office here in­ dicated that tte beatings and brutality would be protested to the Federal Government,

Brown and Harris chose jail because "We just don't like segregation in the court," Mrs, Bevel, expecting her first child in September, said that "I can no longer cooperate with the evil and corrupt court system of this statw. Since my child will be a blck child, born in Mississippi, whether I am in jail or not he will be born in prison,"

-30- NEWS RELEASE THE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA 688-0331

JACflSON, MISSISSIPPI -v-Even after more than 300 Freedom Riders were jailed here last summer, tn¥~Interstate Commerce Commission ruling desegregating bus and train stations is not being obeyed, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) reported. Last week SNCC officials in Atlanta protested mistreatment of a Negro stu­ dent in a Trailways Bus Station in Reidsville, Georgia, The youth, James Alexander, a student leader from Savannah, charged that he suffered "verbal and physical abuse" from a bus station attendant when he tried to sit in the 'white' section of the wait­ ing room. SNCC also cited Albany, Georgia, as an example of "flagrant violation of the ICC ruling." SNCC Field Secretaries in Albany have reported that Negroes are still being arrested and harrassed when they try to use formerly white facilities in Albany's bus station. This week the Atlanta SNCC office released information concerning "mistreat­ ment and intimidation" two SNCC workers recived from a Greyhound Bus driver while en- route from this city to Cleveland, Mississippi.

One of the two youths, Samuel Block, reported that the ticket agent in the Jackson bus station threw his change back at him when he purchased a ticket. When Block asked to have his luggage checked, the agent replied "You'd better speak up be­ cause I don't have time to be bothered anyway," Block is heading up SNCC's voter registration drive in Greenwood, Mississippi. He was accompanied on the trip by Arthur Williams, who is in charge of a SNCC voting program in Greenville, Mississippi,

Williams said that someone had tampered with the ICC's non-discrimination order, which all interstate busses must display. The letters '0', 'u', and 't' had been cut out of the word 'without' on the statement that reads "Seating on this bus is without regard to race, creed, or color."

Williams reported that in Indianola, Mississippi, bus.driver P. E. Lammey got off the bus andheld a 15 minute conversation with two policemen and about 15 other white men. The men stood outside the bus and pointed at the two Negroes in­ side. In Leland, Mississippi, Block had to change busses for Cleveland. When he got off the bus, driver Lammey refused to give him his luggage. When Block protested, the driver got in , shut the door in his face, and drove away.

Block received his luggage two days later, and reported that someone had written "Mr. NAACP" on his check stub. He also said that when he left the bus sta­ tion, he was pelted with clods of earth by a gang of white toughs.

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee is conducting voter regis­ tration programs in 8 cities in Mississippi, SNCC Field Secretaries work in hard core areas of the deep South in an attempt to "make Democracy a reality in America" -30- QroN) d,/£]

Highlander Center 1625 Riverside Dr» Knoxville, Tennessee pONFI DENTAL

MISSISSIPPI VOTER-EDUCATION REPORT BY BERNICE ROBINSON OF HIGHLANDER CENTF.il The Highlander Research and Education Center conducted a Voter- Education workshop June h-9 in Knoxville, Tennessee for staff members of the.Student Non-viclent Coordinating Committee and other student volunteers in preparation for a ninety-day voter registration campaign in the Deep South,. Citizenship schools for functional illiterates, classes in regxstrati.cn procedures were planned, as -well as a series of eight workshops for volunteers. Before leaving, each student drew up plans for action in his community* During this workshop, a request was made by Bob Moses, Field Director cf the Mississippi Voter-Registration Project, that Highlander provide my services to conduct workshops in Mississippi and to follow up on activities of the students working in that stats who had attended the Highlander workshop. A similar request came from Charles Sherard and Charles Jones, Field Directors of the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee Voter Registration project in Albany, Georgia. On June 16, I went to Jackson, Mississippi and conducted a work­ shop similar to the one at Highlander at Tougoloo College for one week. As a result, fifteen students are now giving their free time to the Voter-Registration campaign in Jackson, which Is being conducted under the Hinds Coordinated Voter's League, comprised of SNCC, COPS, NAACP, and the local Voter's League,

On June 2k> I left Jackson and went to Cleveland Mississippi, where I recruited students from Ruleville, Boiling, and Marigold for the Adult Education workshop July 1-6 at the Mount Beulah Christian Center 2. in Edwards, Mississippi, which was sponsored by the Mississippi Adult Education Committee comprised of representatives from SNCC, N AACP, the Director and a staff member of Mount Beulah, and local citizens. Six students from this area attended the workshop. In Cleveland and neighboring Ruleville, citizenship classes were being held to train adults in registration requirements»

On June 26 I visited Greenwood, Mississippi, where one of SNCC's students who attended Highlander's, workshop is conducting a voter- registration and education project. I spoke at a meeting called by this young man, and we recruited eight students for the Mount Beulah work­ shop. However, fear prevented six of them from attending, I also . spoke at a Masonic District meeting where two students signed appli­ cations to attend the workshop. These students were residing in Moorehead, Miss., but they had to go to Indianola to register, and Negroes are not allowed to register in that county* Therefore, they were afraid to attend the workshop and backed out at the last minute.

On June 27 I visited Clarksdale, Miss* where again, there is a coordinated group working on all fronts; conducting classes and voter- registration campaigns, organizing boycotts, and fighting court cases. Two students from this area attended the Mount Beulah workshop,. When I visited Greenville, Miss, on June 28, I found another SNCC student, a graduate of Jackson State College who plans to attend Meharry Medical School in September, doing a terrific job in voter- registration and education, . He has followed through with the use of all the techniques discussed in our June h-9 workshop at Highlanders setting up an officej holding voter-education classes| making notes of sections of the Constitution most frequently used in testing applicants and getting legal interpretation of themj keeping records of blocks 3. ' canvassed, names of persons contacted, amd the dates and hours that they would be ready to take registration testsj providing transportation and following through with telephone calls. As a result, he had registered six out of seven persons whonhe had taken to the regis­ tration office. We recruited two students for the workshop at a meeting he held that evening.

I found another SNCC student who had attended Highlander's work­ shop- beginning to recruit workers for door-to-door canvassing in a voter-registration campaign when I visited Vicksburg, Miss, on June 29, This young man needs a lot of help in this community, so two of the four students from Jackson who attended the workshop at Mount Beulah were'assigned to work with him at Vicksburg, The workshop at Mount Beulah was quite successful, and was sig­ nificant because each student attending was already committed to work in the community from which he came. Two students from the Harvard Law School and a Political Education major from Brandeis (students brought to the South by Bill Higgs, a white Mississippi lawyer from Greenville, Miss, and a graduate of the Harvard Law School who has recently published a handbook of Mississippi politics) conducted morning classes on the relationships between National, State, and local governments. In the afternoon laboratory workshops, the par­ ticipants used maps and census reports of their home counties to outline their voter-registration programs and held mock registration scenes to give each participant a chance to put his knowledge of voting and registration in Mississippi to use in practical situations. The morning classes and laboratory workshops, supplemented by evenings Jofr-otnd to jsraotioal disaus&ion of ways of starting voter—registration u, programs,succeeded! in giving the workers an integrated picture of the problems they face. The Miss* Adult Education Committee, realizing the need to train many more students to carry on this work, not only in the areas where work has begun, but also in other areas where no work is being done, is planning a series of similar workshops, Highlander will be rendering the servioe cf staff members for all of them, and a CORE representative on the board of the Miss, Adult Education Committee has requested my services for a workshop in Baton Rouge, Louisiana July 22-27.

I would like to propose to Highlander Center that we give some thought to conducting a workshop in Knoxville, Tennessee on "The Techniques of Conducting a Voter-Registration 'Workshop" to instruct leaders from the various communities in Mississippi on how to conduct workshops of this kind.

This proposal grew out of my experiences in traveling around the Mississippi Delta, Several people with whom I talked were interested in attending the workshop at Mount Beulah, but fear of reprisals and intimidations inhibited them. This fear is real, not imaginary. In Ruleville, Negroes must be off the street by the 12 p.m.. curfew, or be arrested and held in jail until a fine is paid. In Greenwood, a Negro woman went to register, but the registrar told her to leave her name and address, and she would be called and told when to come back. However, a white couple living near her came to her house the next morning and told her that they would burn her house if she went back to register.

When Bill Higgs drove three students attending a special session at Tougaloo College to nearby Clarksdale for a meeting, all four were & arrested. Mr, Higgs and the three Coke College students, one of whom was a Negro girl, were held incommunicado for over twenty hours.

While we were preparing for the Mount Beulah workshop, we had several conferences, both in Edwards and Jackson, As a result, the Sherriff and members of the White Citizens Council in Edwards had the Director of Mount Beulah in a four-hour conference to tell them the names of everyone participating in the program* They showed him pictures of Myles Horton, Bill Higgs, and others,, taken while these individuals drove through Edwards, telling him that Myles was Director of "That Communist Highlander Center," and that he shouldn't be connected .-with it.

The night we opened the workshop, I was told to "soft-pedal" my connections with Highlander, and all the white people were sent away from our first night session because threats had been made to blow up the meeting place. Rev, T, K, Smith and Bill Higgs, who had both been Senatorial candidates from the 2nd Congressional District two years previously, were accused of using these workshops to set up political machines.

With so many fear tactics being used in the state, I feel that only a handful of Negroes would risk attending workshops too far away from home. Therefore, if the militant leaders who are now working could come to Knoxville, Tennessee and be trained in the techniques of conducting workshops on voter-education, they could return to their communities and hold workshops where the people are. If more Negroes are fully informed of their rights as citiaens, I believe that most

of their fears would vanish. Submitted by Bernxce V, Robinson July 19, 1962 STUDENT NONVIOLENT CO-ORDINATING COMMITTEE llOif Lynch Street Jackson, Mississippi FL 2-8226 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Greenwood, Mississippi, July 28, 1962: Police severely beat a li|. year old Negro boy in the jail here Last Saturday in what Samuel Block, SNCC field secretary for voter registration, described as "another attempted Emmit Till case that just didn't go through," Young Welton McSwine, Jr., who has never been in trouble with the law and who is known as a "hard-working, church-going kid,M was taken to the jail for investigation. There, the police told him, "Alright, nigger, you know why you are here, and we want to know who broke into that white woman's house Wednesday morning;" to which he replied, "Mr. Police, ...I don't know anything about any­ body breaking in nobody's house. I go to the cotton field all the time and back home. You can ask my mother. She can tell you the same thing." Police then took Welton £o the back cell and beat him. First, he was hit in the head with a black jack. Then he was made to sit in a chair while 5 officers questioned him. When he continued to insist, "Please, Mr. Policeman, I swear I don't know anything a- bout that. I was in the field," one of the police beat him in the face with his fist. Another officer hit the young man in the sto­ mach with a billy stick. Next they made him pull off his clothes and lie on the floor while being beaten with a whip. -2- (Mr. Block reports: "Everyone that they carry up there comes back and tells me about the whip that they whip you with up there.") The beating was interrupted by the buzzer used to signal the arrival of someone in the station (and, therefore, the necessity of stopping the evidences of beatings—such as screaming). Mr. McSwine, Sr., the boy's father, had arrived. Jiaanwhile, Mr. McSwine's boss had called to tell the police to rele^/fe the cus­ tody of his father. The police returned to the cell to make the bpVstop crying, wash his face, and dress. He waX/Cheri^&^bd to go sit quietly in the court room. Not knowing whppe the coujrt room was located, he went Into the wrong room. <^&n officer hi^'Jaim in the back of the head, shoved him, and said, ^J'rTaat roTJitr^nigger0" Complaints have been/Tyiled -with the U„S. Justice Department fr y/ by the Student Nonviolent; Co-orXi^ating Committee„ I /^ F 0 3 T- MEDIATE RELEASE NEW ^THE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE l?7v Auburn Avcnuo Atlanta 3, Georgia For Information: James Forman Ph. 688-0331

GREENwCDD, MISSISSIPPI, July 28 - Police severely beat a 14-year-old Negro

boy in the jail here last week in what a young civil rights worker called

"another Emmett Till case that didn't come through."

Samuel Block, Greenwood Field Secretary for the Student Nonviolent

Coordinating Committee (SNCC), said that Greenwood police beat Welton

McSwine after the youth was taken to the jail here "for investigation,"

Block charged that the policemen forced the youngster to strip,

kicked him, and beat him with fists, a billy club, a black jack, and

a leather whip.

McSwine said that policemen at the jail questioned him about "who

broke into that white woman's house last Wednesday evening." When the

boy professed innocence of the crime, the policemen beat him.

They stopped the beating, Block said, when the boy's employer called

the jail and asked that he be released in the custody of his father.

Before releasing him, they made him wash away evidences of the beating

and get dressed,

Complaints have been filed with the United States Justice Department

by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

-30- ^ ***£$* dy U&m 9£Ut*M tWaOti WWriOLWIT BCKRBHIMK COMMTIiiJi 138 AifiUKM AYJUNOK, •*•* ATLAHZ& 3, Georgia 688-0331 Sept* IS, 1962 Distributed byj Southern Conference Mucstloaai Fund* lac. Fiald Secretaries Office, 440& Virginia Awe, t Louisville 11, Ky*

a0013HJiH# Miss.-—The Student cnvioieat Coordinating Committee today protested the billing of aa unidentified S&gro a»a discovered here je eterday

ia the Big Black Hive?, Ma body in a elath saelc weighted down with 100

pouad* ef reeks.

Four Megrees fishin$ ia the tfeii MM the body, shieh *«a appareatly

thrown oft* a highway bridge.

Holmes County Coroner said that tha body had been ia the river

lour or five days, and ordered it hurled is rotter's Field today.

Goodman is about 48 miles south of Greenwood, ass*, where four

field secretaries OK August 1? fisrt fchssir office to avoid pot—Hll

lynching* by a aeaaeiog group of rixitet Mi s.nasd with cheins aad ropes* •Tallahatchie The tova is also near thsnOMftttsassjs alter, where- Jjtamttt fill's body was fount ia 1955 after he was murdered by white man.

Charles SieUew, SJttJ chairman, wired Ooited states /.ttornajr itNM

Robert I* £eaaedy ia Washington! "We urge the Justice Department to lumediataly

investigate the killing of aa unidentified Ifegro man ia Helmets county.

Please sand federal trcnoa «ad/or Marshals to help reconstruct tflesissippi

because Matl-minded citizens have declared open season on Mogroos.**

The population of Holmes County, as cording to the X961 Civil Riphts

Commissioa report* Is 78J» Ifegro. Negroes eonstituto m,ff of tn* tetal

voting-age population, but only H ere registered to vote*

James Feraea, Atlanta, executive secretary of 3!TC» declared: "This is

another Instance of lawlessness designed to protect the vegregated ffMi

structure and to intimidate voter registration workers and potential votara.

"Unless the United states Ooveramat demonstrates that it Mi protect the

rights of American citizens, a trip to the moon will lament >qs a shallow rMMMV

She Student Konvioleat Coordinating Oonraittee hue b««a conducting a

voter resistratioa campaign ia Mississippi for a year, MMl CMti

aeeretaries bav«> bet® arrests*, threatenet, aad beatea by sjobe.

SHCC is also holding ragistratioa drives la Southwest Georgia, where

three churches have been burned to the ground aad registration workers shot

at hf aJght-rldlng terrorists ia the past month.

Two young women s?«r*iag ia Mississippi were wounded by shotgun pellets

oa Sept* 10. NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, N.E. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA " 688-0331 GOCDMOI, MISSISSIPPI, SEPTEMBER 13 — The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee today protested the killing of an unidentified Negro man discov­ ered here yesterday in the Big Black River, his body in a cloth sack weighted down with 100 pounds of rocks. Four Negroes fishing in the river found the body, which was apparently thrown off a highway bridge. The Holmes County .'•;• tfcr- Coroner said that the body had been in the river four or five days, and ordered it buried in Potter's Field today. Goodman is about 45 miles south of Greenwood, Mississippi, where four SNCC field secretaries on August 17 fled their office to avoid potential lynchings by a menacing group of white men armed with chains and ropes. The town is also near the Tallahatchee River, where Emmett Till's body was found in 1956. Charles McDew, SNCC chairman, wired Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, "We urge the Justice Department to immediately investigate the killing of an unidentified Negro man in Holmes County. Please send federal troops and/or marshals to help reconstruct Mississippi because the Nazi-minded citizens have declared open season on Negroes." The population of Holmes County, according to the 1961 Civil Rights Commission report, is 72$ Negro. Negroes constitute 64.7$ of the total voting age population, but only 41 are registered to vote. James Forman, executive secretary of SNCC, said today: "This is another instance of lawlessness designed to protect the segregated power structure and to intimidate voter registration workers and potential voters. "Unless the United States government demonstrates that it can protect the rights of American citizens, a trip to the moon will indeed be a shallow victory."

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, based in Atlanta at

135 Auburn Avenue, N.E., has been conducting a voter registration campaign in Mississippi for a year. Several field secretaries have been arrested, threatened, and beaten by mobs. SNCC is also holding registration drives in

Southwest Georgia, where three churches have been burned to the ground and registration workers shot at by nightriding terrorists in the past month.

Though SNCC receives some funds from the Southern Regional Council's

Voter Education Project, additional contributions are desperately needed, -30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, N.E. ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA for immediate release 688-0331

ATLANTA, GEORGIii, August 1 - Listing "another example of police intimidation of

voter registration workers," the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

asked Federal authorities to investigate threats made against a voting instruc­

tor in Holly Springs, Mississippi.

The Atlanta SNCC office said that Deputy Sheriff Ben Rose of Holly Springs

had told SNCC worker Frank Smith not to return to the registrar's office. Smith

is working in voter registration in Holly Springs, and has taken several Negroes

to the Clerk's Office to register.

Smith said that the Deputy told him "Nigger, you ask too many questions.

We don't like people asking questions around here,"

Earlier, SNCC had asked the Justice Department to investigate intimidation of prospective voters in Terrell County, Georgia, Last week Terrell County Sher­

iff Zeke T, Matthews and thirteen other "roughly dressed" white men broke into

a Negro voter registration rally conducted by SNCC workers. Policemen warned

the Negroes at the Southwest Georgia vote meeting that "We'll get you," and

Sheriff Matthews told newsmen that "We want our colored people to go onliving

like they have for the past 100 years."

On Monday, July 30, two SNCC Field Secretaries were jailed in Terrell County

on "loiterihg" charges and were held incommunicado.

SNCC Staffers Charles Sherrod and Ralph Allen were arrested July 30 when

they accompanied five Negroes to the registrar's office in Dawson, Georgia.

The Atlanta SNCC office said that they had received numerous complaints of

"intimidation, beatings, and jailings" from their workers in Southwest Georgia.

-30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, N.E. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA 688-0331

CLEVELAND, LIBERTY, and RULEVILLE, MISSISSIPPI, AUGUST 29 — Robert Moses,

director of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee Voting Project,

announced efforts this week by Mississippi Negroes to vote and to challenge

the political structure of this state,

-ft* SiSZpliJid* Negroes are circulating a petition to the President of the

United States asking that Rep. Jamie Whitten be disqualified from sitting in

the House of Representatives,

The petition reads: "We, the below named Negro citizens of the United

States and the state of Mississippi, all 21 years old and older, would have

cast our votes for Morrill W, Lindsey of the Second Congressional district

of Mississippi, in which we reside, in the June 5> 1962, Democratic Primary

had we been permitted to vote,"

Moses said that in Liberty^ 11 Negroes went to the registrar's office

to file applications on August 21, Moses, and Travis Britt, a SNCC field sec­

retary, were beaten several times by local whites as they worked on voter registration last year. Liberty is also the scene of the murder of Herbert Lee,

a 50-year old Negro working en voter registration, by Mississippi State Leg­

islator Eugene Hurst on September 25, 1961.

Moses also announced a voter registration program in Ruleville (Sun­

flower County), This, the home county of Sen* James 0, Eastland (Chairman of

the U, S. Senate's Judiciary Couuittee) has a Negro voting age population

of 13,524 (out of a total of 22,309) and has 161 Negroes registered to vote,

Charles McLaurin, a SNCC voter registration field secretary, said that a

total of nine people went to the registrar's office last week and found the

office closed. He said that efforts would be made to register voters in

Ruleville and Indianola, two of the principal towns in Sunflower County.

Charlos McDew, SNCC Chairman, wired Senator Eastland:

"We find it 'inexplicable' why Negroes in Sunflower County cannot reg­

ister in your home county. As Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, you

have an obligation to work for justice for all people. It is our hope that you

will instruct the county registrar to open his office to potential Negro voters. The SNCC Chairman urged Sen. Eastland to resign from the Senate if "violations

of voting rights are not corrected," -30- HE ferment of social change and the application of T the Christian gospel to the problems of human so­ ciety sometimes churn up dramatic incidents—particu­ larly if the race issue is involved, and the location is CLAIMING in the South. The story of John Robert (Bob) Zellner is a case in point. Although it may be folly—perhaps even unjust THE RIGHT —to focus on one individual among the thousands who have been active participants in the struggle for racial justice and understanding, it may still be valua­ ble in understanding events even now taking shape. TO CHOOSE: Bob Zellner's involvement in the work of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee is, in many ways, typical—a sort of paradigm—of the role of the indi­ vidual in the contemporary Southern Revolution. a profile Bob's family—a somewhat typical southern one— was educated at Bob Jones College, and held tradi­ tional "Bible Belt" religious and social concepts until their own religious convictions forced them to re-ex­ BY EDGAR A. LOVE amine the mores of their society. When Bob was a small child, his parents came to an increasingly liberal position on social issues, especially the race question. The Zellner sons—Bob is the second of five boys— were raised to share the parents' convictions. Like children of many Methodist families in the South, Bob entered a small denominational college— Huntingdon College in Montgomery, Alabama. As a student, he became interested in the Christian ap­ plication of sociological methods to the problems of a biracial society. And because Huntingdon is in Mont­ gomery, he had ample opportunity to put his convic­ tions to the test. In Bob's senior year—1960-61—one of his classes received an assignment to "study the race problem and present your idea of a solution in a paper." Bob and some other students were aware that they were living in a community which had attracted world-wide attention but a few years before as a result of the ap­ plication of nonviolence (as a philosophy and as strategy) in the midst of racial tensions. Therefore, they were not content to go only to the library for their answers. Instead, they used the resources of their com­ munity and attended the annual workshop on non­ violence sponsored by the Montgomery Improvement Association, the organization that had led the Mont­ gomery bus protest. Several Negro ministers in Alabama, including the Reverend Ralph Abernathy, who had succeeded Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., as president of the Montgom­ ery Improvement Association, were defendents at this time in a libel suit by city officials—an outgrowth of an ad on which their names appeared in the New York Times seeking support for Dr. King who was under attack. Bob and some fellow students attended the trial of this suit and offered their friendship and sup­ port to the ministers. When the verdict was against the ministers and the courts confiscated Mr. Aber- WU nathy's car, the students took a collection of $22 among Huntingdon College students and sent it to classes in protest because a fellow student, Brenda Mr. Abemathy with a note saying: ". . . We are dis­ Travis, had been expelled from school for "sitting-in" appointed that the officials chose to resort to such at the local bus station. The Negro school administra­ petty harassment. . . . We would like to stand up for tion was under pressure from the city government, decency. . . . Any financial assistance we might be and the students decided to march on City Hall in able to give will be nominal, but we wish to express protest. They asked the SNCC members to go with our moral support with this small sum." This, along them. Except for Bob, all were Negroes. They readily with several private interracial meetings, was about agreed to go. "How about it, Bob?" one of them asked. the extent of the students' activities, but it was Bob did not hesitate. He said he would go. enough to cause a major controversy at Huntingdon. That afternoon he became the victim of an angry mob and was beaten under the eyes of the police; OLLEGE officials announced that it was the policy that night, he was thrown into an unheated jail cell C of the college that students who wished to re­ and denied food and bedding. A Negro prisoner in an main in school should attend no meetings where adjoining cell shared his supper with Bob and gave Negroes were present. According to Bob's father, col­ him a blanket. lege officials later said verbally that the reason for this After a few days, Bob and his associates were out policy was that any other approach was "impractical on bail. They face four- to six-month jail sentences and impossible" at that time. Several ministers in the on convictions for breach of peace, which are on ap­ Alabama-West Florida Conference (which supports peal. Huntingdon College) protested the administration's In December, 1961, came Albany, Georgia, where policy. In an official document, it was noted that in students were also demonstrating and asked Bob's seeking interracial contacts the students were only support. Again, along with the others, he went to jail. following the policies and recommendations of The Methodist Church, concluding: II IS arrest in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, came on Feb- We do not question the right o/ the administration of n ruary 17, 1962. On that occasion, he and Charles Huntingdon College to disagree with . . . the policy, direc­ (Chuck) McDew, chairman of the SNCC, went to the tives, advice, and recommendations or The Methodist Baton Rouge jail to visit a friend, Dion Diamond, also Church ... (but) we question the rights of the institution to a SNCC staff member who had been arrested several prohibit students from following these policies, advice, and weeks before because of his part in student demonstra­ recommendations if they so choose. . . . tions against segregation there. Dion was under very high bond, and had to stay in jail. This matter is still an issue in the Alabama-West Bob and Chuck arrived in Baton Rouge late in the Florida Conference. afternoon of February 17. They learned at the jail Bob was graduated from Huntingdon with honors that they could not visit Dion until the next visiting and spent the summer of 1961 in various interracial period, several days later; they could not stay that activities in order to study further the whole problem long. But they were also told that they could leave him of racial conditions in a democratic society. More and a basket of fruit and books. They went to buy these, more, he feit called to participate actively in the move­ returned, and left them at the jail with a note. By this ment for integration. time, officials had apparently learned who they were. The Southern Conference Education Fund, inter­ They were preparing to leave the jail and leave town ested in seeing more white students participate in the when they were stopped by officials and arrested. historic movements being developed by southern Negro They had been in Louisiana two days—in Baton students, made a grant to the Student Nonviolent Rouge only a few hours. The charge was criminal Coordinating Committee (SNCC) for the employment anarchy against the state of Louisiana. of a field secretary to spend the 1961-62 school year Bob has been fortunate in that, unlike many white in an attempt to present the viewpoint of this move­ students active in the protest movement, his parents ment to southern white students'. The leadership of the share his convictions and have supported his actions SNCC asked Bob to take this job, and he accepted. consistently. In January, 1962, when Bob was re­ On October 4, 1961, Bob was in McComb, Missis­ fused admittance to the campus of his alma mater, sippi, for a staff meeting with fellow SNCC workers Huntingdon College, because "his presence posed a who were engaged in Negro voter registration ac­ potentially dangerous situation" in that his "views tivities. McComb is in southern Mississippi—a rural on racial matters differ from those of the student area where virtually no Negroes are registered to vote body," the Zellners issued the following statement and, until the recent stirrings, there had never been to the press: a challenge to segregation. It was in McComb that "Our son, John Robert Zellner, is currently in­ Bob faced his "baptism of fire." volved in following his Christian conscience in the While the SNCC meeting was in session, over a face of public disapproval. With other young stu­ hundred students from Burgland High School left their dents, Negro and white, he is active in seeking to The Zellners then continued: "Not all Methodists share these beliefs. It is not required of them that they do. In our church those who differ are entirely free to do so. It is felt, how­ ever, that those who do hold such convictions and choose to act in accord should have the blessing of their church and the tolerant understanding of this membership. Bob has been taught these things and has made them his own. . . . "Some have chided us, saying, 'But all this agitating and demonstrating is not the way to do it.' To this we answer: "Send us an outline of your better way. Draw up a report on how long you have worked at it and the success you have had. We espouse no particular method or technique. Our concern is for getting the problem solved. Our generation has had (as several before it) a try at the problem and our success has bring about a just, more democratic, and more Chris­ been something less than phenomenal. We say let tian solution to the race problem—a problem his the young try it their way. They can hardly do worse generation did not create. than we—and they just might have what it will take "Our son's activities have landed him in jails, sub­ to turn the trick! How do we know it won't work? It's jected him to mob violence, and have held him up to never been tried before. public and private scorn—none of which has yet "Others have said, 'But we have had this problem broken his spirit. We, his parents, are proud of him a long time. It has never been solved. This younger for this. We doubt that any of his critics have paid generation isn't going to solve it either.' To this we such a price for the convictions they so vehemently answer: hold. "But look at the progress they have already made! "Many friends (and some others) have asked us And besides this, if we expect to keep praying the for explanations and have indicated a desire, for one Lord's Prayer, 'Thy will be done on earth as it is in reason or another, to know why Bob is so engaged heaven,' we had better keep working at the job. and what he hopes to accomplish by it. . . . "Our son was reared in . . . The Methodist Church "As long as our son, and others with him, are 'in ... he is an honor graduate of a Methodist college. . . ." there pitching,' we intend to stand by them, so help The parents' statement then quoted from the us God!" Discipline of The Methodist Church, including these This is the testimony of Bob's parents. A similar passages: testimony, striking in its simple analysis, is that of Robert Moses, a young Negro working to promote OUR THEOLOGICAL BASIS: The Methodist Church voter registration in Mississippi: must view the perplexing times and problems which we "It has been said that few people know—or at least face today in the light of the teachings of Jesus. . . . To talk—about the bitterness and hatred which many be silent in the face of need, injustice, and exploitation southern Negroes feel toward whites. I've thought of is to deny him. . . . We stand for the equal rights of racial, the kids I've met here in McComb and some of the cultural, and religious groups. . . . The right to choose a hatreds they have expressed toward whites and some home, enter a school, secure employment, vote or join a of the folklore stemming from that hatred coupled church should not be limited by a person's race, culture, or with ignorance. religion.... "At the same time I thought of the visible effect RECOMMENDATIONS: That Methodists in their homes, of Bob Zellner's appearance among us as a friend and in their work, in their churches, and in their communities co-worker: one girl talking of her white brother, when actively work to eliminate discrimination and enforced seg­ I had previously heard her say with bitterness, 'We regation on the basis of race, color, or national origin; that don't associate with peckerwoods; another boy talk­ as a church we pursue a program of education and action ing long after Bob had left of his laughter and good to bring about Christian practices with respect to housing, humor. ... A new meaning I thought I detected in open occupancy, schools, opportunity of employment, and the phrase 'Black and white together' from our theme community acceptance which . . . create a sense of belong­ song. Little things, maybe, but very important, I feel. ing * The kids here need more contact with people like • DISCIPLINE of The Methodist Church, 1860. pgph. 2020-2026 passim (Italics him. . . ." supplied). EDGAR A. LOVE is resident bishop of the Baltimore Area (Central Jurisdiction) of The Methodist Church, where he has served for the past ten years. He holds degrees from Howard University, Boston University, and the University of Chicago, and has been thrice honored with the degree of Doctor of Divinity. He serves as Chairman of the Board of the Southern Conference Educational Fund.

THIS ARTICLE is reprinted from the November, 1962, issue of tnotiue magazine. For additional copies write to the Southern Conference Educational Fund, Inc., 822 Perdido Street, New Orleans 12, Louisiana.

WHAT HAPPENED LATER

Bob was eventually released from the Baton Rouge jail on $7,000 bail and continued his work with SNCC. In April, 1962, he took part in demonstrations against segregation in Talladega, Ala. For this he was arrested on a charge of conspiracy to violate trespass laws. He was also named in an injunction banning integration activity in Alabama.

Free again on $1,500 bond, he spent the summer and fall of 1962 traveling over the South, talking with other white students about the challenge of our times. In January, 1963, he again visited Huntingdon College in Montgomery, Ala. He was walking quietly along the campus talk­ ing with some students when he was arrested by state agents. The charge was vagrancy.

While he was in jail, the state added a charge of "false pretense," which carries a 10-year sentence. This charge involved a check Bob had written the day he was arrested. The prosecu­ tion said he did not have sufficient funds in his bank account in Atlanta to cover the check when it was written. A bank official wired police that the check would have been honored if presented for payment. The check was never presented. Speaking in open court, the assistant prosecutor said he had offered to drop the check charge if Bob would plead guilty to vagrancy, accept a sus­ pended sentence, and "cause us no trouble in regard to race matters." He said to Bob's attorney during the court proceeding: "I told you I wanted this boy to leave Montgomery. That is what I was interested in." Bob refused any such deal. Subsequently, his lawyers filed a petition in court stating that they had evidence that his arrest was personally ordered by Alabama's new governor, George Wallace, just before he took office.

Meantime, while Bob was free on bond, state agents followed him constantly. They even trailed him to Mobile, Ala., to the funeral of his grandmother, Mrs. J. J. Hardy, widow of a Methodist minister. Here they created such terror among friends and relatives that Bob's mother made a personal appeal to the agents to go away, but they did not.

All these things brought protests from organizations and decent people across the country. The vagrancy charge was dropped by the state. The "false pretense" case brought a mistrial, when the all-white jury could not agree. Retrial was scheduled for May, 1963. Bob's other cases in various places, including Baton Rouge, still await trial. All told, he faces charges carrying total sen­ tences of over 25 years.

Many Methodists have stood by Bob. A character witness in the Alabama cases was a Mont­ gomery white woman who is the daughter of a Methodist minister, the wife of a retired minister and the mother of two ministers. She said she had known Bob since he was a child. Asked about his reputation, she stated: "It is above reproach in my estimation." On the day of Bob's "false pre­ tense" trial, 20 white Methodist ministers from throughout Alabama were in the courtroom to show their concern and support. NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, N. W« FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 3^-T^ t Atlanta lit, Georgia 5 ? H* SNCC FIELD SECRETARY ASKS FOR FEDERAL TROOPS FOR VOTER PROTECTION IN BELZONI, MISSISSIPPI

BELZONI, MISSISSIPPI, JANUARY 21 - Samuel Block, a field secretary for the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in Greenwood, Mississippi, has asked the

United States Department of Justice for federal protection of voter registration workers in Belzoni, Mississippi.

In October, 196l, Herbert Lee - a 52-year-old Negro active in SNCC's Amite County voter registration drive - was shot and killed by State Legislator E. H. Hurst.

Despite testimony of witnesses that Hurst fired point-blank at Lee, Hurst tv-as never arrested, never jailed, and was aquitted by a coroner's jury.

Block wrote to the Justice Department:

"I am aending you an open letter demanding troops or federal marshalls

for protection in Belzoni, Mississippi for voter registration workers

because I sincerely feel they will be most needed in Belzoni. To sup­

port my statement, I refer to the killing of Reverend Lee, who was very

active In voter registration. There are also a couple of cases where

Negroes xfere killed, their bodies mutilated, and nothing was done•*»*•"•

about either case."

Block also demanded a "complete investigation concerning the denial of surplus food to Negroes in LeFlore County because I strongly feel that without the help and aid of welfare and the United States Department of Agriculture, Negroes will not be able to survive during the winter months of 1963."

Block and other SNCC field secretaries were forced to leap out of a 2- story building in September, 1962 when a group of whites approached their office in

Greenwood, Mississippi armed with guns and ropes.

-30- NEWS RELEASE 3 k^ STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, N.W. FOE m EDIATE RELEASE Atlanta lit, Georgia 638-0331 JUSTICE DEFT, FILES SUIT IN SUNFLOWER COUNTY, MISS,J 5NCC GIL ASKS SUITS IK EVERY SOUTHERN S'lATE

Y 23, 1963 — Charles McDew, chairman of the Student

ommittee, hailed today's Justice Department suit against

Sunflower County, Mississippi, and asked that suits be Iniated coui • ,d "in every other Southern/state where violence and intimidation occur every day t© prevent Negroes from registering to vote."

McDew's statement followed the announcement of the Justice department suit

against Cecil C, Campbell, c@unty clerk and voting registrar., and the State »f Miss­ issippi in U. S. District Court, Oxford, Miss.

The Sunflower suit was filed three weeks after seven warkers far the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee sued the Justice department to insure protection rf voter registration workers in the State.

In Sunflower County — Sen, James 0. Eastland's heme — only llli voting—age

Negroes are registered out ®f a voting-age population of 13,52li, but more than half the 8,786 voting-age whites were registered. According to the Civil Rights Comm­ ission's I960 repsrt on veting, 67.8$ of the county's overall population is Negro.

McDew said: "We greet with satisfaction the Justice Department suit in Sun­ flower County, where SNCC workers have been active since the summer »f 1962. Our staff has been jailed on fraudulent charges, threatened by authorities, and beaten by local whites. Negroes active in the voter registration drive have been shot.

We urge the Justice Department to follow this action with suits in every other

Southern county and state where violence and intimidation »ccur every day tc prevent

Negroes from registering to vote. We alse ask the Department tc bring suit against those Mississippi county officials — in Sunflower and Leflsre — who have cut off surplus food supplies t« Negroes as reprisals against their activities."

In answer to Sen. Eastland's comment that "There is no foundation In fact ftr the allegations in the bill of complaint," McDew said, "We recommend that Sen. East­ land examine documented and published reports of terror and violence in his own horn? county before he says 'no foundation in fact' exists for a cult,"

Sunflower County has been the scene of constant terror and harassment against

Negroes and voter registratitn workers since the drive began. In August, 1962 several

Negrtes lost their jobs in a wave of reprisals against Negroes associated with the drive, OYiuxches had their free city water and tax exemption cancelled because they were being used for "purposes »ther than wcrship services." Several SNCC staff members were arrested in Indianola for "distributing handbills without a license," and on

September 12 two young girls w

Nonviolent II P 111 C 6 Raymond Street, N.W. II mma \ Atlanta 1U, Georgia r N • WW \ 688-0331 Coordinating II L ff J Pebruary, 1963

Committee DICK GREGQRY T0 mim CLOTHING TO MISSISSIPPI FEB. 11

GREENVILLE, MISSISSIPPI, FEBRUARY ? — Famed comedian Dick Gregory will personally escort a cargo of food and clothing collected in Chicago for dispossessed Negro families here.

Gregory, who has rented space for 6,000 pounds of foodstuffs on a cargo plane slated for arrival in Memphis at 11 a.m., Monday, February 11, will accompany

the food and clothing to Clarksdale, Mississippi. Headquarters of the national food drive for Delta Negroes who have been forced off their land because they tried to vote are in Clarksdale, directed by Dr. Aaron Henry.

The Chicago comedian is contributing to a "Food For Freedom" drive, sponsored by the Chicago Friends of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). The drive was started after SNCC and other organizations issued a call for

foodstuffs and clothing for Delta Negroes. SNCC field secretaries, who have been conducting voter registration drives in Mississippi since October, 1961, estimate

that 20,000 Negroes have been dispossessed and cut off welfare and surplus food

rolls since the voter registration drive began. # # O tudent

\\ onuiolent FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE W oordinating cTRaymond Street, N.W, NEWS Atlanta lij., Georgia 688-0331 w ommittee February, 1963

TALLADEGA INJUNCTION HEARINGS CONTINUED UNTIL MARCH 13

TALLADEGA, ALABAMA, FEBRUARY 21 — At tha request of the State of Alabama, hearings on a temporary restraining order against anti-segregation demonstrators here have been continued until March 13 to give th?3 State "additional time to amend its plea*"

During the last two weeks of hearings, most of the enjoined parties (the stu­ dent body of Talladega Collegej Robert Zellner, a field secretary £>r the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee^ Talladega College President Arthur Gray, and others) have filed amended motions to prove that the State has come into court

"with unclean hands" in conspiring to maintain segregation in Alabama.

The injunction stems from demonstrations last April when hundreds of Talladega students staged protest marches against segregated facilities in tbs city.

The State holds in the hearings that anti-segregation demonstrators incited violence by their presence and th£fc the State's only concern is the prevention of violence. In addition, state investigators have implied soma "subversive" influence in the demonstrations.

Defense Attorney Orzell Billingsley said, during the hearings, "We are not trying Communists here. We are trying the case of segregation and discrimination in Talladega, Alabama«,"

The enjoined parties have maintained consistently that the demonstrators were not inciting potential vf.olencf}, but that this potential could have come from the crowds of hostile white/j gatherec. on the streets of Talladega, In addition, the en­ joined persons maintain that the State, by preserving a system of complete state­ wide segregation, hae come into court with "unclean hands."

The temporary restraining Order, handed down in April, 1962, is still in —30—• effect. NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 6 RAYMOND STREET, ATLANTA lli, GEORGIA

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, February 22 •• A Field Secretary from the Student Ifonviolent

Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was arrested here today and charged with "circulating

breach of the peace."

Samuel Block, 22, is being held on $1,000 bond somewhere in Leflore

County.

Block, who called the Atlanta SNCC office shortly after his arrest, told

SNCC Chairman Charles McDew that he didn't know what jail he was being held in, and

that policemen who had arrested him on East McLauren Street here after he stepped

out of his office wouldn't tell him where he was,

Block is in charge of SNCC's Leflore County voter registration project.

For the past two weeks, however, he has been distributing food to Negro families who

have been cut off surplus food rolls in this Delta county because some Negroes here

have tried to regsiter to vote. On Wednesday night, February 20, four businesses

located one block from SNCC's McLauren Street office here were burned to tfc# ground.

After the burning, Block charged that local segregationists had meant to bjjrn his office down. £>

Block has been arrested five times in Mississippi since he began working

1th SNCC's vote drive. He has also been beaten twice, and narrowly missod being

ynched last August when he leaped from a second story window here to eseape a mob

f white men carrying ropes, chains and iron pipes.

In Atlanta, SNCC Chairman protested Block's arrest in a telegram to

aited States Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy*, McDew urged an investigation of

/.he continued harrassment of SNCC Field Secretaries working to register Negro voters

i Mississippi. We demand that the Justice Department cease abdicating its respon-

.bilities and m^ve to stop the police-state tactics being employed by the officials

f that state."

-30- NEWS RELEASE \fi i \ STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street. IE W. • FOR IMMEDIATE FEIEASE Atlanta llj., Georgia 688-0331 SNCC FIELD SEG^Y BLASTED IN GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, MARCH 1 — Janes Travis, a 20-year old field secretary

for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, was gunned last night by three

white men and is in a hospital hero in critical condition,

Travis is in Greenwood-Leflore Hospital with a shoulder wound and a bullet

lodged behind his spine. He is scheduled to be transferred to University Hospital

in Jackson this morning.

Travis was accompanied by Robert Moses, director of SNCC's Mississippi voter

registration project and Randolph Blackwell, field director of the Atlanta-based

Voter Education Project, when an untagged white Euick began following them about

9:30 p«m. Three white men were in the car. The three Negroes had something to eat and drove to the highway in the dir~ about 11 p.m. ection of Greenville/ The white Buick was parked at the intersection of the

highway and followed for seven milese

Moses reported that the three fired into the car with pistols, and that

bullets smashed both front windows and whizzed around them. Travis, the driver of

the car, shouted that he had been hit. Moses grabbed the wheel and brought the car

to a halt. Travis was given medical-attention at Mississippi Vocational College

and then brought here to the hospital,

Moses said early this morning, "We all were within inches of being killed."

He reported that at least l£0 Negroes have attempte dto register to vote in

Greenwood in the past two days, "the first real breakthrough in Mississippi."

SECC Chairman Charles McDew xdred Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy early

this morning and requested an Investigation into the shooting, SNCC executive

secretary wired President John F. Kennedy today:

Based on your speech yesterday on voting rights for Negroes in the South, we urge you to protect our workers in Mississippi. Last night James Travis, 20, was snot by three whites in an untagged white Buick seven miles from Greenwood and is in critical condition, Travis, Robert Moses, and Rand­ olph Blackwell almost died last night, This incident is clearly connected with the fact that at least 15>0 Negroes have tried to register in Greenwood this week. We urge you to take executive action to prevent murder in MissLssippio - 30 - URGENTJkCTION MMORANDUM

On last Monday and Tuesday, February 2$ and 26, over 150 Negroes in Green­ wood, Mississippi tried to register to vote,, This marks the first time that many Negroes in Greenwood - or any Black Betl county - have tried to register. You have all read the enclosed press release which tells how Jimmy Travis was gunned down outside Greenwood last night. Greenwood Is In Leflore County, in the Delta, There are 19,806 Negroes in Leflore County and 6,881 whites. Last sum­ mer, three of our field secretaries barely missed being lynched when they jumped from the second story window of their office to escape a mob sf white men carrying chains, ropes and pipes- Last week, three Negro businesses located one block from SNCC's Greenwood office burned to the ground. SNCC Field Secretary Sam Block charged that the un­ known arsonists had meant to burn his office down. Last Friday, February 22, Sam Block was arrested, taken to an unknoxm jail, and charged with "circulating breach of the peace." The charge was later switched to "Issuing statements calculated to breach the peace". Sam xvas tried on Monday, February 25", and was sentenced to six months in jail and a $500 fine, The judge who pronounced the sentence told Sam that he would reduce the fine to $250 and would suspend the sentence, if Sam would leave Mississippi for goodo The white men who shot Jimmy, the policemen who arrested Sam, the people who burned the buildings, were all aiming for one goals they want to stop - by any means possible, fear, intimidation, terror, brutality, force «• Negro registra­ tion in Mississippi, This is not the first time SNCC people have been shot at, or the first time one lies wounded -• perhaps fatally - in a hospitals, Two girls were shot - one through the head - in Ruleville last summer. Two SNCC staffers narrowly missed a shotgun blast fired into their bedroom in McComb two years ago.

We are asking you to:

(1) Protest the shooting and demand an investigation from: the President, the Attorney General and the Justice Department, and the Civil Rights Commissions (2) Keep sending shipments of food and clothing to Sam Block at US' East McLauren Street in Greenwood. Sam Block has told us that the food and clothing he has already distributed helped to boost morale in Leflore County, (3) We intend to Intensify our efforts in Greenwood, in Leflore County, and in all of the Delta Counties, We intend to send more field workers into Miss­ issippi, All of'you have supported SNCC in the past. We are asking you now for all the support you can give us, and for the names and addresses of others who could help keep us In Mississippi,

We intend to stay in Leflore County until the job is done.

SNCC 6 Raymond Street, N. W. Atlanta lk, Georgia 688-0331 BACKGROUND ON JIMMY TRAVIS

Jimmy Travis, twenty years old, a field secretary for the Student Non­ violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)7~~was born in Jackson, Mississippi and has lived all his life there.

He was one of thirty young people, native Mississippians, who joined the

Freedom Rides in the summer of 1961. He spent lU days in Parchman Penitentiary*

He worked in Vicksburg, Mississippi last summer in a voter registration program conducted by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee,

For the past month and a half, he has been working on a similar project in Orangeburg, South Carolina.

He wanted to work in Mississippi, however, and was driving with two other voter registration workers when three white men, in a car with no tags, fired into his car. Seven shot holes were found in the car later0 The right and left front windows were smashed,

Jimmy is in the University Hospital in Jackson, with a shoulder wound and a flattened bullet lodged near his spine at the base of his necko

He is one of twenty native Mississippians, all young people, who have de­ cided to act themselves to change the social structure of their state. Working with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in voter registration and direct action programs against segregation, they have been beaten, jailed, nearly lynched and shot at„

Many find that they cannot work in their own homes, because of the pressures their parents and friends are subject to,

"During the Freedom Rides, I decided that I should do something for others,"

Jimmy wrote. "Since that time I have worked with the movement^"

-30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, N.W. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta ll;, Georgia 688-0331 SNCC WORKERS SHOT AT AGAIN IN GREENWOOD, MISS. .

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, MARCH 7—Workers for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee and Greenwood citizens were shot at again here last night.

Samuel Block and Willie Peacock, two SNCC field secretaries, and two young

women from Greenwood, were leaving a church here last night when white men in a

1958.Dodge station wagon—with no license tags—shot at. their car,

James Forman, SNCC executive secretary, reported from Greenwood that

window glass had been shattered, but no one was injured.

Forman added that 28 Greenwood Negroes had. gone to the county courthouse

yesterdav to register, and 22 had actually been registered.

Last night's shooting followed almost exactly one week on the heels of the

shooting of James Travis, a 20-year-old Negro SNCC field secretary, in Greenwood,

Travis was shot in the shoulder, and another bullet was lodged behind, his spine

at the base of his skull. Doctors in University Hospital, in Jackson removed the

bullet in an operation March 1, and reported that had the bullet penetrated

Travis' body with a little more force, he would have died instantly. Travis is

recovering satisfactorily now at his parents' home in Jackson,

The Atlanta-based Votsr Education Project announced a concentrated campaign

in Leflore County, of which Greenwood is the county seat, the day after Travis'

injury, and said that many civil rights organizations—-primarily SNCC-—would

send workers in to the area-to.step, up the voter registration campaign.

According to SNCC workers" in the area, the attack on-Travis, and now. on

Block and Peacock,.was precipitated by.almost 200 Negroes in the past week

attempting to,register and vote in Greenwood.

SNCC officials have urged the federal government to send in marshalls

and/or troops•to protect voter registration workers in the area. ^ tudent

Nonviolent II [J III f C ltl J WW ^ 6 Raymond Street, N.W, oordinating II k if *# Atlanta 1/*, Georgia 688-0331 commi'tte e March 20, 1963 TRAVIS VOWS TO bONI'INUE THE STRUGGLE

JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI, MARCH 20 — A 20-year old Negro youth — almost

killed by white assailants three weeks ago in Greenwood, Mississippi —

has vc\;red to continue "fighting to bring democracy to Mississippi,"

James Travis, a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinatirg

Committee (SNCC), said that the experience he had undergone February 28

"has only served to convince me that we must continue to work, harder

than ever, to see that all Mississippi citizens have the protection of

law and order."

Travis was driving from Greenwood to Greenville, accompanied by

Robert Moses, director of SNCC's statewide Mississippi project, and

Randolph Blackwell, field director of the Atlanta-based Voter Education

Project, when three white men in an untagged white 1962 Buick fired into

his car. All side windows were completely smashed. Travis received a

shoulder x-round, and another bullet penetrated his body at the back of his

skull and became lodged behind his spineo

Moses said;, "We xtfere all inches from being killed,,"

Doctors from University Hospital in Jackson, where Travis was taken

by ambulance, reported that if the bullet had entered Travis' body with a

little more force, he would have been killed instantly.

Travis is a native Mississippian and a former Freedom Rider. He

says, "I am going back to Greenwood* People there need all the help they

can get. They are hungry, and their children are hungry, but they xtfant

to register and vote*"

- 30 - NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE „„,- TMWWTVTA ™? „.„,„,. z _ „. IKLKEDJAIE RE LEASE 6 Raymon ds Stree t iOa, — • Atlanta 14, Georgia 688-0331

100 Negroes Try To Register In One Day In Greenwood, Mississippi

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, March 20 - Over one hundred Negroes tried to register to vote today, reported James Forman, Executive Secretary of the Student Nonviolent Coordina­ ting Committee (SNCC), Forman is now in Greenwood working with SNCC's vote drive,/ Forman said that this is the largest number to attempt to register in one day since the SNCC state-wide voter registration program, began a year and a half ago-. About 400 Negroes, Forman said, had tried to register in Greenwood in the last month. Over 150 Negroes over a period of two days had tried to register the week of February 25. Three days later, James Travis, 20, a SNCC Field worker, was shot in the shoulder and spine and required an operation in University Hospital in Jackson, Accompanying Travis were Robert Moses, director of SNCC's Mississippi pro­ ject, and Randolph Blackwell, field director of the Atlanta-based Voter Education Pro ject, Neither were injured, but Moses said, 'We were all within inches of being kill One xreek later, white assailants tried murder again. This time, SNCC Field Secretaries Samuel Block and Willie Peacock, and two Greenwood citizens, Essie Broome and Peggy Mayre, xirere shot at while their car stopped in fron of the SNCC of.fie here. All the side windoxvs of the car xvere smashed, and the four were covered with shattered glass, Forman said here that the pattern of harrassment and intimidation had started in Greenx-rood once SNCC workers came here in August, 1962. Block and thro other SNCC workers had to jump from a second story window of their office when a mob of whites, after conversing with police, surrounded the building and came up the frcni stairs of the building armed with guns and ropes. At that time, SNCC demanded Federal protection, When LeFlore County officials cut an estimated 22,000 Negroes from wel­ fare and surplus government food rolls, SNCC workers began nationwide appeals for aid to feed the dispossed Negro families, Thousands of tons of food and clothing have been sent by FrIends of SNCC groups in Chicago, Ann Arbor, Detroit, Los Angeles and various student groups throughout the country, Last week, the Chicago Friends Of SNC: sent 37,000 pounds of food. All but two of SNCC's Mississippi workers are noxtf concentrated in LeFlor County, where coordinated efforts are being made to register every eligible Negro, The Atlanta-based SNCC has been conducting vote drives in Mississippi since 1961, -30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, N.W. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta lii, Georgia 688-0331 MISS. NEGROES TO GET FOOD FOR ONE MONTH GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, MARCH 20 — The Leflore County Beard of Supervisors voted today to resume, for one month, a full-scale surplus food distribution program. The surplus food program was discontinued last year after the Atlanta-based Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) began a voter registration drive here. The student anti-segregation group charged that the food cut-off was aimed at "starving out" Negroes who attempted to register and vote,-, and discourage others from doing soa An estimated 22,000 Nagroes, mainly seasonal workers, were affected* Wednesday's announcement was hailed as "a great victory" by James Forman, SNCC executive secretary, who said: The decision is a great victory for those working to bring democracy to Mississippi. Many Americans, especially those connected with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, have been untiring in their efforts to feed hungry Delta Negro?.''-, Euch of our time in the past three months has been spent in meeting the food n:-eds of these people. From now on, we ?$$&> double our efforts to register every E^gro in this county« We hope that we will not meet the violence and other obstacles we have thus far encounteredo The "violence and other obstacles" Forman referred to were two shooting

incidents involving SNCC workers. On February 28, SNCC field secretary Jimmy Travis, 20, was shot twice by three whites. A week later, a carload of SNCC workers were shotgunned outside their office here. Through student and other groups in the North, the Student Nonviolent Coor­ dinating Committee has sent "many thousands of tons" of food and clothing into the Delta, a SNCC worker said. The drive will continue, the worker said, "until we have some assurance that Leflore County's Negroes can survive."

SNCC maintains direct action and voter registration programs in Alabama, Arkansas, Mississippi, Georgia, South Carolina and Florida. Fifty young people, Negro and white, most of whom are in their early twenties, have interrupted their studies for a year or more to work in the field for $15-25 per week.

- 30 - ^ tudent

\\ on violent 6 Raymond Street, N»W, C NEWwm WW S\ Atlanta ik, Georgia oordinating | ^ Li W w ^J 66&-0331 March, 1963 committc c FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

MOSES VOWS PROGRAM WILL CONTINUE DESPITE FIRE IN SNCC GREENWOOD OFFICE

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, MARCH 25 — Robert Moses, director of the Student Nonviolent

Coordinating Committee's statewide Mississippi voter registration program, said here today after a fire in the SNCC office early this morning almost destroyed all registration records, "We are not going to be chased out. Our program will con­ tinue o"

About midnight last night, Curtis Hayes, a SNCC field secretary, and Joe Lee

Lofton, a Greenwood high school student, drove by the SNCC office on 12$ Eo Mc-

Laurin Street and noticed a light on. Both tried to get into the office but someone inside held the door* Hayes cautioned Lofton to leave the building, and as the two crossed the street, they noticed smoke, and went to call the Fire Departments

Negroes in the neighboring building said they heard glass break, and then saw two whites slip out of the building and run down an alley-. Moses said that or.e of the witnesses reported that the two were apparently youngo

Moses said that most of the records were saved from being burned — the SNCC office In Greenwood had lists of names of persons who received surplus food and others who had been and wanted to register — but that all the office equipment, including -typewriters and a used mimeograph machine, was destroyed. Moses said

the telephone had been ripped out of the wall.

Moses saids "Apparently this was intended to keep us from renting office space in Greenwood," and vowed that SNCC workers would not " be chased outo"

Greenwood police said there was no evidence of arson?,

This fire follows in the wake of another burning last month, and two attempted murders of SNCC field staff here. - 30 - s tudent

Nonviolent ^ | 1 A ' m 6 Raymond Street, N0Wa Atlanta lUs Georgia ll If ^J 688-0331 C• oordinating NEWhi S F0R IMMEDIATE RELEASE

ommittee

NIGHTRIDERS ATTACK GREENWOOD NEGRO'S HOtSE

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, MARCH 27 — A midnight shotgun attack last night

on the home of Dewey Greene, Sr» — father of the second Negro to try to

enter the University of Mississippi — was protested strongly by Charles

McDew, chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, todayo

McDew wired Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy;

These nighttime attacks on our staff and on Greenwood citizens must be stopped. We urge you to act immediately to insure the safety of all citizens in Mississippi, particularly those active in voter registration*

McDexir also protested the shooting to Mississippi Governor Ross Harnett:

Last night, nightriders attacked the home of a Greenwood citizen. The lawlessness in your state cannot be tolerated any longer0 We urge you to use your executive powers to guarantee the safety of all citizens in Greenwood, Mississippio

Last night about midnight, George Greene, a Greenwood high school

student who has been working closely with SNCC's voter registration drive

here, was driven home and immediately after he entered the house, two shot­

gun blasts shattered the front door and bedroom window*. No one was injuredo

Greene's eldest son, Dewey, Jr. is petitioning the Federal Court to

enter Ole Miss.

Robert Moses, director of SNCC's statewide voter registration program,

said early this morning that the shooting might have been an attempt to

intimidate George Green from working with the voter drive0

Green said, "I do not intend to stop my work with SNCC until all

Negroes are registered to vote in Leflore County."

- 30 - $ tudent 6 Raymond Street, N. W. Atlanta J 4, Georgia N - - M - - -, m* 6GQ-03.31 onoiolent ^| 11 f f Mar en 27, 1963

V^ oordinating NEWS

W- ommittee

10 SNCC WORKERS JAILED IN GREENWOOD; POLICE DOG USED ON NEGROES

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, March 27 - Ten voter registration workers from the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) - including the anti-segregation group's Executive Secretary, James Forman - were arrested here and charged with "inciting to riot" and "refusing to move on" after Greenwood police turned a dog loose in a crowd of 150 Negroes on their way to register to vote at the LcFlore County Court­ house. The jailed workers, in a statement from city jail, decided to remain in jail until the charges against them are dropped. And from the jail, SNCC Executive Sec­ retary James Forman issued a call to "every Southern protest group to send workers into Greenwood until law and order become reality here," Forman said in a telephone conversation from the jail that "the Student Non­ violent Coordinating Committee workers in LeFlore County are determined to stay until every eligible Negro is registered to vote!" In jail are: Lafayette Surney, Lawrence Guyot, Curtis Hayes, James Forman. Robert Moses, Willie Peacock, Bobby Talbert, James Jones, Charles McLauren and Frank Smith, Also jailed was an elderly Negro man who has been active in the SNCC vote drive. Guyot was arrested first, at 11:00 o'clock this morning. He and SNCC worker Forman were leading 150 Negroes from Wesley Chapel Methodist Church here to the courthouse.. Forman was arrested then also, and according to eyewitnesses, Green­ wood Mayor Charles Sampson ordered a police dog loosed on the crowd. SNCC's Bob Moses, director of the group's Mississippi project, was bitten once on his leg. Another man, Matthew Hughes, was also bitten by the dog and re­ quired treatment at a local hospital. The crowd of Negroes, dispersed by the dog, re-grouped at the church. . They were entering cars to make a second try at registration when Greenwood police, with their guns drawn, arrested eight other SNCC workers and the elderly man in fro$t-*f the church, Forman said that he didn't know what charges had been lodged against him. The others were charged with "inciting to riot." In Atlanta, the SNCC office protested the arrests and "intimidation of pro- pective Negro voters" to the United State Department of Justice, the Civil Rights Commission, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and with several U, S. Congressmen, The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee has been conducting voter registration drives in Mississippi since 1961. Several attacks against SNCC workers in LeFlore County have been reported in the past two months. The group mounted an all-out vote drive after one field secretary was almost fatally wounded when three white men fired into his car. -30- 6 Raymond Street NW Atlanta llj, Georgia tudent 688-0331

j\ onviolent

c oordmfltm^ N' • EW™ TRfAlFFOR^PsNCTRIAL* FOR*FS£ C WORKERS SLATEDTQMORRGWj 22 ACQUITTED; CHARGES DISMISSED AGAINST ONE; MOSES AND FOUR OTHERS CONVICTED 'N LIS RDERLY CONDUCT c ommittee

GREENWOOD. MTSSTSSTPPTE. v.ARfrtT PR — .TamP. Forman, executive secretary of the

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, reported today from the Greenwood City

Jail that some disposition had been made today in trials of the SNCC workers

arrested yesterday accompanying Negro citizens to the county courthouse to register

and vote.

Forman said that Bobby Talbert and Curtis Hayes had been found "not guilty"

today. He said that charges against Frank Smith had been dismissed, and that

trials for himself and Lawrence Guyot were continued until tomorrow at 1 p.m.

Robert Moses, director of SNCC's statewide voter registration program, was

convicted today along with James Jones, Charles McLaurm, Lafayette Surney, and

Willie Peacock. All will be sentenced tomorrow.

Forman said the group of SNCC workers would remain in jail for the immediate

future.

Lawrence Guyot, while asking for a continuance today, was told he was cited

xtfith contempt and. remanded back to jail. He was not charged with the citation.

Todav more than 50 Negroes went to the courthouse to register and filled out

forms. They were dispersed at an intersection two blocks from the courthouse after

they left by police. SNCC workers reported that a large police dog, on "free rein"

bit Rev. Tucker of Turner Chapel AME Church on the ankle, and Landy McNair, a SNCC

worker, had his trousers leg torn.

Mildred Forman, wife of the integration leader, reported that she and seven

other Negroes tried to get into the courthouse to witness the trial of her husband

and the other SNCC workers, but police and newly-deputized civil defense workers would not let them in. Mrs. Forman said her group was pushed off the sidewalk by

Hinds County (Jackson) Sheriff Gilroy who had a large police dog on a leash.

Three of those arrested yesterday—Moses, McLaurin, and Surney—had sued

Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover January2, 1963,

to act against local authorities in Mississippi who the plaintiffs said had failed

to protect the rights of Negroes. In their suit, the SNCC workers asked for FBI

agents, marshals, and other federal authorities to prevent harassment of Negroes

in the state. SNCC workers in Atlanta published a fact sheet which cited instances of

intimidation directed against SNCC voter registration workers since August, 1962, Xirhen field workers leaped from a second story window to avoid a lynch mob. Just this week the SNCC office in Greenwood was destroyed by fire, -30- STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, NeW0 Atlanta lU, Georgia 688-0331 FACT SHEET ON GREENWOOD (LEFLORE COUNTY), MISSISSIPPI AUGJJST_26, l£6|s Samuel Block and three other SNCC field secretaries, shortly after moving inTo" Greenwood to begin a voter registration program, report they had to leap from the second-story window of their office to escape a white lynch mob, armed with guns, ropes and pipes. FBI and Justice Department notified^ protection askedo OCTOBER, 1962t Leflore County Board of Supervisors vote to drop surplus food program wnlch had helped sustain some 22,000 Negroes, the majority of whom are seasonal workers and sharecropperso

Same E^^^LIPJ^J.?.^ l Block reports that four Negro businesses, one block from the SNCC. "oTrTce"on 115 E0 Molaurin Street are burned to the ground. Block says,, ,!I believe this was an attempt to burn down our office." Federal authorities notif-- iedj protection asked-, FEBRUARY 22, 1963s Samuel Block arrested by Greenwood police. Charge: "circulating breach of the peace" (ale)0 Charge later changed to 2 "Making statements calculated to incite the breach of the peaccV Federal authorities notified* FEBRJJAJffJ!^ 1963s 150 Negroes pack county courthouse at Block's trial to hear him refuse to"accept* a suspended sentence if he agrees to drop all voter registration activitya Block convicted; he appeals. 200 more Negroes try to witness trial, bub cannot get in0

IEBMi5I~^-f£-lLi2-2f-2' A "total of 1?° Negroes go to county courthouse to register and vote ETan unpre"ce.*r>nted show of determination0 FEBRUARY 28, 19.631 James Travis, 20,, a SNCC field secretary and native Mississippi an in slioF'oy three "white assailants eaven miles from Greenwood:. Travis receive.-; a shoulder xroundo Another bkllet becomes lodged behind his spine. Robert M.:;3e;^, direct or of SNCC's statewide voter registration program, and Randolph Blackwell;, field director of the AtlantsiHbased Voter Education Pro.j.w**^, are also in the car with Travis but are unharmed despite the fact that all side windows of "the car are qma-jh- ed<, Travis is taken by ambulance to University Hospital in Jackson xiu.ro do-",-'"or;, operate to remove bullet and report that Travis would have died instantly had tho bullet penetrated his body with more force0 Federal. aAithoritt.es notifSsdj. pr-tn:-;' ..,". MARfTH 1; 1963; VEP announces full -scale campaign in Greenwood to register all •degrees in lefLore county0 Staff members of SSKTi come from other Mississippi project to concentrate efforts in Greenwood* MARCH 6, 1963i Samuel Block and Willie Peacock, two SNCC field seCftftaries, shot at by"white assailants in an untagged car as they, and two Greenwood citizens,-. Peggy Marya and Essie Broome, are in oar in front of SNCC office* All windows are shatter­ ed, but nobody is injured,, Federal authorities notified; protection askedo MARCH 21.2_1963: The Leflore County Board of Supervisors votes to reinstitute the county program of surplus fcod distribution after representatives of the U6 S« Dep- . artment of Agriculture say the government will handle the program if Leflore offic­ ; ials won t0

MARCH_2l!., 1963: SNCC office set on fire0 All office equipment completely demolished, Host of the records are saved. The telephone is ripped from the wall0 Witnesses report that two white men are seen fleeing down an alley after smoke begins to pour from a xtfindow. Federal authorities notifiedj protection asked9 MRCH_26,_19o3: Two shotgun blasts shatter front door and bedroom window of Dewey Greene ,~~3ro, lather of George Greene, a young high school student working with the SNCC driveo Dewey, Jr. is second Negro to apply to Ole Miss* Nobody is injurede Fed­ eral authorities notified; protection askedo MARCH 27,_1963: Ten SNCC field staff arrested in Greenwood for "inciting to riot" after accompanying a groxxp of 100 Negroes to county courthouse to register. Eight of ten are arrested in front of church attempting to load cars of people wanting to go to courthouse to register. In jail NOW: James Forman (executive secretary), Rob­ ert Moses 'director of SNCC MississippT'program), James Jones, Curtis Hayes, Charles McLaurin, Frank Smith, Bobby Talbert, Willie Peacock, Lawrence Guyot, Lafayette Surney. REGISTRATION IN LEFLORE COUNTY: 13,567 Negroes eligible to votej 163 registered (Civil Rights Commission Report, January, 1961) StfcJL April 3, 196 3 LeFlore County is located in the Mississippi Delta 120 miles north of Jackson. The Negro population (30,400) in the cotton county is almost twice that of the white population (16,700). At the same time there are only 300 registered Negro voters compared to 6100 white voters. About half of the 47,100 residents live in the town of Greenwood. In this county there are five Negro schools, none of which are accredited by the regional association, and two white schools which are accredited. The average Negro person over 25 years old has completed only 4.3 years of schooling, compared to 11.9 years among the white population. The lack of compulsorary school attendance laws along with pressures for the Negro youths to work rather than attend school has resulted In this very low level ofjeducation. The difference in earnings is also very great, with the averag*? Negro family earning $600 per ijiear ccappared tp tlje average white income of $2300. Many Negro families earn 3 or 4 dollars a day during the summer months working on farms, and are dependant upon commodity assistance during the winter. Hospital facilities and job opportunities follow the same pattern, and public facilities are completely segregated. In an attempt to better the conditions through democratic means, SNCC in conjunction with the other civil rights organisations working in the state, has in recent months been encouraging Negroes to register, pay their poll tax, and to vote. However, state laws do not make this an easy task, particularly not so for an undducated person. To register in Mississippi a person must fill out an application form requiring that he be able to read, write, interpret any section of the state constitution, and give a reasonable interpretation of the duties of a citizen. The circuit clerk as registrar of voters has the power to make the test either relatively eas^t or extremely long and difficult, and also to decide whether or not- one has passed the test. As the registrar has been handling only two applicants at a time, the number of people who can apply is limited to less than 25 a day. After an applicant takes the test he is told to come back in a month to see if he has passed. In addition to the obstacles the state hasnut in the way of prospective voters, in Greenwood there have been economic reprisals and physical violence against these individuals. Jimie Travis \-jas shot and almost killed. Other SNCC workers were shot at on two occations. Tiie SNCC office was burned, private papers were taken and published in the local newspaper. Eight of the SNCC staff were arrested and sentenced to 4 months in jjail and $200 fines. While walking down town with a group of individuals who wished to register, a police dog was put on Reverend Tucker, who was bitten and had tob e given medical aid. Car loads of policemen and depudies in steel helmets drive through the streets. Some of the police cars have no licencd plates, so that the officials can't be as easily identified. Many individuals have been threatened with physical violence by hoodlems or with police arrest if they continue to stand up for their rights. Others have been fired from their jobs or put off the*plantations where they have been employed.

(fffvet y\r%^ /«• Gvi/fts (vwv* teervf) President of the Drr? U':h ^AICC,/U.^3 rf l*'-.ahrtti.« City tf NowY'rtc New York 7, N.Y.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOROUGH OF MANHATTAN A PROCLAMATION

WHEREAS, the right tc v to is a fundanental right of Anerican citizenship; and WHEREAS, tlr usrnds rf Ariericans of tho Ne ;r^ race whe properly seek tr< exercise that right, with the support cf the Federal G' vernnont, are being prevented fron registering by beatings, harass- neht,failings, and intiriidatirn; and WHEREAS, the effort t- keep these Ariericans fr n regis­ tering has included the denial to then, f• r a tenp^rary period, ,sf Federal surplus feed end oo°nrrilo retaliation; and WHERESS, this inhuman prt gran against a niir-rity gr^up which represents me rut cf ten United States citizens, has brought th' usands rf ncn, wuien, and children in tho Mississippi Delta to the verge of starvation in our land of plenty; and VJHEREAS, aid to these ill-nourished citizens is in the highest tradition of American social justice, NOV;, THEREFORE, I, EDVARD R. DUDLEY, President of the Borough of Manhattan, do officially coimend the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Co.uiittee and all others helping in this progran of nercy, and do officially declare the week beginning Satur­ day, April 6, 1963, as "FOOD FOR FREEDOM WEEK" and call upon all citizens of Manhattan to give naxiriun support to the Student Nonviolent Co­ ordinating Coiiiittee and cooperating groups so -that the fight by a . linority for their Consti­ tutional rights will not be hindered or stopped by near starvation, and hereby affix ny signature as ordained on this 5th day of April, 1963. Edward R. Dudley Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee April 5, 1963 Room 1025 5 Beekman Street New York 38, New York Co 7-5541 For immediate release FOOD FOR FREEDOM

Today Edwaed R. Dudley, President of the Borough of Manhattan, issued a proclamation declaring the week of April 6, 1963 a3 "Food for Fr edom Week" and called upon "all citizens of Manhattan to give maximum support to the Student Non­ violent Coordinating Committee and cooperating groups," in their drive to aid the Negro sharecroppers of Mississippi in their fight for their Constitutional Rights..

Mr. Dudley pointed out that minority groups in America "are being prevented from registering by beatings, har­ assment, jailing, and intimidation." These inhuman acts, Mr. Dudley continued, have "brought thousands of men, women and children in the Mississippi Delta to the verge of starvation in our land of plenty."

SNCC, with the cooperation ef many organizations in New York City is collecting nonperishable food and clothing to send to the Mississippi Sharecroppers. Bill Mahoney of SNCC sugg ests that people interested in donating to the drive contact one of the following organizations: Brooklyn CORE, Pr 8-5170; Riverside Democrats, Un 5-4438; Fort Washington Manhattenville Reform Democrats, Au 6-8371; Harlem Educational Project, To 2-4100; Village Independent Democrats, Ch 3-6655; East Harlem Reform Democrats, Tr 6-8030, For further information, please contact the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee at ffhe address listed above. NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, N.W, FOR IMMEDIATE REIEASE Atlanta I4, Georgia ~ 608-O331

MANHATTAN BOROUGH PRESIDENT PROCLAIMS "FOOD FOR FREEDOM WEEK," COMMENDS SNCC

NEW YORK CITY, APRIL 9 — Edward R. Dudley, Borough President of Manhattan, proclaimed April 6-13 "Food for Freedom Week" on April 6 and called upon "all citizens of Manhattan to give maximum support to the Student Nonviolent Coordin­ ating Committee and cooperating groups" in the drive for food to aid destitute

Negro sharecroppers in Mississippi who are attempting to register to vote*

Mr. Dudley's proclamation read in part:

"<,..Thousands of Americans of the Negro race who properly seek to exercise that right (to vote), with the support of the Federal Govern­ ment, are being prevented from registering by beatings, harassment., failings, and intimidation.o.This inhuman program against a minority group xjhich represents one out of ten United States citizens-, has brought thousands of men, women and children in the Mississippi Delta to the verge of starvation in our land of plenty..."

Workers for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee began to conduct a nation-wide food drive when the Leflore County Board of Supervisors voted to discontinue its surplus food program in October, 19620 Most of those cut off, an estimated 22,000, were Negro @Ln a county where registration campaigns had been underway since Augusy.

On " te*?ahy21 , 1963 the Board of Supervisors voted to reinstitute the program after representatives of the Agriculture Department said the Department would do it if the County didn »t. The food program, which will continue only through April, is being supported entirely by Federal funds0

SNCC workers in the Delta said they were encouraged by the county's resumpt­ ion of the food program, but said that after April food will still be needed to supplement meager images padd to thousands of sharecroppers» Robert Moses, director of SNCC's Mississippi voter registration program, said also that attempts were being made to have Negroes, as well as whites, distribute the food to needy families. - 30 - NEWS RELEASE STuDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, NeWo . FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta lU, Georgia 608-O331 "DISORDERLY CONDUCT" CHARGES DROPPED AGAINST FORMER SNOG FIELD SECY

HATTIESBURG, MISSISSIPPI, APRIL 9 — Charges of "disorderly conduct" — growing out of intimidation against a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coor­ dinating Committee in September, 1961 — were dropped today here,

John Hardy, now a student at Tennessee State A & I University in Nashville, appeared in Federal Court here today as complainant in a Justice Department suit. Hardy was hit over the head with a pistol by the Walthall County Registrar in 1961 and subsequently charged with "disorderly conduct." The Justice Depart­ ment obtained an injunction against his prosecution.

Today's suit was settled in front of Federal Judge Harold Cox in a "consent agreement." Charges against Hardy were dropped, and officials of Walthall County agreed not to interfere with Negro citizens or workers in voter registration drives.

Hardy, as field secretary for SNCC, had appeared at the Registrar's office on September 7, 1961 with two Negro citizens xtfho wished to register. (Walthall

County, according to the I960 Civil Rights Commission Report, has 6,100 Negroes of voting age, and not a single registered voter.) Hardy had been conducting classes in voter registration.

Registrar Wood hit Hardy on the head after he had come in to aid the two citizens in the registration office. First Wood threatened Hardy with a gun and told him to leave. As Hardy turned to go out, Wood approached him from behind and hit him on the heat with the butt end of the pistol.

Hardy was helped across the street, blood streaming from his wound. A few moments later, still on the street, Hardy was arrested on "disorderly conduct, and inciting to rfcto" He was later given medical attention.

- 30 - NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, N. W. FOR HMEBIATE RELEASE Atlanta lU, So©»

NEGROES TRY TO REGISTER AT HOLMES COUNTY COURTHOUSE: GREENWOOD OFFICIALS AGREE TO COME TO CITIZENSHIP CLASSES

LEXINGTON, MISSISSIPPI, APRIL 10 — Samuel Block, bield secretary for the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, accompanied 16 Negro citizens to the Holmes "

County Courthouse yesterday to register to vote.

Only two were able to actually get into the courthouse, but they were unable to register before the building closed. The othfr lU did not even get in.

According to the I960 Civil Rights Commission Report, there are 8,757 Negroes of voting age in Holmes County, and only ul are registered.

Block reported that he went with the group to Lexington, Holmes county seat-

When they arrived at the courthouse, six white meh in plainclothes with guns told them mthey had to disperse because they were "parading illegally without a permit."

The group dispersed. They then waited outside the courthouse under a tree, while unidentified whites took photographs.

They were told they could only enter the building one by one.

Block said that FBI agents were on the scene as observers.

-30-

DICK JS2EG0RY TO SPEAK AT SNCC CONFERENCE

ATLANTA, GA., APRIL 10 — Dick Gregory, the famed comedian, will address the

Easter Conference of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committe at its session Sunday, April lU. Gregory has recently been in Greenwood, Mississippi, where he led marches by Negroes seeking to register to vote.

The conference, which is expected to draw several hundred students from every Southern state, begins Friday, April 12 with an address by Rev. C. T.

Vivien, civil rights leader from Chattanooga, Tennessee. Mr, Vivien will speak on the conference theme, " Emancipation Then — Freedom Now." -3Q- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT N0NVKXE1C COORDEWi: 6 Raymond "'! i^etj !T<,W. Atl;A\ ;.; . .. > x-gia FOR r-SI'xDtATE KETjffiJSB Tel^ ::-'-.; C".-;

5? ARRESTED IN ITTA ESS?., SERVING CIM? OS TH WARM

ITT/. BGKA, MISSISSIPPI, .TOES: .20 — Robert !&**»< director of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee8s Mississippi rote? registration project ^ repcrt^d today that £0 Negroes were arrested June 13 in Itta Bena aftei white had smcfce« bcsribed - vr-ter registration meeting-, -••••sor paid i'-hat when Negroes yrsuLked out of the meeting t':<3 go t? the mas?-"

; shal and protest the laik of police pro to*vy or..: ' ^ were arrested on ^hargee of "breach 05" the ,-»w SW. - -J Twenty-nine of the group are shildren between the •age?trnjf 10 and 17 end may be released frua jail la i*t&5x parentn5 "jun'^odyp bit the othear 29 adolts "• • some of whom are soirisa ia bae-ir 6o^a - are now serving t.Juae in the Grsersfoco r-iij* ftsm-.

At thair trial yovt,tv;da^^ ths group HROS convicted of the charge and sen* jrenced t» 6 ^tenths in ;1ail sod f$G0 flx£ eaehc Hoses said tha* bond had been set -at $^X'G for each female and $750 foe e.:. '1. nij.e, bu1; thai ao.y total sum war? likely to be prohlhitive tc win the group's release- Moses said today., This inc&dent javnoi be ignored by the itaexlsac people. SvreZy &e ssonayioiJt'* of this country will net- all-u- these Mississippi men ZDJ. women^ who iutervl.y wanted police pro taction, to remain in ja.1.1-,- I*saro of the *-•"• - - William McGee and Nick Hampton •- hat been working as volunteers on the SNCC vote drive- »foicfl was instituted :h; toe Delta area last year0 30 ^ <• 1° JAILS! IN GREENWOOD

^ • S SHOT NEAR CANTON, MISS.

' 1REENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, June 25 - Ten Negroes were jailed today in front of the

LeFlore County Courthouse where they were eating their lunch. The Negroes, waiting

for a chance to take Mississippi's complicated voting test, had defied a decision

"by the rouuty board of supervisors "designed to make it even harder for Negroes

to vote." County Supervisors decided this afternoon that Negroes could not eat

their lunch on the courthouse lawn and that Negroes wanting to register would

be admitted tc the courthouse one at a time only*

Among the 10 arrested today were SNCC workers . Jimmy Pmitt.

Eollia Watkins, McArthur Cotton, Will Kerry Rogers, and Mary Booth.

SNCC worker.Frank Smith, who has been working in LeFlore and Marshall

Counties here, said five Negroes, feturning to their homes from a voter

registration meeting, were shot last night near Canton, Mississippi. Smith said

that none of the five was seriously injured, but all required hospital

treatment. -30- NEWS RELEASE i lM - *? e , r v , JLJCU. (A STUDENT NCN VIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE • MM*^' ... [} X^<± 6 Raymond Street, N ,Wf. F^QR^MMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta li\.f Gecroia "" " . Tel: 683-0331 12 ARRESTED IN GREENWOOD COURTHOUSE Greenwood, Mississippi, June 26 - Nine Negroes, all waiting to regis­ ter and vote, were arrested in the Leflore County courthouse today. Field staff of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee also re~ ported that 11 of the 29 arrested yesterday and today are SNCC workers Frank Smith, the director of SNCC's voter registration po- Holly Springs, Miss* said today from Greenwood thft when Negroes ap­ peared at the registrar's office they were told nobody would be registered today, The Negroes said they would not leave, and would wait until the*/ could get in the office Then they were arrested,, Smith said that the nine Negroes arrested yesterday were tried about two hours after their arrest and sentenced to four months in jail and $200 fine each on charges of "disturbing the peace.," James Forman, executive secretary of SNCC, wired Justice Depart­ ment officials following yesterday?s arrest and urged them to block the prosecution. The following Mississippi SNCC workers are now in jail in Green-* wood: Mary lane, George Greene (the brother of Dewey Greene, ths second Negro- to apply for admission at Ole Miss); Don White, F;oo"..r" Harris, Don Handy, Mollis Watkins, Lawrence Guyot, Mary Booth, Ji Pruitt, McArtnur Cotton, and Will Henry Rogers, Smith said that five SNCC workers were cut of jail and that "our voter registration project will continue no matter whatB" SNCC has operated a state-wide voter registration program since the summer of 1961 „ After a SNCC field secretary was shot in Feb*, 1963, some 500 Negroes attempted to get placed on voter rolls here. Eight SNCC workers spent eight days in Greenwood jails during days of clashes between Nearo protesters and police. ~30~ TWO SNCC STAFFERS ARRESTED AS NEGROES PROTEST SIT-IN ARRESTS'\ 7^*^ '/^JL- GREENVijLOg, MISSISSIPPI, JULY 1 — Two field secretaries of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Charles McLaurin and Charles Cobb, were arrested here this afternoon as they spoke to a group of Negroes on the steps of the oity jail* McLaurin and Cobb were charged with "resisting arrest" and "creating a disturbance" as they spoke to some 200 Negroes who were

? protesting this afternoon s arrests of six persons in Walgreen'n9 About a half hour later, two others, Je3se Outley and Nathan­ iel Washington, were also arrested sitting at the counter in Wal­ green' s, Curtis Hayes, the only SNCC staff member not arrested, said at 6:45 p«m. that Negroes "are ready for anything*" - 30 - NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOrLTN COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Stfeet, N« W» FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta ill, Georgia Tel: 668-0331 SIX ARRESTED IN GREENVILLE, MISS. AFTER ARRESTS IN WALGR^N'S GREENVILLE, MISSISSIPPI, JULY 1 - The second direct action attempt in this city's history ended today in six arrests at Walgreen's

Drug storee Saturday, ten Negroes were arrested after they tried to play baseball at a city park. Charles Cobb, a field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, reported today that members of the Greenville Student Movement had launched this city's first direct action at­ tack against segreaation, and that of the 16 arrests Saturday and today, llj. "'ill remain in jail0 This afternoon five Negroes and a young white student entered Walgreens, The white man, Huntpr Morey, bounht food and was about to share it with the Negroes when the manager exclaimed, "Get out of here. I told you, god damn it, get out?" Police calmed the manager and ejected the group, However, when they discovered that Morey had not paid for the food he ordered, they carried him back into the store and made him pay the bill© The demonstrators are being held in the Greenville city jail on charges of trespass,, Bond, for those over 18, is set at $500 each0 Two of the ten Negroes arrested in Saturday's demonstration were released on bond, but the other eight remain in jail, Cobb said, as well as the six arrested today at Walgreen's, Despite the fact that four of the six could be released as minors in their parents cognisance, they have refused to leave,, -30- N E W S RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 6 Raymond Street, N.W. , Atlanta li|., Georgia f s\ <• lit Tel-. 688-0331 / (M^> p^°^ SIX STUDENTS ARRESTED IN GREENVILLE, MISSISSIPPI GREENVILLE, MISSISSIPPI, JULY9—Six Negro students were sentenced to six months in jail and 1^00 fine each because they tried to enter a "white-only" park here today. The six, all members of the Greenville Student Movement, were arrested for "breach of the peace" today at Strange Park© At their t?ial~-immediat©!y after the arrest took place-—the six were convicted and sentenced. They are: Jacob Bayas, 16; Mike Hutchlns, 16; Luretha Jefferson, 18; Ella Louise LOuls, 18;

Lassie Clifton, l8j and Matthew J0hnson, If?. Officials of the Student Nonviolent- Coordinating Committee wired the Attorney General of the United States to protest "the excessive sentence to penalize American students for trying to exercise their rights." Two field secretaries of the Stude.it Nonviolent Coord N,;-. ting. Committee~«Charles Cobb ai d Charles McLaurin were charged with "disturbing the peace" an d sentenced to four months in jail. All the studenta arrested have committed themselves to serve their sentences. The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee has five field secretaries in Jackson, Mississippi, conducting non­ violent workshops in lieu of the violence which occurred there after Medgar Evers' murder. Under the leadership of director Robert Hoses, some 2$ young people are working on various voter registration programs In Greenwood, Itta Bona, and Lexington. -30- NEWSRELEASE ; STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE ~^")A , ' J^Pl 6 Raymond Street, N.W. (J l/L^^> f*-*-*— - Atlanta 1!+, Georgia FCR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Tel: 658-0331 JUSTICE DEPARTMENT SUES TO RELEASE NEGROES IMPRISONED AFTER VOTE MEETING GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, EULY 9 — Trial will behin July 11 here on a Justice Department suit to release i|.f> Negroes imprisoned after a voter registration meeting June 17 in neighboring Itta Bena» The Negroes — who had walked to the town marshal's office to protest the smoke-bomb­ ing of their voter registration meeting — were charged with"breach o the peace" and have been in Parchman Penitentiary since the date of their arrest. James Forman, executive secretary of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee — the group which has a voter registration. program in the Mississippi Delta — said today that the Department had filed for an injunction to restrain Leflore County officials fror„ "intimidating those seeking to register and vote" and to release thc~ already imprisoned. The suit, entered in the U. S. District Court (North Mississippi] seeks to enjoin John J. Frazier, Jr., the Leflore County prosecutor; H. Ed Webber, the deputy sheriff of Leflore County and the town mar­ shal of Itta Bena. and others.

Forman said that Leo Branton, an a ttorney from Los Angeles, would come to Greenwood tomorrow "to survey the situation here regarc ing the illegal deprivation of Negroes' rights here in the Delta." Branton is active in the Los Angeles Friends of SN CC chapter. Forman said that four whites had been apprehended today for the smoke-bombing of a Negro home on Sunday night, and were given 30-c*

citizens who tried to protest lack of police protection in Itta Bena0 - 30 - NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Rf/mond Street, N.W, FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta Ik, Georgia JULY, 1963 Tel: 688-0331

U SENTENCED FOR RESTRAINING TRADE

CLARKSDALE, MISSISSIPPI, JULY 2$ -- ^ix young civil rights leaders — jailed a week ago on charges of violating a city anti-litter ordinance when they passed out leaflets urging aboycott of merchants here — were released today.

The six: Lafayette Surney, Cecil Scott, Sam Jackson, Ihomas Gaither, Barbara Gates and Euzilla Hicks — were released today and yes- terday. Surney, a field secretary from the Student Nonviolent Coord­ inating Committee, Gaither, a field worker from CORE, and Scott aid

Jackson, Ciarksdale natives, were released on fUOO appeal bond each. Miss Gates and Miss Hicks, both 16, were released by a juvenile court judge and the charges against them dropped for lack of evidence.

City officials here have brought an injunction against further demonstrations. Tne court order, which names CORE, SNCC, SCLC and the NAAC°, prohibits the groups from "engaging in, sponsoring, inciting or en­ couraging mass street parades." ?he order also prohibits "boycotting, : trespassing and picketing and other unlawful acts." Ihe four men were convicted on charges of conspiring to with­ hold trade,

They were represented by R. Jess Brown of Jackson.

-30- N E W S R ELBA S E STuOEKT SOKVIOLEST COORBIMPING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street, H«Y« FOR IMMEPIATE RELEASE Atlanta Ii„ Georgia July 30, 1963 Telt 688-0331

$6 ABHESTED TOYING TO PPESFNT CLAR.KSDALE PETITION; MARION BRAMDQ AND BILLY GRAHAM LIPECTLD HERE CLftRXoft&LEj MISSISS3TFI, JUCZ 3-0 ~» ELfty-six persons, including Aaron Henry, stats president of the National Association ibr the Advancement of Colored People, a'-d a rr-pTer-ent.^t.ive cf the National Council of Churches, were arrested bore this afternoon In a vain attempt to present a petition to dartedale officials urging a bi a^acial occmittee* Lafayette £ urney.... field secretary for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, said also that Billy Graham, world-famous evangelist, and Marlon Brando, film star, were expected to ccme to Clarksdale soon to aid the anti«

Sumsy said tha group of £6 went to the city hall, armed with a signed petition asking for a bi-racial committee. They never got a chance to presait it T®o members of the group hold 5"gas reading "Segregation is evil" and "The way out is a tdUra/rial cemdttoo,'" Qtjpexs were waving American flags. Tho group was charged with "parading without a permit" and sentenced to

30 days and $103 fine. Sumey said most of the arrestees had vowed to remain in jail* Dr.j Horry, who has been under attack here for many years by arch-segre g- ationist forces, led the line* Accompanying him was an unidentified white man, an observer for the National Council of Churches* Dr. Henry, the church group, SNCC, and other persons and organizations were cited here a manth ago in an injunction forbidding demonstrations.

- 30 - NEWS RELEASE .-~x^ STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE J J/-^^° 6 Raymond Street, N.W. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE^ Atlanta 1U, Georgia JULY , 1$£& Tel: 688-0331 SNCC CHAIRMAN MAKES SPEC LAI, APPEAL FOR 68 IN PASCHKAN STATS PSKITENTIABI

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, JULY 30 — John Lewis, chairman of the Stiident Nonviolent

Coordinating Committee, appealed today to the "American citiaenry" to "insist"' on the release of 68 Negro•Mississippians imprisoned in Parchraan Penitentiary only be­ cause they wanted to register to vote,"

The arrests, which took place in a six-day period, occurred in Itta Bona and

JresMwoodji both in the Mississippi Delta»

Forty-six persons were arrested June 18 in Itta Bena after they walked to the town marshal's office to protest the smoke-bombing of their voter registration meet­ ing. They were charged with "breach of the peace," and sentenced the next day to six months in jail and $5C0 fine each. Bojjd was set at $500 per woman and 1750 \ '-' man*

The other arrests took place in Greenwood on Jiuie 25 and 26 when 22 Negroes, most of them full-time and. volunteer SIICC staff workers, were arrested inside the

Leflore County Courthouse after Negro citizens refused to move from the closed regidtrar's office. All were sentenced to six months in jail on "breach of the peace" charges with bond set at $500 per person.

All of the 68 are in Parchman Penitentiary in the maximum security wing where, according to reports, women in their '60's have been made to work and where guards, have shaved, off the prisoners' body hair under the guise of "disease prevention."

Le^is said in Atlaita today:

"We appeal to the American citizenry in every state in this land to insist that Federal authorities order Mississippi officials to release these citizens;, innocent of every 'crime1 except wanting to register to vote. The total bond for their release is $1*2,000 and our resources are limited* There is only one way in which these people will be released, and one way only: ishen the American public cares enought to demand it."'

-30~ NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE O^L*^^ , / * 6 Ravmond Street, N.W. f ^<-P- Atlanta li\, Georgia FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE u Tel: 638-0331 AUGUST, 1963 _ . BALLOTS FILED BY NEGRO CITIZENS DECLARED INVALID IN MISSISSIPPI 3 FIELD SECY's ARRESTED IN RULEVILLE

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, AUGUST 8 — Field secretaries of the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee reported today that all ballots cast by disenfranchised Negroes here and in Itta Bena have been declared i nvalido Dick Frye, a SNCC field worker, said today that according to Hugh Middieton, executive secretary of the Leflore County Democratic Party Executive Board, ballots cast by Negroes here will "not be counted." Middieton said, "Each ballot has been examined by the Board and they are all not qualified to vote in the election under the laws of Mississippi so none will be counted." Yesterday some J4.OO Negroes in Greenwood and 15>0 Negroes in Itta Bena filed affidavits and ballots at the two respective polling places.. The affidavits were to the effect that they had been denied the right to vote, which is itself contrary to Mississippi state law. In Ruleville, Mississippi, three field secretaries for SNCC were arrested on August 6, the morning of the state primary election. Curtis *Iayes, Charles McLaurin and Charles Ccbb had gone to seek the election manager to inquire about voting procedures and to see if they could be poll-watchers when they were arrested at the request of Ruleville Mayor CM. Dorrough. Mayor Dorrough presided at their trial which, Cobb said. "took 30 seconds," and charged with "interfering with an election," The three were sentenced to 30 days in jail and $100 fine each. John Lewis, SNCC chairman, strongly protested the arrests to Assisstant Attorney General Burke Marshall and demanded "immediate Justice Department intervention." -30- NEWS RELEASE ^iCl/ul^ L^-^~- STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE ^ ' 6 Raymond Street, N.W. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Atlanta \\\, Ga. AUGUST, 1963 Tel: 688-0331 MISSISSIPPI RIGHTS FIGHTERS LOSE JOBS? kS OUT ON BOND IN ITTA BENA ITTA BENA, MISSISSIPPI, August 20 — Eleven Negro residents here Indi­ cate white employers are attempting to force out of the state any .' . Negro who seeks his rights. The eleven men said they have been told they will not be given back their jobs if they particioate in civil rights work. Four of the rights workers had been working at Mississippi Voca­ tional College, an all-Negro school near Itta Bena. They were told by the school's chief administrator, President John H. White, that they would probably be able to get their jobs back if they gave up the movement. White told them, "By your protesting, a cloud h^s moved between th© white and colored in Itta Bena. If you continue to wear your civil rights buttons and going to meetings, how can you expect to clear the cloud." According to Scott Harris, one of the group, all the people who were on the County Work Farm will be "marked men" in Itta Bena, But, Harris said, "ITm not going to give up the freedom fight. I'll nev^r go back begging for a job. *f I have to leave town, then I'll fiml z job someplace else." The eleven were part of a group of fy.5, ranging in age from 15 to 75 years, who were arrested when they sought police protection after the bombing of a voter registration meeting at Hopewell Baptist Church here. The h$ are free on bond raised by the National Council of - Churches. The Justice Department has appealed the case to the Fifth Circuit Court. -30- NEWS AELEAS£ STIDENT NGNVIOLeM COORDINATING CC*iJTTEE 135 /"-3URN AVENUE, N.E. hlW-'i #, CohGlA F0Ti IMKCEIATE ESLFASE

GHBENWOOD, i-.T,SS. AUGUST 17 Samuel Clock, a Student Nonviolent Coor­ dinating Committee field secretary working or; voter registration, has beer, threatened and intimidated here be^avse of his registration activ­ ities. Block's experiences are a long series of clashes with Greenwood police and registration officials. Some of block1s friends have asked him to leave Greenwood because "the widte people are planning to kill him,," Block refuses to leave. Block's troubles first started when he protested the beating of a. local 14-year old Negro boy, Welton McSwine Jr., to the Justice Dept. McSwine was taken to the Greenwood police station after a white woman's house was broken into and beaten in the head and stomach with a blackjack, then whipped. About three weeks ago, two policemen came to 616 Avenue I, Block's residence and voter registration office. They told Block they were in­ vestigating an automobile theft. One told him that he was a "smart nigger if from up North" and that he didn't say "yes, sir" and "no, sir", he would "end up on the concrete and get up without any teeth." Block took four Negroes to the Greenwood county courthouse to regi­ ster several days later. A woman deputy registrar said to Block, "What's for you, boy?", After a dispute, she reluctantly agreed to accept the applications from the Negroes. iA/hen she finished adininistering the test, she refused to tell the applicants if they hai passed. v\lhen Block returned home that afternoon, he received a telephone call from a man who identified himself as speaking for the White Citi­ zens Council. The caller, whom Block believes is called Patton, told him, "If you take anyone else up to register you'll never leave Green­ wood alive." Block reports that, he has recei-vied. jaxxy eur-h otlls.h*»jtor«. -2-

(Several weeks previously, Block was told by a Greenwood school principal who had leased the room to him for some time that she had received one of the WCC calls because of her association with him.)

The latest incident of intimidation occurred when Block took two

Negroes to the registrar's office about two weeks ago. A Miss Lamb, the registrar, left the room as the two Negroes were filling out applic­ ation forms and during her absence, two policemen entered the room, vi/hen Miss Lamb returned, she went to confer with the police outside the door, and Block noticed them walking by as many peeple stared in the door.

As the Negroes left the courthouse after completing the registration forms, the policemen waiting outside said something tc Block .which he could not hear. Block accompanied the two Negroes to a cab and took them home. A police car followed, and stopped as the cab paused to discharge

the two registrants, Block proceeded to his residence in the taxi, got out, and went across the street to a drug store, while standing in the store, he saw the police car go by slowly. As soon as it was out of sight, he hurried into his house.

Block is asking citizens across the country to file complaints with the Justice Department because of this intimidation of Negroes active in the voter registration campaigns.

- 30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, N.E. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA 688-0331

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI, AUGUST 29 — Charles McDew, Chairman of tho

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Coi.i-uVttee, has asked President Kennedy for

Federal intervention hero to prohibit terror and intimidation against young

Negroes working on voter registration,

McDew wired tho President: "Request you send Federal marshals to Green­

wood Mississippi to protect voter registration workers. If no Federal inter­ vention is forthcoming in Greenwood and other Delta cities, there is great

possibility of more Emmett Till cases,"

The incident which touched off SNCC's request — though there have been

many similar incidents lately — occurred shortly after midnight, August 17*

Three voter registration workers, Samuel Block, Luvaghn Brown, and Lawrence

Guyot, vera an the Voter League Foundation office at 6l6 Avenue I, Greenwood,

when they looked out the window and happened to notice several policemen on

the street, conferring. One officer talked briefly with an unidentified white

nan, and then left,

A few moments later, a car filled with white men drew up in front of

the building, Guyot began to telephone some local Greenwood citizens to alert

them to the trouble which seemed about to begin.

Then Block and Brown noticed another car, also packed with white men,

stop in front of the building. As Block also began to telephone, still a

third car drew up loaded with men. The three young Nogroes noticed that in

the first car one man had a shotgun or rifle in his hand; they went into one

of the rooms in the voter office. They heard footsteps on the stairs,

Guyot went and closed tho door leading into the hall, locked it, and

shut off the light. The three went into another room, climbed out of a window,

and onto the roof. They could see more cars stopping in front of the build­ ing. As they heard a rush of footsteps on the stairs, they went over the roof

and fled into a nearby home,

Tho Negro youths notified the FBI and were told that an FBI agent was

coning over. None ever came,

A local citizen reported to tho registration workers that ...? group

of whites entered the office early on August 19 and ransacked it, -30- NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 135 AUBURN AVENUE, N.E. FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE ATLANTA 3, GEORGIA 688-0331

ATLANTA, GEORGIA, SEPTEMBER 13 -- Charles McDew, chairman of the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, today wired prominent Americans urging

"the nuto press for immediate Federal investigations into the wave, of terror

and violence sweeping Mississippi and Southwest Georgia,

The telegram reads:

Please urge the U. S. Justice Department to conduct full investigation and apprehend those who killed unidentified Negro man in Goodman, Mississippi, Investigations also necessary on shooting of Marylene Burks and Vivian Hillet in Ruleville, Mississippi; shooting of Christopher Allen, Jack Chatfield, and Prathia Hall in Dawson, Georgia, and burning of two churches in Dawson and one in Leesburg, Georgia,

A wave of terror and Klan reactivity is sweeping over Southwest Georgia and Mississippi, Fear we cannot protect our field secretaries and potential voters without direct inter­ vention of Federal government.

The telegram was sent to New York Gov. Nelscn Rockefeller; Sen­ ator Jacob K. Javits (N.Y.-R.)j Roy Wilkins, NAACP; A, Philip Randolph, head of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters; James Farmer, CORE:

Whitney Young, National Urban League; Dr. Reinhold Niebuhr, internationally known theologian; Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; Jackie Robinson; Harry

Belafonte; and Floyd Patterson. Many others are being contacted.

#

DAWSON, GEORGIA, SEPTEMBER 13 — At an open air voter registration meeting, members of the Terrell County Movement voted to erect a tent as temporary shelter to replace a burned church. The tent was donated by the Student

Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, whih had been holding voter registration meetings at the burned Mt. Olive Church, Three churches in Terrell aid

Lee counties have been burned to the ground in the past three weeks — two of them were used to house voter registration meetings. SNCC has pledged its aid to help rebuild these churches. _3(v Student Nonviolent ' Coordinating Committee 708 Avenue N Greenwood, Mississippi September 15, 1953

Dear Friends, We write you from Greenwood, Mississippi, headquarters of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee**} Toter Eegietration Project. ?or the past year we hmm worked with Nagro eitii starts struggling to exercise the right to vote<, Events in Mississippi and the nation during the past year have indicated to us the feasibility of expanding our operations In Mississippi, The conditions we hare encountered in the state, convince us of the necessity of immediate expansion* Kiere la a massive migration of Negroes from Mississippi ery year. They flee northmrd, untrained and uneducated, filling the ghottoes, making now ghettcesj adding to an alroa&y ferploolve unemployment Bituation, This migration will not be stopped unless Negroes in Mississippi can be convinced tb&t they mast stay and solve their prcblema la Mississippi: the problems cf finding wot* la tho face of the mechanisation and consolidation of farms, getting an education in the poorest schools in a poor school systems removing from political positions those who are preventing education and denying jobs,, The Negro in Mississippi has no money to offer the politicians who keep him co politicallys economically, and socially deprived, but ho has a significant potential voting power that has for the most part remained untspped, Less than ^ of tho Negroes In MiaelaEiipl are registered to vote, Negroes constitute 36$ of the persons in MisslBSippi 21 yaar3 old and older. We have divided our personnel into five voter registration teams, correspondlig to the five congressional districts in the state* These teame will be direct©! by experleneed voter registration workers, and will be responsible for (l) get­ ting 200,000 Negroes to vote in a mock electlonwhlch will act as a trigger for a stepped up registration drive in every area of the state,(2) mobilising local communities to exercise their right to register and vote. We are beginning to take steps toward the solution of economic conditions among Negroes which are a direct result of their impoverished political and social position.

We face resistance on every level, from the racist judges of the federal dis­ trict courts to the poor white people, systematically manipulated by the po­ litical opportunista who control the state government. Having only ourbodlee and experledce to throw into the etrugtle, we have estimated a budget of $3,930 for the first month* Wo sak your support. Money for supplies and operating expenses-—such as emergency telephone calls— lm our first need. We also desperately need cars* Now we have lees than a car per district; to move of-* fie?*outly we should have a car for each city ^ftxore a project is started. Some other neodsS arex reproducing equipment, typewriters, paper. The changes which make us feel an espaa&ed registration program may be @uccersfulhave hem. made with great help from people like you. Hungry people have been kept from starving and thousands have been carried to the courthouse to attempt to re­ gister. Because of your contributions in Leflore County over 1500 Negroes have tryed to register this year, even though less than fifty (50) been allored to pass the test. We thank you.

ONE MAN...... OM VOTE* .BY '64 \SefT< J

From: Mississippi Staff To: Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee R,E,i Operation Mississippi

The following is a statement of proposed operation and program for the next year of operation in Mississippi, The statement of proposed operations is also accompani­ ed by a minimum budget for each project. It is our hope that SNCC will realize the importance of the pro­ ject and mognitude of the operation and honor our re­ quests.

Yours in the Struggle,

Mississippi Staff (1)

In a mock election conducted by voter registration worker in Mississippi during the second Democratic primary held August 27, more than 33,000 Negroes ineligible to vote according to the discriminatory voter registration requirements in the state-cast their ballots for gubernatorial candidate J.P. Coleman, Despite the limited area of the state participating (namely:Greenwood, Jackson, and Clarksdale), Negro leaders felt that the response of Negro citizens was indicative of s strong desire among Negro citizens across the state of Mississippi for their voting franchise.

Apparently, the political potential- of a voting Negro popu- lace in Mississippi is being felt in state political; for, just recently, the Mississippi Democratic Executive Committee iff stating their opposition to a two-party system in Mississippi said: "a two-party system would split white conservative and open the door to Negroes holding the balance of power','

Voters registration workers, who have been conducting a vote drive in the Mississippi Delta, operating out of Greenwood, knowing the urgent need for a strong protest registered by Negroes across the state at: (1) the inherently discriminatory state voter registration requirements, which along with the misuse of these requirments by voter registrar, have consis­ tently made it impossible for Negroes to register to vote, and vote; (2) the myth that Negroes "arenf ready", and don't want to vote; (3) the failure Of the federal government to recognize that Negroes have long wanted to vote, but con­ tinuing economic and physical reprisaliT against Negroes attempt­ ing to exce.r.iee the right to vote, makes the decison of whether to register to vote (2) or not virtually <•, chocie between life and death rs long as the iedcrcl government reiuss to act to protect the right to vote. Vote workers in .Mississippi have begun laying plans for e state­ wide mocK election with tho goal o± getting 200,000 Negroes or more to to vote for afiogro candid- ' tc running for governor.ffot the first time,there is c strong jftopublicen gobornotoriol candidate running, end with his bid for the governorship,their is a real chance that the conservt tivc democrats voting bloc that has dominated iklssiss- ippi politics will he split,If the democrats bloc splits,200.000 Negroes votosdf they were registered)would prob< bly bo more votes thctn either candidct would got ,<. ndcouldf if registered)certainly swing the election to either candidate.with c showing of this kind by thousands of Negroes across the state of Mississippi,the myth that Negroes arcn' t" ready" t..nd don't w<.nt to voto would dispell­ ed and could locfl to tho Justice Department Pressing more forcefully tho voting suits it he s pending,particularly the one asking for the removal of the literacy test,poll tax,and good moral character requirement •Negroes would i^orc cle:. rly recognize their political potential through the reactions of whitos-of the n ture of tho dei-iOcii tic jix^cutive COEUoitteo's recent st: tcmont-and be encourged to register to vote. The State of Mississippi was broken up into five Hfferont areas.& ch ai'ot h'.s i director and c ch director ht=s c number of people assigned to wont along with him,These area assignments were mode to correspond with congressional district lines. The breakdown facilites effidency and will provide a more divorsiiied program ueming contcentr,tion possible.The v; rious director shall establish rapid communications system ,nd shall work in close contact with eeoh otht-r. .bach director sh<_Il also h-. ve the respensibixity for finding the maintaining close relationship with the lead­ ers in lis district so that it will be possible co, at s e ^ointa, ask the leaders to run for public office. He shall travel from one project do the other, within his district, coordinating and helping in any way pos­ sible, the people working with him. He shall be respon­ sible for ascertaining all of the available information pertaining to his district and meet with other director frequently to map strategy and programs for the entire s c a a e ,

The following is a list of names of persons who shall be working with them in their rospectives districts. En­ closed is a rap with pencil marks setting off each indi­ vidual district and insertee is a number indicating what district number is involvee.

The directors, workers and district numbers are as fol­ lows: DISTRICT I Frank Smith, Director A. Willie Blue B. Claude Weaver ? C. Donald White DISTRICT II Samuel Block, Director A. Charles Kay HcLaurin B. Dicky Flowers C. Willie Shaw D. Willie Smith E. Fannie Luc Earner F. Assize Moore DISTRICT III McArthur Cotton, Director A. Jesse Harris B. Dick Frey C. Dave Greene DISTRICT IV George Greane, Director A. William McGee DISTRICT V Lawrence Guyot, Director A. Carl Arnold B. John O'Neal C. Jerry Bray D. Jimmy Lee Prswitt

We are suffering from a shortage of many things includ­ ing money and people. The director have set a own a mi­ nimum, number of people needed to work with their particu­ lar district. So far Frank Sr< ith needs three (3) people, McArthur Cotton needs five (5) people, George Greene needs five (5) more people and Lawrence Guyot needs five (5) more people. If there are gooc young people, please direct them to Mississippi, the best project around. Euvester Simpson,Willie Peacock,Chico Nebblet and Elizabeth Vasser axe going to New Orieans,to work with the VEP project there. That means that with Emma Bell assigned to finances,in Greenwood office we have only James 3ones who is yet un-decided about school, who is un-assigned. From: Frank Smith To: SNCC RE: 1st Congressional District

I, Frank Smith, shall direct the first congressional districts and the Northeastern half of the second con­ gressional district. Presently we shall begin with three men beside myself. They are Donald White, who shall work in Columbus, (Lowndes County), Willie Blue, who shall work in Batesville, (Panola County), ana Claude Weaver, who shall work in Tupelo, (Lee County), We shall establish an office in Holly Springs, (Marshall County), from whence I shall direct the project. All of these other counties are accessible to Holly Springs by car in a matter of hours. These areas are already familiar to me, in that, I worked in them during the past fiscal year. The idea is to develop a task force of SNCC'ers never before equal. Men, who are versed in the actions and interactions, of their own areas and who shall be familiar with the various facets of the whole program. These shall be accomplished by the following program:

I. Mass meetings are the only way that we can talk to large numbers of people at one time. To accomplish mass meetings we shall have to pass the word of the meetings through the community by word of mouth, leaf­ lets, announcements, etc.

II. Organizing block captains, in cities wherever possible. We shall encourage peocle to organize their own blocks and to encourage the people within that block, until everyone has gone down to register and vote. The captains are to list names of everyone and to con­ tact them personally and to worry them until they will then turn over a list of the registered, potentially registered, and all of the persons from the block who (6) have gone down to try to register, to the field secretary working in that particular area.

III. Organize all clubs, fraternities, churches, bars, etc., and get them to get their membership registered. To do this, the field worker must contact all organization heeds personally, and try to make them take a personal intrest in getting their members regis­ tered. The vote may be suggested as one of the criteria for becom­ ing a member of the club.

IV. The process, if intensive canvassing, by both students and adults, shall be used often. It shall be utilized with the idea of making local leaders recognize and realize the fact that the fight for the vote is their own personal battle. That they should wage their own personal Non-Violent war, in concert to it, that they and everyone else be allowed to vote by '64. The problem and wants of local community shall be used to make people under­ stand the neccessity and advantage, as well as the constitutional guarantee of voting.

V. We shall develop a task force of six SNCC'ers, to work in the 1st Congressional! District, that shall be able to move into any given area within the district, and go to work in a matter of hours. This means that there shall have to be a great deal of communication between the members of the task force. These people shall familiarize themselves with every aspect of anything that has to do with their area and district. One person shall be immediately assigned ,to familiarize himdelf with the workings of the Agriculture Department and one other will become familiar with the Dept. of Labor.

VI. We shall organize people in District One, around the idea of a mock election. It is our feeling that this will, (1) give people experience at the art of voting, (2) make the world understand that we really want to vote, and if given the chance, we will vote, (3) give the field worker a chance to observe the final process of organization in action, and (4) give an added feeling of pride to the persons ex- (7) ercising the right to vote, though in a mock election,

The budget for the indivudal projects, in district 1, is as follows: Transpotation. .$25.00 per week Salary ..$10.00 •« " Telephone Calls «...$ 5.00 " '' Supplies $10.00 •• '• Room and board $10.00 » • «' Total $60.00 per project per week 4_ $2^07D0 per week for the four projects.

This budget is based on a minimum weekly requirement for each indivudal. project. I plan to operate four projects in my district therefore I request a sum of $240.00 per week. There will only be one car in the district, which covers an area of about 200 miles. This means that a worker is going to be about half as efficent, because of the lack of transpotation. If we had

cars we could do twice as much worke We could get twice as many people registered to vote. The awesome problem of transpo­ tation which plagues virtually all SNCC workers, especially in Mississippi, would be sloved. We dannot walk all over there big rural counties.

Respectfully, Frank Smith, Director, Dist. 1 10; SICC From: Samuel Block, Director llnd District E.E.: Operetion Mississippi The Second Congressional District is one of the most important Districts. It has a greater precentage of Negroes and the seat of the Congressmen has allresdy been challenged.

jit the present time I,.Samuel BIOCK;, am in charge of the second District. In the second district I shell have seven persons working with me. The seven people and the arers in which they will be work­ ing, ere as follows: i*, Charles Key McLeurin ...Indicnola (8unfl0¥/er Go.) B. Willie Shaw .....Belzoni (Humphrey's Co) 0. Matthew hughes. Belzoni (Humphrey's Co.) D. Willie Smith ..Charleston (Tallahatchie Go.) No James Jones ...... Clarjisdale ( Cohoms Co.) F. Dickey Flowers....* Tunics So. G. Fannie L. Earner .Ruleville (Sunflower Co.) E. i»mzie iiioore Cleveland (Bolivar Co.)

There ere other people who will be working with us, that have not yet been assigned. These people will &e assigned as soon as some judgement hes been made as to which areas they are most needed and would be most effective. No decision has been made as to v;hether or not James Jones will be returning or going beck to school. It is also our intention to develop e closer working relationship among ell of the workers in the (5) congressional districts that we are wording, we have (9) some ways listed in our minds, that may be able to develop. Some of these things are as follows: i*. Eeve, in the ares that we are working, a person that will be responsible for other staff membexs to our national office. , B. Organize a group of ministers in eech area that will be responsible for getting churches for mass meetings in their areas. Because we feel that mass meeting will serve the best purpose of meeting people in the city and rural arers if called by the min­ isters, instead of us. We do feel that this is possible since Dr. Jackson gave his report at the National Baptist Conference that ell Baptist Churches would be expected to cooperate with Civil x-iight' s activities in the South. C. Organize Block Geptiens, in each city where it is possible, end Ir ve them to organize a committee of block captisns. Then it may be possible to organize a district bloc& captain for about once per month, to discuss strategy that is being used in each town or city. The purpose for-having block oaptejtns is to introduce them to the program of wor& that they will be engaged in and to stay on them until .they, have realized the basic importance of having the full cooperation of all persons, within the block and to stay on them until all of them have registered to vote. They will list names of each person in the block using a form saying whether or not the person is registered to vote and shall be re­

sponsible to turn in a daily report to the SJJCC worker, working in that particular area. D. Get responsible and respected people of tho city, out of each block to help organise, along with the worker in charge, different clubs, churches, ju£o joints, beauty salons and etc., ( and get the people in which they come in contact. E. Eave some person in the area to organize the students of that area to also be active in all programs that are being carried on. i*nd in term let them have a program and an organization of their own. The students shall be used for the following: 1. Holding iiiass meetings 2. Evening and week-end canvassing 3. Office worK 4. Speaking to church group 5. Running errands 6. Talking to their parents and freinds 7. Turning in weekly reports

F. The person in charge of each area will be expected to turn in his or her own report end seeing that he has a person that could be in charge in case he or she has to iei,ve at any time. G. If at any time another staff member asks for help in any area we will have people to send out there from any of the 2nd district, that can be used in an emergency force. E. In all aspects, each person will be in charge to familiarized himself Yi?ith every town and county in the district, in case he has to move around within the district. I» Ee will have a complete understanding that salaries will be dependent upon the filing of reports each weeis. J. Ee will organize, first, around the idea of a mock election. We feel that since so Qiuch has been going on all over the state con­ cerning voting people will want to learn more about voting. We will familiarize them with the Justice Departments suit, that has been (11) filed, in Mississippi by telling people the purpose of the suit, what it means to Negroes as a whole, when and where the suit will be heard, JL» We think that the mock election will ease the minds of people *«ho have had some apprehensions about what happens when a person goes to vote. It will also let the world know that Negroes do want to vote. It would also imply whet would happen if Negroes could vote.

We will need a list of the following supplies: 6 Cameras to make pictures 5 Small mimeograph machines 6 Boxes of typing paper 6 Boxes of mimeograph paper 6 Packages of Stencils IE Bell points pens 6 Small file cabinets 6 Dictioncrys ;2 Letter baskets 6 Brief cases . 6 Pi.per cutters 6 Electric radios 6 Boxes of index cards with 5000 cards per box

The budget lor each person per month shall bo as follows: Telephone .calls $25.00 per month House Rent $25.00 " " Transportation, .-.,...*. <...... a ,%20.00 '' ,! (12) Food $30.00 per month Supplies ..$20.00 " '' Total. $120.00 per person per month 8 $960.00 per month for the 2nd Dist

It has not yet been 8 certained as to whether or not people will be able to survive on these ''minimum'' type budgets. We hope that we shall be able to live within said budget end that 3B0C will see fit to grant to us, said sum,

Samuel Block September 13, 1963

PL.aNS iiiil) BUDGEi 3rd C. D. Mclrthur Cotton The third congressional district includes some of the large cities in the state of Mississippi namely, Jacitson, Yazoo, Vicks­ burg, Natchez, McComb, end Brookhaven. There is also about 47;b Negro population, wnich means that the Negroes could be extremely instrumental in deteimining elections. My plans are to establish projects in Einds County, v^hich includes the state capital; Warren County, which includes Vicksburg; Natchez, Adorns County; and mcComb, Pixe County. Contacts will be made in the surrounding counties, but since they ere predominantly rural, and this and the coming two months are harvest months, little emphasis will be put on them for the time being. In the third district there are three Negro senior colleges and three Negro junior colleges. We pian to use the college students and teachers to help conduct voter registration 'work­ shops. Eoliis 'hatpins, who will attend Tougaloo this semester, plans to organize the campus in order to help in v.r. activities in the surrounding areas. The project hetds will be as follows; Jessie Eerris, hinds County; Die* Frey, Natchez; Dave Greene, Vic&sburg. 1 will head the Pike County project, which also ue the temporary head office. mcComb (Pits County) is a historical site for SfiCC, being that it ia where the first SNCC voter registration project started; it aiso represents all of the mistakes that were made in that particular project. Since I had the opportunity to be a part of that project, I feel that I will have a good understanding of the problems to be facee there. The total weekly budget will be $50 per project; it will be broken down thus: 1. Transportation $15.00 (25.00 for traveling 2. Room $10.00 director) 3. Food $10.00 4. Supplies(leaf lets, etc) $10,00 5. Telephone $ 5.00 Plus at least $10,00 salary for personal expenses of project heads. There is e desperate need for a Cc.r for each project, but as it stands, there is only one car in the third district. (13) TO: SNCC FROM: GEORGE GREENE RE:OPERATION MISSISSIPPI The fourth Congressional District one of the most important dis­ tricts we find in the five districts in the state. AsCanton B.Philadelphia 0,Forest D.Newton E»Meridian George Greene FoMendenhall Magee Magee It is our intention to develope a closer working relation­ ship among all the workers in the five Congressional District that we are intending to work in* Ao Have in the area that we are working in a person that will be responsible for other staff members of our National Office in caseof any emergency* B,Students shall be used: 1. Holding Mass Meeting SoEvening and week-end canvassing 3.Talking to parents and friends 4«Speaking in Chruches icJldults 1,Speaking in Churches 3,Talking to friends and other people 3»CanvaBsing whenever they can. D* Mass Meeting Mass Meeting will be held.The mass Meeting is the other way we talk to large number of people at once<, (14) E. Worshop 3orfcs]j.op will be held on week-ends for students.That we lope to inform the students,so that we will be able to canvassoThe workshops will be held in various cities* P» Get the leaders of city and town to the COFO meetingSoTo make them able to understand what is going on in the state. Gc We shall organize first the ideal of: A* Mock electionoWe will fill them in on the Justice Departmnet suit against the state of Mississippio We are going to gain the ballot by 1964

Budget for each person per month

FOOd-i ».,...*..«...>.«»««.*o«e.«.oJ f uUn 00

IlOUSe no.o,93«oo3o.e>owa..o«o«t>a.'>«*3 f uO o UU

OUppxXeSo 9,4o«.o.«•«»*,.•...•es.oeyoUo UU Transportationo,• »*«,.«••••.,..«, ,$2QoQQ Telephone oko...... o$25«> 00 $120o00 per person a month

|120o00 7 #840o00 Per month for the Fourth Congressional Distrist*

George Greene 14 - A r

The following is the budget for Laurence Guyot, Director of district V.

Transportation.....•.•••»#*e»o»*»»*»©»©$25»Q0 £Ar '^eek Salary $10.00 " »« Phone Calls*, , $5*00

Materals ...0 $10. 00 »» •«

Hoom and Beard,.,.,.<...,,o.o.o.OD,.,..o^lOoOO ** " Total...... „.•<>..•.„&60»00 *8 «' pCT-projett 4

$2&&o 00 for the total of four projects

This plan is to operate four projects which will coniaand a mindmum of &60«>00

per pacojecta which makes a grand total of #240o0Q per week, for the entire

operation, in the Fifth District0

Yours in the struggle,

Laurence Guyot, District, Dist» V (15) TO: SNCC FROM: CHARLIE COBB RE: ECONOMIC NEEDS AND AIDS IN RURAL AREAS

.YST TO THE SUCCESS of the vote drive in Mississippi is going to be our ability to handle certain pressing economic needs a— mong Negroes in the state.Steps in this direction were made in at least two instance last year,with results that have been poait- ive aids in the registration effort as well as frist steps to­ ward the elimination of the widespread economic poverty among Negroes in the state: (l) the seilding of Negroes farmers and share­ croppers to the National Sharecroppers Conference held at Brinks, North Carolina in November of 1963;(2) the food and clothing dis­ tribution program was a major factor in the significant break­ through in the Leflore County(Greenwood) vote drive.With the increasing mechanization of cotton fields which is resulting in the deprivation of income for thousands of Mississippi Negroes, the feudal system which Negroes still living on plantation are forced to live under,economic repricals against Negroes Part­ icipating in vote drive across the state,the consolidation of farms in the state forcing out the email farmer,and discrimi­ nation against Negroes seeking aid under certain federal programs, and the general lack of knowledge among Negroes of what aid they can get to help solve their economic problems,I believe that it is time for SNCC to begin to direct a part of it*8 energy toward the solution of these proolemsj Certain steps can be taken at once: A.Getting familiar with,and becomming ground in existing,and available government agriculural.progams, B.Simplifying these programs in order that they might be effect­ ively and comprehensively presented to Mississippi Negroes. 0.Organizing,educating,and mobilizing local groups to utilize federal and state aid programs. (16) 1.State wide conference of farmers and sharecroppers 3.Getting delegate from Mississippi to attend the NSF conference in South Carolina on September ciSnda D.Documeoting discrimination in federal programs(which are administered locally)* Eo Documenting discrimination in state welfare programs(i«e<> Leflore County,8unflower County,and Amite County)« Fa&eeping the Deparment of Agrloulture informed of these dis­ criminations, and seeing to it that presure for the removal of discrimination is maintainedo G, Documenting of economic reprisals that have occured as a result of civil rights activities. At least one staff person should begin work on this,and more should added as the year wears on the job gets biggeSr* Finance Right now,I believe this program can be operated from within the structure of existing voter registration projects-The main expense would be transportation»Perhaps some organization such as the National Sharecroppers Fund could be persuaded to subsidize this project* Transportation per week $10,00 Personal Expense —110»00 Starkville pi CofLumbus

iPascfgoula

OPERATION MISSISSIPPI *** PROJECTS NEWS RELEASE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE October, 1963 8£ Raymond Street, N.W. \tlanta, Georgia COEO MAPS VOTE FIGHT: 88-0331 ^zz^^ HENRY "RUNS" FOR GOVERNOR IN FREEDOM 3ALL0T CAMPAIGN iKSON/ MISS., Ocjt. 7 - A state-wide meeting here of the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO) mapped plans yesterday to run a Negro gubernatorial candidate in a Freedom Vote prior to the Nov. election. Dr. Aaron Henry, I).2-year-old President of COEO, agreed to campaign throughout the state in the next three weeks in an effort to bring out a record Negro vote for his candidacy in the unofficial balloting. COFO's Freedom Vote campaign is directed at potential Negro voters, regardless of whether they are registered. The plan is to place ballot boxes In churches in nearly 20 cities during the week 1 ,-ior to Nov. [|_, to give Negroes an opportunity to cast ballots in

- ipport of COFO's program.

COFO's aim Is to demonstrate that Mississippi Negroes want to ate, but are not permitted to do so, COFO Director Robert Moses, 28, : the meeting.

The balloting, Moses said, is directed against literacy and interpretation tests administered to Negroes by white voter registrars. Literacy tests should not be required, Moses explained, because the state has not provided Negroes with adequate literacy education. COFO Director Moses heads the Mississippi registration program of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Dr. Henry said there is no right or wrong In the interpretation tests. The only standard, he said, Is what satisfies each white registrar. COFO decided to continue and intensify voter registration campaigns in 20 cities from the Delta region to the Gulf. The registration campaigns will be aimed, at the I96I4, '66 and '6? elections for all national and state offices. The strategy Includes the development of political education clubs In loc^l communities to provide issues ^nd candidates at which •. eter registration can be directed. Arrangements were made to continue the food and clothing dis­ tribution in the Delta communities where "poverty is most severe." COFO is an affiliation of automonous local groups and the " lor civil rights organizations. '55 THE GENERAL CONDITION OF THE M I S S I S S I P P I NEGRO

This paper is a report published by the Student . Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. It is general and extensive in scope rather than specific and de­ tailed. The report's purpose is threefold;

1. to give SNCC's llississippi field workers a handy reference source detailing statistically some of the general facts relating to the sta­ tus of the Negro in llississippi,

2. to indicate the dire necessity for support of community centers and county workers, and

3. to serve as a guideline for more detailed studies to be made in the near future.

In this study, the terra "nonwhite people" is used instead of the term "Negro" in many instances. De- cause of the high proportion of Negroes in the non- white category, it is not a distortion to use data that refers to "nonwhites" as data that refers par­ ticularly to Negroes* In I960, in llississippi, 99.6 percent of the total nonwhite population was Negro, and 99.7 percent of the nonwhite farm operators were Negroes.

STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 RAYMOND STREET, N.N. ATLANTA, GEORGIA S38-0331

October, 1963 Labor Donated PERTINENT BACKGROUND DATA

Growth in the Population. 1940-1960

Number and Proportion - 915,722 Negroes constituted,—in 1960, roughly_42% of the__total 2,178,000 population in Mississippi. Be­ tween 1940 and I960, the total population remained nearly the same (percent change: -0.2), with a more than 7% decrease in the Ne­ gro population compared with an increase of more than 6% among the non-Negro population. (See Chart 1 and Table 1.) Although birth rates among Negroes have been consistently higher than those among whites, mortality rates are higher, average life expectancy is lower and migration out of the state is considerably higher among Negroes than among whites.

Birth Rates - The higher birth rates among Negroes, in comparison with whites, are shown in Table 2. In 1949, the rate per 1,000 among the Negro population was 34.8, compared with 21.8 among whites. Since 1945 there has been a significant rise in the birth rate for Negroes. During the depression 30*s, sharp declines in birth rates occurred among both Negroes and whites. (Chart 2)

Death Rates - Death rates among Negroes continue to be higher than the rates for whites, though the difference in the rates has con­ sistently narrowed. (Table 3) It is still a fact, however, that the death rate among Negroes today is not as low as it was for Ttfhites in 1913, the first year for which we have death rate data. This is largely a reflection of the continued low standard of living under which Mississippi Negroes exist, in addition to a lack of access to adequate hospital care. (Chart 3.)

Infant Mortality - Infant mortality rates since 1920 for both races have generally gone downward. The rate for nonwhites, however, swung upward in 1957 and continued upward until 1961 when It start­ ed downward again (Chart 4). It takes no statistical genius to understand what the figures reflect: In Mississippi the chances of a Negro baby dying within the first year of life are at best twice those of a white baby. Though most babies of both races do survive, Negro babies have a greater chance of starting life with a health handicap. In communities where Negroes are subject to major segregation and discrimination, the Negro baby is much more likely to be born prematurely. Premature babies may get excellent care jlf. they are born in or near a hospital with a modern center for premature infants, but Negroes in Mississippi are largely de­ nied this. (Table 4)

Significant Population Characteristics, 1950-1960

A^e Distribution - Table 5 compares the changes in the Negro and white population which have occurred among different age groups between 1950 and 1960. During this decade the total population of Mississippi remained almost the same. There was a net increase in the white population and a net decrease in the nonwhite popu­ lation. Most significant for Negroes is the large decrease in the group aged 20 to 34. Because workers in this age group are tradi­ tionally preferred in hiring for new employment, this change in Report for Miss. Field Staff, age composition of the population may contribute to increased em­ ployment opportunity for younger Negroes. The situatio.n may also add to the dilemma of employers whose hiring policies continue to favor white workers and workers under 35 years of age. (Chart 5.)

Urban-Rural Distribution - In 1960, the Negro population was largely rural, there being over two-thirds of the Negroes in the State living in rural areas. Of the 79,545 persons who migrated from rural areas into Mississippi cities, only 5 percent were non- white. There obviously has been no significant rural-urban redis­ tribution of the non-white population within the state during the last decade. This is largely a reflection of the fact that employ­ ment opportunities for rural non-whites in the state's towns and cities are poor. (Table 7) County Variations - Table 8, showing the Negro and white population in 1950 and 1960 for each county, reveals the high percentage of Negroes in some counties and the considerably high out-of-state migration taking place. There are 29 counties wherein Negroes con­ stitute more than 50% of the population. Hinds, Calhoun and Coa­ homa are the counties with the largest numbers of Negroes, Tuni­ ca, Clairborne, and Jefferson have the largest percentages of Ne­ groes. The area commonly referred to as the "Gulf Coast" has shown the only consistent increases in population during the last decade. Significantly, this is the most affluent economic area or region in the state.

Cities of 10.000 or more - Table 9 shows the 18 cities in Mississ­ ippi that have a population of greater than 10,000. In all of these cities, with the exception of Biloxi, Negroes constitute 20 percent or more of the total population.

Educational Attainment

As shown in Table 10, in 1960 a11 Negroes aged 25 and over had completed an average of only six years of school. This is five years less than the average for whites. The average is even less in the rural-farm areas where a high proportion of Negroes live,

RECENT LABOR FORCE' AND EMPLOYMENT TRENDS

Negroes in the Labor Force Proportion in the Labor Force - The proportion of Negroes in the labor force is very similar to the proportion for whites. There is a noticeable difference in the proportions when the races are divided into sexes, however. There is a greater per cent of Negro women, particularly urban married Negro women, in the labor1 force, than white women. The proportion of Negro men in the labor force is noticeably lower than the proportion of white males. (Table 11 and Chart 7) Report for Miss. Field Staff,

Unemployment - Table 12 shows that in 1960 the average unemploy- • •• ment rate for Negroes was more than 50 per cent greater than that of whites. Changes in the rates for the two races from 1950 to 1960 were relative--the same. This change has been an unfavorable- one, resulting in an unemployment rate for Negroes of 7.1 per cent, (Chart 8) .

Status amo ng different age groups - Tab 1e 13 s h ows , for 1960, the variations at different ages in the lab or force s tatus of Negroes in compari son with white men and women, About 67 % of all Negro men ages 1 4 or over were in the labor f orce compa red to roughly 75% of all xjhite men. A significantly higher pro portion of Negro men under age 24 and over age 65 were i n the labo r force. for both Negro men and white men between th e ages of 20 and 64 the rates of 1 abor force participation were comparabl e. The pattern among wome n shows some significant cont rasts. Th e proportion of Negro wome n in the labor force was high er than fo r white women in every age group except ages 14-19 and 2 0-24. Amo ng white women, the rate o f labor force participation d rops after age 24 (about the averag e age of marriage), whereas f or Negro w omen the rate in- creases th rough the 45-49 age group.

Industry Distribution - In Table 14, it is apparent that of the roughly one-half million employed Negroes in the State, more than a third are employed in agriculture with more than another "third employed in service industries. Unbelievable as it may seem, :. though Negroes comprise almost 40% of the total employed labor force, only about 4 1/2% are employed in manufacturing and even less than that in construction employment.

Pattern of Unemployment - Table 15 reveals that of those Negroes unemployed, not more than 8% can be categorized as skilled workers. Though 21.1% of those unemployed were previously semi-skilled op­ eratives or kindred workers, 31.9% were non-agricultural laborers and 21.55% were farm laborers. Thus, over 50% of the unemployed Negroes were unskilled laborers.

INCOME

Income of families. 1950-1960 - Table 16 and Chart 9 present the median income of all Negro and x/hite persons for the years 1950- 1960. In 1960 Negroes had an average annual income of $606, only 29% of the average income of $2,023 among whites. The difference seems particularly wide in view of the fact that a higher propor­ tion of Negro family members are in the labor force. The data in the previous section on labor force and employment show that a higher proportion of Negro males under age 24 and women over age 24 are in the labor force than is the case among whites.

There is a relatively smaller differential between Negroes and whites for urban as compared with rural persons. In 1960, the average income of urban Negroes was 33% of the average among Report for Miss, Field Staff, continued 5 whites, a decline from38% in 1950. The urban Negro family in 1960 had an average income of $871, compared with an average of about $2600 for whites. Between 1950 and 1960 the average Income of urban whites increased some $800, whereas among Negroes it in-, creased less than $200. Among rural persons the median income of Negroes increased from $390 in 1950 to $474 in 1960 when it was about 31% of the average for white persons. This represented a relative decline from the $390 average of 1950 when the rural Ne­ gro's average income T*as 41% of the average among rural whites. The money income of both Negro and white persons living on farms remained low and increased relatively less than that of rural non- farm and urban families in the years 1945-1949.

HOUSING CONDITIONS

Statistics revealing housing conditions for Mississippi Negroes are somewhat shocking. In 1960 there were 207,611 housing units for Mississippi Negroes, Of these, 38.1% were owner-occupied, and 61,9% were renter-occupied (significantly out of line with the national proportion of owner- and renter-occupied housing). Of the 207,611 houses, only one-third can be classified as being in sound condition; the. others have been classified as either deteriorating or dilapidated. Of the homes in rural areast over 75% are without any piped water at all and over 90% of these rural homes had no flush toilets, no bathtub and no shower, (see Table 17) Chart 1 Population, Chart 2 Birth Rates, Selected Periods 1940 & 1960 in thousands Rate per 1,000 population 2,184 2,178

37.6 3/,-y; 36. 6 34.8 1,263 24.0 fa 23.2 ?2.9 r>n a 21, 8 i- V • .

§ i ?/••:••' y/, ">Y/,-: >/••/; m •'/••/ v. •//, •///,•/ '//A /'r- ',/// '/V/•

! % w 9//A Mb § .•<• /- it w • / '/ -'.'//- ,:'/••?, 1940 I960 1930 1950 1955 1961

— *~

-JL00. chart 3 Death Rates \ Chart 4 Rate per 1,000 popula­ 90 Infant Mortality tion. \ . 80

JJU0. ! 70 I 11.2, { — Novi-ujt. 11 z. i

m i 60, '//Vs.tmz.v \ j 50 Y/. I e#ei 20 •e evi 1913 '/.I96 -A0 10

NEGRO 192: '25 '30 '35 '40 '45 '50 '55 60

White (decrease) percent (increase) -U0 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30 —i , l_ —! i ! J L.

Total, all ages

- y\ under 10

•o: 10 - 19

\y//.y /t

WJ /.' J//f/ • // .

35 -kk

hS -6U

#n 65 and over ,iiWi_ l

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census CHART 6: NEGRO POPULATION, BREAKDOWN BY COUNTY (PERCENTAGE DISTRIBUTION)

Over 50%

34% - 49%

16% - 33%

6% - 15%

0-5%

MISSISSIPPI SCALE Of MILES 40 I

STUDENT VOICE MAP Chart 7 Percent of Negro and White Population in the Labor Force, i960

FEMALES MALhiS urban —* * • ""••

ru^!al rural non-iarn „ farm - v 76.0 ™-° 'f~ \%X urban K ; 0 'A ft , ' y ^ ''/•' • / ''/'/ , / rural ? il > /. ' ? a non-farm rurai i\ v.5 farm / , y.'

7/. 5 //, J, % / J / ,, 1 .'/''' ,7, ' I •/ J /¥> > • /' —i I,. . J __ LI—n 1 Chart 8. Percent of Negro and White Workers in the Labor Force Unemployed, 1950 and i960

Ne T]hite Source: U. S. Bureau of O gro ED the Census

EUMl3M«mg«MUa 10 APPENDIX TABLES TABLE 1: POPULATION OF MISSISSIPPI, BY COLOR, 1900-1960

Nonwhite Year Total Number Percentage 1960 2,178,141 920,595 44.4 1950 2,178,914 990,282 45.5 1940 2,183,796 1,077,469 49.1 1930 2,009,821 1,011,744 50.5 1920 1,790,618 936,656 52.5 1910 ...... 1,797,114 1,011,003 56.2 1900 1,551,270 910,070 58.6

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census

TABLE 2: ESTIMATED BIRTH RATES, BY COLOR; SELECTED YEARS, 1920-1961

Births per 1,000 population Year Nonwhite White 1961 34.8 21.8 1959 36.6 20.9 1955 36.6 23.2 1950 37.6 22.9 1940 27.3 20.9 1935 25.1 20.3 1930 24.0 23.2 1925 23.4 24.1 1920 22.7 26.3

,_'. Source: Mississippi State Board of Health TABLE 3: DEATH RATES, BY COLOR, SELECTED YEARS, 1920-1961

Dea ths per 1,000 popula tion Year Nonwhite White 1961 11.0 8.8 1959 11.4 3.1 1955 10.2 3.7 1950 11.2 8.0 1940 12.6 8.6 1QOC n 7 1 J J J 1930 14.8 9.0 1925 14.4 8.8

1920 15.1 y. j • Source: Mississippi State Board of Health TABLE 4: DEATHS. UNDER 1 YEAR; SELECTED YEARS, 1920-1961 11 Deaths per 1,000 population

Year Nonwhite White

1961 50.0 23.5 1960 54.4 23 1955 46.4 24 1950 42 28 1945 44 36 1940 60 46 1935 58 47 1930 84 51.0 1925 85 53.0 1920 1.01 59.9 Source: Mississippi State Board of Health

TABLE 5: POPULATION OF MISSISSIPPI, BY COLOR, AGE, AND SEX 1950-1960 kge"and I Negro Nativeborn White Change: 1950-1960 Sex 1950 1960 1950 1960 Number N.B. Percentage Negro White Negro N.B.W. TOTAL 987.935 915.722 1.179.964 1.250,282 •72.213 70.318 -7.3 6.2 Under 10270.685 276,403 250.315 260.678 5 i 746 10.363 2.1 4.1 10-19 203.905 206,53,6 208.785 231.572 2.681 22.787 1.3 10.9 20-34 188.975 130.405 264,085 236.908 -53.510 •28.177 -38.5 •10.7 3 5-44 114,475 7-9.38 6 244.450 157.199 35.089 4.930 -33.8 -2.1 45-64 143.430 149.447 206.455 251,333 6.017 44,927 4.2 21.8 165-over 66,605 72.528 85.680 92.043 5.923 6.363 8.9 7.4

Total 479,580 440,641 589.369 621,656 •33^939 37.787 -3.1 5.4 UnderlQ 135.685 138.456 128,310 133.140 2.771 4,830 2 . 0 !• 3.8 10-19 100.490 105.074 107.490 120,351 4,584 12,361 4.5 1.3 20-34 86.520 57.893 129,785 117.612 -28.621 -12.173 -33.1:! -9.4 35-44 52,755 3 3.923 79.810 77.132 -18.832 -2.6 28 -35.7 •3.3 45-64 70,940 70.053 101.770 122,435 837 20,715 - 1.2! 20.7 65-over 33.270 35,284 41,200 50,886 2.014 9.686 6.1L 23.4 FEMAL? Total 508.355 475.081 590.095 628,626 -33.274 38,531 -6^6 6.5 UnderlO 135,000 137,947 122^005 127.538 2.947 5.533 2.2 4.4 10-19 103.415 101.512 101,295 1113221 1,903 9.926 -1. 9.8 20-34 102.395 7 2^512 135.300 119.296 ,-29.883 -16,004 -29. hi -11.9 35-44 61.720 45^463 82,320 80,017 -16.257 2,303 -26.41J - 2.8 45-64 72 *JL£O_ 79.394 104^685 128^897 6.904 24.212 9.6| 23.1 65-over 33 73351 37.244 44.480 41,157 3.9091 -3.323 11.71! -7.T Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census 12 TABLE 6:POPULATION OF MISSISSIPPI, BY RACE AND URBAN_RURAL RESIDENCE, 1960

Residence Native-born White Negro Male Female Male Female

Urban 245,006 266,507 134,907 158,765 Rural; non-farm 243,385 243,131 156,597 167,778 Rural; farm 124,265 118,988 149,137 148,588 Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census

TABLE 7: URBAN AND RURAL MIGRATION, BY RACE, IN MISSISSIPPI, 1950-1960

AREA POPULATION NET MIGRATION NATURAL NET 1950 T9T0" Number INCREASE CHANGE-% State 178,914 2,178,141 •424,158 -16.3 19.4% -0.03 White 1,188,631 PR -R32? 1,257,5457,b46 108,470 • 7.9 14.9 5.8 Nonwhite 990,282 20,595 •315,688 -2 5.5 24.8 -7.0 Urban 607,162 820,805 79,545 10.7 22.1 35.2 White 374,320 525,853 75,476 16.8 20.3 40.5 Nonwhite 232,842 294,952 4,069 1.4 24.9 26.7

Rural 1,571,752 1,357,336 -503,703 •27.1 18.4 -13.3 Whxte 814,312 7-31,693 •183,946 20.1 12.4 -10.1 Nonwhite 757,440 625,643 -319,757 -33.8 24.8 -17.4 Source: Mississippi State Board of Health

TABLE 8: COUNTY BREAKDOWN OF POPULATION AND MIGRATION

County Population No. Nonwhite % Nonwhite Net Change of Nonwhites 1950-1960

Adams 37,730 18,695 49.5 •16 Alcorn 25,282 3,333 13.2 •14 Amite 15,573 8,443 54.2 -19 Attala 21,335 9,546 44.7 •17 Benton 7,723 3,609 46.7 - 6 Bolivar 54,464 36,943 67.8 -14.4 Calhoun 15,941 4,346 27, 3 • 1.3 Carroll 11,177 6,5C0 58, 2 •26.4 Chickasaw 16,891 6,511 38, 5 -22.7 Choctaw 8,42 3 2,520 29, 9 24.3 Clairborne 10,845 8,245 76.0 • 7.7 Clarke 16,493 6,492 39.4 •17.6 Clay 18,993 9.719 51.3 - 3 Coahoma 46,212 31,582 68.3 •11 Copia 27,051 14,059 52.0 -13 Covington 13,637 4,741 34.8 • 9 Desoto 23,891 14,643 61.3 •11.4 Forrest 52,722 14,752 28.0 13.0 TABLE 8: COUNTY BREAKDOWN OF POPULATION AND MIGRATION, COMT! 13

County Population No. Nonwhite % Nonwhite Net Change of Nonwhite, 1950-1960

Franklin 9,286 3,800 40.9 -11.7 George 11,098 1,287 11.6 4.5 Greene 8,366 1,923 23.0 27.9 Grenada 18,409 9,057 49.2 - 7.9 Hancock 14,039 2,255 16.1 10.6 •Harrison 119,489 19,256 16.1 43.5 Kinds 187,489 74,840 40.0 17.1 Hoi: .as 27,096 19,501 72.0 -20.3 Humphreys 19,093 13,335 69.8 -17.2 Issaquena 3,576 2,400 67.1 -28.3 Itawamba 15,080 874 5.8 - 6.7 iJacxson 55,522 10,864 19.6 61.3 Jasper 16,909 8,507 50.3 -12.5 ijefferson 10,142 7,653 75.5 - 9.1 kJefferson Davis 13,540 7,414 54.8 -13.9 IJones 59,542 15,447 25.9 2.9 .Kemper 12,277 7,449 60.7 -21.0 Lafayette 21,355 7,245 33.9 -10.4 Lamar 13,675 2,232 16.3 6.0 Lauderdale 67,119 23,484 35.0 0.4 Laurence 10,215 3,861 37.8 -18.9 Leake 18,660 8,101 43.4 -11.6 {Lee 40,589 10,289 25.3 - 3.5 vaflore 47,142 30,443 64.6 -13.8 Lincoln 26,759 8,352 31.2 - 9.1 Lowndes 46,639 17,768 38.1 - 3.5 Madison 32,904 23,637 71.8 - 5.2 virion 23,293 7,885 33.9 - 6.0 Marshall 24,503 17,239 70.4 - 2.8 Monroe 33,953 12,021 35.4 -12.3 Montgomery 13,320 5,971 44.8 - 4.1 jjfeshoba 20,927 5,901 28.2 -11.5 Newton 19,517 6,567 33.6 -16.4 ^'cvubee 16,826 12.102 71.9 -18.8 ;'vtibbeha 26,175 11,448 43.7 - 2.6 ^anola 28,791 16,226 56.4 - 7.2 earl River 22,411 5,190 23.2 15.5 Perry 8,745 2,412 27.6 9.1 Pike 35,063 15,408 43.9 - 1.9 Pontotoc 17,232 3,286 19.1 -13.9 Prentiss 17,949 2,186 12.2 - 6.3 Quitman 21,019 13,304 63.3 -15.3 Kankin 34,322 12,818 37.3 - 6.2 Scott 21,187 8,137 38.4 -13.2 Sharkey 10,738 7,491 69.8 -18.5 Simpson 20,454 7,200 35.2 - 1.0 'Smith 14,303 3,247 22.7 - 4.2 >tone 7,013 1,711 24.4 25.3 Sunflower 45,750 31,020 67.8 -18.7 Callahatchie 24,081 15,501 69.4 -20.1 Cate 18,138 10,442 57.6 0.7-- Tippah 15,093 2,756 18.3 -18.8 Tishomingo 13,889 679 4.9 -15.8 TABLE 8: COUNTY BREAKDOWN OF POPULATION AND MIGRATION, CONT'D. 14

County Population No. Nonwhite % Nonwhite Net Change of Nonwhites, 1950-1960

Tunica 16,826 13,321 79.2 -24.8 Union 18,904 3,312 17.5 - 8.9 Walthall 13,512 6,100 45.1 -14.9 Warren 42,206 19,759 46.8 - 1.7 Washington 78,638 43,399 55.2 - 7.8 Wayne 76,258 5,309 35.7 - 6.6 Webster 10,580 2,642 25.0 - 1.9 Wilkinson 13,235 9,428 71.2 - 3.4 Winston 19,246 8,393 43.6 - 9.7 Yalobusha 12,502 5,540 44.3 -16.8 Yazoo 31,653 18,791 59.4 -14.9

. - - • Sources; United States Bureau of the Census and Mississippi State Board of Health

TABLE 9: URBAN PLACES OF MORE THAN 10,000 PERSONS, 19 60

PLACE TOTAL WHITE AND NONWHITE NONWHITE POPULATION MALE FEMALE MALE FEMALE Biloxi 44,053 26,606 17,447 2,748 2,809 Clarksdale 21,105 9,834 11,271 5,056 6,148 Cleveland 10,172 4,902 5,270 1,841 2,042 Columbus 24,771 11,022 13,749 4,542 5,396 Corinth 11,453 5,334 6,119 1,042 1,275 Greenville 41,502 19,636 21,866 9,186 11,002 Greenwood 20,436 9,303 11,133 4,675 5,826 Gulfport 30,204 15,064 15,140 3,030 3,306 Hattiesburg 34,989 16,644 18,345 5,189 6,026 Jackson 144,422 67,619 76,803 23,854 27,702 Laurel 27,839 13,169 14,720 4,615 5,352 McComb 12,020 5,574 6,446 1,531 1,882 Meridian 49,374 22,715 26,659 7,501 9,260 Natchez 23,791 11,073 12,718 5,633 6,710 Pascagoula 17,155 3,599 8,556 1,924 1,961 Tupelo 17,221 8,158 9,063 1,347 2,300 Vicksburg 29,143 13,422 15,721 6,098 7,436 Yazoo 11,236 5,109 6,127 2,745 3,441

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census 15 TABLE 10; YEARS OF SCHOOL COMPLETED BY PERSONS 25 05. OLDER, 1960 YEARS COMPLETED COLOR NUMBER 2 5 GRADE SCHOOL HIGH SCHOOL AND OVER NONE 1-4 .5-6 7 8 1-3 4

Nonwhite Number 383,017 24,313 92,063 61,525 37,729 67,239 42,547 16,273 Percentage 8.4 31.3 20.2 9.1 12.4 11.1 4.2l ! White i Number 681,959 8,444 40,274 51,865 38,450 98,287156,554 168,058! Percentage 1.2 5.9 7.6 5.6 14.4 23.0 24.d

Median grade: Nonwhite - grade 6 White - grade 11 Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census TABLE 11: EMPLOYMENT STATUS OF THE CIVILIAN, NONINSTITUTIONAL POPU­ LATION IN MISSISSIPPI, BY COLOR AND SEX, 1960 (% distribution) EMPLOYMENT STATUS AND WHITE NONWHITE SEX URBAN RURAL RURAL URBAN RURAL RURAL NON-FARM FARM NON-FARM FARM Both sexes: Total, 14 years and over 100 100 100 100 100 100

In labor force 57.6 49.3 48.9 58.1 45.7 45.1 1 Not in labor force 42.4 50.7 51.1 41.9 44.3 44.9 i In labor force employed 96.0 94.6 96.3 91.2 92.9 95.3 unemployed 4.0 5.4 3.7 8.8 7.1 4.7 i Females: Total, 14 years and over 100 100 100 100 100 100

In labor force 37.7 29.1 24.1 48.9 30.5 21.5 Not in labor force 62.3 70.9 75.9 51.1 69.5 78.5 In labor force employed 95.3 95.0 95.0 92.0 91.7 90.2 unemployed 4.7 5.0 5.0 8.0 8.3 9.8 TABLE 11: CONT INUED 16 EMPLOYMENT ISTATUS AND WHITE NONWHITE Is EX 1 URBAN RURAL RURAL URBAN RURAL RURAL > NON-FAR*'! FARM NON-FARM FARM Hales: Total, 14 years and over 100 1 100 100 100 100 100 In labor force 79.3 70.0 72.7 70.0 63.0 69.2 Not in labor force 20.7 30.0 27.3 30.0 37.0 30.8 In labor force employed 96.3 94.5 96.7 94.5 93.5 96.9 unemployed 3.7 5.5 3.3 5.5 6.5 3.1 Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census TABLE 12: RATE OF UNEMPLOYMENT, 19 50-19 60 y 1950 1960

wh i t e nonwhite wh i t e nonwhite

2.7 4.5 4.5 7.1 Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census

TABLE 13: TOTAL IN LABOR FORCE (PERCENTAGE), BY AGES, 1960 j j AGE MALE FEMALE j NONWHITE WHITE NONWHITE WHITE : Total, 14 100 100 100 100 years and up 14-19 33.0 34.5 15.1 16.5 20-24 80.3 64.3 38.6 40.8 25-29 89.5 92.4 43.4 39.4 30-34 91.2 94.3 47.2 42.6 35-39 91.2 93.9 48.8 44.0 40-44 91.2 93.2 49.1 46.6 45-49 90.4 92.1 49.6 45.3 50-54 87.2 89.1 46.3 41.9 55-59 81.9 33.9 40.4 35.3 n ; 60-64 72.4 71.0 30.7 26.0 65-69 49.0 44.9 18.2 14.8

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census a TABLE 14: INDUSTRY GROUPING OF EMPLOYED PERSONS, 1960 (PERCENTAGE) 17

INDUSTRY NONWHITE WHITE

State Urban Rural Rural State Urban Rural Rural Non-farm Farm Non-farm Farm Agriculture 34.9 3.1 36.0 76.5 12.8 1.2 8.4 47.1 Manufacturing 4.6 6.7 4.4 2.0 23.3 20.1 29.1 20.2 Wholesale trade 1.3 2.4 1.1 0.2 3.2 4.6 2.5 1.1 Mining 0.1 0.2 0.1 0.1 1.3 1.3 0.9 0.8 Transportation, Communications and other pub­ lic utilities 4.0 3.6 3.3 1.5 4.8 6.1 3.3 2.8 Retail Trade 8.5 14.4 7.4 1.7 16.9 20.9 16.9 7.5 Service In­ dustries 35.9 55.1 31.7 12.4 26.1 31.1 23.0 10.8 industry not reported 2.1 2.6 1.9 1.5 1.9 2.2 1.7 1.8 •ource: U.S. Bureau of the Census

TABLE 15: MAJOR GROUP OCCUPATION OF THE EXPERIENCED UNEMPLOYED, 1960 (PERCENTAGE)

GROUP MALE FEMALE

White No nwh i t e White Nonwhite professional 2.4 0.6 5.5 2 Farmers and farm managers 3.2 3.5 0.4 2 Managers, officials, proprietors 3.5 0.2 2.5 1 clerical and kindred workers 4.4 0.9 18.6 0.6 Sales workers 4.0 0.2 10.9 0 Craftsmen, foremen and kindred 28.5 10.4 1.2 0, Operatives and kindred workers 29.1 21,1 35.2 5. Private household workers 0.1 0.7 2.4 39.8 Service workers, except private household workers 3.0 6.1 12.5 12.8 Farm laborers and foremen 4.8 21.5 2.4 31.5 Laborers, except farm and mine 13.3 31.9 0.7 1.0 Occupations not reported 3.7 3.0 7.6 3.7 Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census

TABLE 16: MEDIAN INCOME FOR PERSONS, 1950 AND 1960

RACE 1950 1960 State Urban Rural State Urban Rural

White $1,236 $1,826 $973 $2,023 $2,622 $1,065 Nonwhite $ 440 $ 693 $390 $ 606 $ 871 $ 474

Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census 18

TABLE 17: NEGRO HOUSING IN MISSISSIPPI, I960

STATE TOTAL URBAN RURAL

Total Housing Units 207,611 77,824 129,787 Owner-occupied (#) 79,059 32,913 46,146 Owner-occupied (%) 38.1% 42.3% 35.6% Renter-occupied (#) 128,552 44,911 83,641 Renter-occupied (%) 61.9% 57.5% 64.4% Condition Owner-occupied: sound 36,656 17,677 18,979 deteriorating 27,545 10,055 17,540 i dilapidated 14,858 5,231 9,627 Renter-occupied: sound 33,168 15,294 17,874 deteriorating 52,629 15,937 36,692 dilapidated 42,755 13,680 29,075

Water Supply Hot and cold piped inside 40,870 33,181 7,689 Cold only, piped inside 39,101 30,376 8,725 Piped water outside 27,502 10,229 17,273 No piped water 100,138 4,038 96,100 j Toilet Facilities Flush toilet,exclusive use 62,160 52,481 9,679 Flush toilet, shared use 7,570 6,965 605 None 137,881 18,378 119,503 Bathing Facilities Bathtub or shower, exclusive use 44,991 36,333 8,658 Bathtub or shower, shared 2,207 1,807 400 $0 bathtub or shower 160,413 39,684 120,729 Source: U.S. Bureau of the Census 1JV*3T| NEWS RELEASE STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 6 Raymond Street FOR IMMED.IATEj RELEASE Atlanta lib, Gesrgia 688-0331 ATLANTA, GEORGIA, December 5 - The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) announced today the beginning of a campaign to free Clyde Kennard, a 30-year-old Negro who was tho first of his race to apply to an all-white school in Mississippi, Kennard, a native of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, first applied to Mississippi Southern College in 1958, After two attempts, he was convicted of being an acces­ sory in a $25 chicken feed theft and sentenced to seven years in jail, "It is csmforting to think of the might of the Federal Government protecting James Meredith at Ole Miss/' SNCC Chairman Charles McDew said, "but America must not forget Clyde Kennard, like Meredith a veteran, whose reward for trying to en­ joy an education in his home state is a seven year prison term on a trumped-up charge." After his second vicit to the white school in 1959, Kennard was arrested for reckless driving. At the police station, he was confronted with five pints of whiskey which police claimed to have discovered in his car. He was found guilty of possessing illegal whiskey (Mississippi is a dry state) and fined $600 and costs. The resultant publicity spurred a camapign of economic reprisals against him. The Army Air Force veteran found it increasingly difficult to buy feed frr his poultry, his credit was cut off, and an unnoficial boycott went into effect.

On September 25, I960, five sacks of chicken feed valued at $>5 each were stolen from the Forrest County Cooperative Warehouse. An illiterate 19-year-old Negro, Johnny Lee Roberts, confessed the theft, but claimed that Kennard had engineered the robbery. Roberts was placed on five years of probation and freed,

Kennard, however, was convicted of being an accessory to the crime and was sen­ tenced to seven years in jail. He has been behind bars since,

Kennard, who spent several months last year in the University Hospital in Jackson where he received lU blood transfusions, has asked his mother net to vi­ sit him. Instead, he has asked her to think of him as still being in the Army,

Student groups, human relations and civil rights organizations and indivi­ duals are being asked by SNCC to send letters and telegrams of protest te their congressman and the President. Students at Tougaloo Southern Christian College in Mississippi have already begun preparing a petition for Kennard's release, SNCC Chairman McDew urged that letters sent to Kennard at Parchman be sent by registered mail to insure their release.

"Kennard's imprisionment is a national shame," McDew said, "and every Amer­ ican should work toward his release,"

-30- m i 5 5 PETITION

TO: JOHN F. KENNEDY, President of the United States of America ROBERT F. KENNEDY, Attorney General of the United States of America

WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, petition you for relief of Clyde Kennard, imprisoned for almost two years in Parchman Penitentiary, Parchman, Mississippi, on a charge of alleged theft of $25 worth of chicken feed* Mra Kennard had applied to Miss­ issippi Southern University in 1958 and 1959o In 1959* as he was leaving his interview with MSU officials, he was arrested for reckless drivingo At the police station, officials said Mr, Kennard had several pints of illegal whiskey in his car, Mr0 Kennard was fined $600 —- with no appeal of the case* In I960, five sacks of chicken feed were stolen from the Forrest County Cooperative Warehouse, Johnny Lee Roberts, a 19-year old illiterate, confessed to the crime as State's witness, but said that Mr0 Kennard had instigated the theft, Roberts' own testimony re­ vealed that Mr0 Kennard did not have the necessary knowledge of the warehouse and of the watchman's schedule to have planned the burglary. An all-white jury (Negroes are systematically excluded from registering to vote in Forrest County, and are therefore excluded from jury rolls) deliberated ten minutes before find­ ing Mr0 Kennard guilty and sentencing him to seven years' imprisonment*

WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, ask you to intervene in this case on behalf of Clyde Kennard and on behalf of justice. It is clear that the civil rights of Mr« Kennard, a Negro, have been violated under the llrbh Amendment of the United States Con­ stitution*

WE, THE UNDERSIGNED, aware of the position of the Federal Government in the case of James Meredith, ask you to file an amicus curao brief in half of Clyde Kennard and to release this man from bondage,

Clyde Kennard's only "crime" is that he wanted, like James Meredith, to attend the school of his choice in the State of Mississippio

1. (Name) (Address) 2. 3. iu 5. 6. 7. 8. 9.

10. Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 8 1/2 Raymond Street, North West FOR IMMEDIATE RELEAS1 Atlanta, Georgia, 30314 Tel (404) 688-0331 December 11, 1963

FEDERAL JURY FREES FIVE IN MISSISSIPPI BEATING

OXFORD, MISSISSIPPI: Vive Mississippi law officers, charged by the U. S.

Department of Justice^jtfith seven counts of conspiracy to deprive five Negroej oi their civil rights, were set free here by a Federal jury.

The five were accused of beating five civil rights workers arrested in Winona,

Mississippi after they entered a white rest room at a bus station there.

State highway patrolman John L. Easinger, Montgomery County Sheriff Earle

Wayne Patridge, and Winona Police Chief Thomas J. Herod, Jr. , all claimed they were innocent of the seven charges brought against them by the Justice

Department.

The Justice Department called six witnesses, including four of the Negro com­ plainants, and two FBI agents. June Johnson, Euvester Simpson, Rosemary Freeman, and Lawrence Guyot, all testified that they had been beaten in the Winona jail. Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer told the court that she was kicked by Sher iff Patridge after he yanked her off a bus in front of the bus station in Winona. She testified that she had remained on the bus while her four companions entered a segregated lunch room, /ill five were arrested on charges of disorderly conduct. Annelle Ponder, a field secretary for the Southern Christian Leadership Con­ ference, testified that three of the defendants beat her in the Winona city jail on June 9. She said, "And I'm not completely over it yet. " James Harold West, a SNCC worker, told the court he was beaten by poll _m and two Negro prisoners who were ordered to beat and kick him. He said he v* ...c later forced by a policeman to sign a statement saying that no beating took place. Two Negroes who were in the jail testified that they had been'paid"a pint and a half of corn whiskey for beating West. Guyot, a SNCC field secretary, told the all-white jury he was "kicked, punche and beaten with a slapjack" when he went to Winona to post bond for West and the women. Guyot said Sheriff Earl Patridge ordered him to "get out of Winona and stay gone" but he was stopped by highwayman Basinger and knocked down because he refused to say "sir" to the officer. Then, said Guyot, he was forced to disrobe and was beaten in the sheriff's of­ fice before he was jailed for "disturbing the peace. " FBI agents took the stand to introduce photographs showing injuries to the five. One agent testified he had examined a bloodstained shirt worn by Miss Johnson while she was under arrest. * -30- ONE MAN - ONE VOTE FEDERAL PROSECUTION & CIVIL RIGHTS in ALBANY, GEORGIA

"... The only instance in which the government has moved with vigor has been against Negro leaders who have been working to remove the evils of the segregation system. "

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made this statement after nine leaders of the Albany, Georgia Movement were indicted and convicted by a Federal jury at the request of a Federal Attorney General.

Dr. King's statement is tragic but true. A look at Southwest Georgia's history of oppression and brutality aimed at keeping Negroes "like they have been for the past 100 years, " according to one sheriff, reveals the Federal government has always moved with caution and hesitation until the civil rights of white persons were allegedly under attack.

IN JUNE, 1958, James Brazier was arrested by police in Dawson, Geor­ gia after he complained they were beating his elderly father to death. He too was beaten and died. The government convened a Grand Jury which returned no indictments.

IN JULY, 1962, Mrs. Marion King was carrying food and clothing to de­ monstrators jailed in Camilla, Georgia. Although she was in her seventh month of pregnancy and carrying an infant child, a police officer kicked her and punched her in the face until she fell to the ground and lost con­ sciousness. A month later she gave birth to a premature, dead child.

IN JULY, 1962, Sheriff D. C. "Cull" Campbell of Dougherty County broke a walking stick over Attorney C. B. King's head. Campbell said later, "I'm a white man and he's a nigger. Yeh, I knocked hell out of him and I'd do it again. "

IN AUGUST, 1963, during anti- segregation demonstrations in Americus, Georgia, children were hit with billy clubs and beaten with electric cat­ tle prods. One man, not a participant in demonstrations, had his leg broken by state police with a baseball bat. Another youth had twenty stitches taken in his head, as a result of a police bating. A U. S. Justice Department spokesman was quoted by the Associated Press as saying, "There is no evidence of police brutality in Americus. " The power of the Federal governmentto prosecute in these and many other instances of brutality and violations of civil and human rights is amply covered by the 1957 and 1960 Civil Rights acts. Cover­ ed so well, in fact, that Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy denied the need for additional legislation in this area.

The cases of Mrs. Marion King, brutalized before witnesses so badly that she lost her child; of Attorney C. B. King, beaten by a man who admitted he did it because King was a "nigger"; of James Brazier, whose killing was brought before a Grand Jury when no jury was neces­ sary for prosecution; and in the cases of the Americus beatings, were no Federal action has resulted, illustrate the hazards southwest Geor­ gia Negroes must face, and face alone.

But the actions taken against nine Albany Leaders indicate that the Federal government is ready to prosecute when it wants to, when it feels it can get a conviction, and when it is politically expedient to do so.

IN JULY 195u, a Negro was arrested and shot three times by the Sheriff of Baker County. The Negro, Charlie Ware, brought a damage suit against the sheriff, and the case was heard by an all-white jury which decided for the sheriff. One of the jurors who decided against Charlie Ware was Carl Smith, the white owner of a store catering exclusively to Albany Negroes.

Leaders of the Albany Movement approached Smith, as they had approach­ ed other Albany businessmen, and tried to get him to upgrade his Negro employees. He refused and on April 20, 1963, four Negroes picketed his store for one-half hour. Two days later, he closed down, claiming the half-hour picket line and a boycott called by the Albany Movement had forced him out of business. He complained to the Justice Depart­ ment, as civil rights leaders had complained of James Brazier, Attor­ ney C.B. King, Mrs. Marion King, and the Americus beatings.

THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT RESPONDED THIS TIME, However, with a force of "at least 35" FBI agents, (according to U. S. Attorney Floyd Buford in his prosecution of the Albany leaders) a Grand Jury investi­ gation, and indictments charging conspiracy and/or perjury against nine people. These nine are the leading forces behind the direct action and voter re­ gistration campaigns in Albany that made the world wonder in 1961 why the most powerful nation in the world could let its citizens be jailed and beaten without taking action.

They are: DR. W. G. ANDERSON, President of the Albany Movement MR. SLATER KING, Acting President of the Albany Movement who succeeded Dr. Anderson and whose wife had been beaten in Camilla; MRS. ELIZA JACKSON, Secretary of the Albany Movement, who lost her job at an all-Negro State College after she began working with the movement; REV. SAMUEL WELLS, perhaps the single most active local worker in Albany, and a Board Member of the Albany Movement; MR. THOMAS CHATMON, a local barber and Movement Board Mem­ ber, ran for City Council in 1962; MSSRS. ROBERT COLBERT and LUTHER WOODALL, two young, frequently arrested Albanians notorious with police for their participation in demonstrations; MISS JONI RABINOWITZ, a white field worker for the Student Non­ violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC); MR. ROBERT THOMAS, a Negro active in the Albany Movement

Dr. Anderson, Colbert and Woodall were charged with "conspiring to injure a juror. " The others were charged with perjuring themselves during the Grand Jury investigation.

THAT EIGHT NEGROES, all active in trying to destroy a system that is at the very least embarrassing to the Federal Government should be singled out for attack by that government is surprising in itself. Miss Rabinowitz' indictment is even more so.

She is accused of falsely telling the Grand Jury she was not at the seene of the half-hour picket. Her defense presented thirteen witnesses— including one girl who looks like her, and admitted that she but not Miss Rabinowitz had been there—to back their case that the indictment was based on mis­ taken identity. The prosecution—the Federal Government—put three wit­ nesses on the stand who declared she was there. SNCC has had many white students active in southwest Georgia since work began there in 1961. Their presence has been an embarrassment for local and Federal officials, for a southwest Georgia sheriff never knows if he is beating just another crazy northerner or a Congressman's niece when one of SNCC's white workers is maligned; with Negroes, he is sure he's beating no one who counts, or so it would seem.

Miss Rabinowitz' indictment was clearly an attack on all the white youngsters who come South to embarrass the rural policemen and the Federal govern­ ment. If this Federal action goes unprotested, other Federal Grand Juries— and county juries also —may use this same tactic to halt any rights drive which grows too impressive.

THE ALBANY INDICTMENTS CAN BE REVERSED, but only if the United States Department of Justice takes the necessary legal steps. This will be done only if the American community which believes in civil rights makes their protests known.

WHAT CAN YOU DO ABOUT THE ALBANY CASUALTIES?

Write to Attorney General Robert Kennedy demanding that his office:

1. confess error before the U. S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals and join in appellants motion to reverse the convictions and dismiss the indictments.

2. direct the U. S. Attorneys in the South to examine their jury lists and to apply to District Courts for the immediate compilation of lists representing a true racial cross-section of the population. (In the Division in which the court that heard the Albany cases is located, 34% of the population is Negro. The jury box selected to hear these cases contained 1, 985 names; only 177 —or 5%— were Negroes.) Contribute to the cost of defense and the expense of appeals. Send your contributions to: SNCC, 156 Fifth Avenue, Room 902, New York, N. Y. 10010 (make checks payable to The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee)

labor donated NEWS RELEASE #32 STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 6 RAYMOND STREET, N. V. ATLANTA, GEORGIA 3 0314

MISSISSIPPI NEGRO CANDIDATE HAS STRONG RIGHTS PLATFORM

CLARKSDALE, MISSISSIPPI, APRIL 1, 1964 - The first Negro woman to run for Congress from Mississippi told a campaign meeting here tonight she wanted to "go to Washington to right the wrongs" done Negroes by the incunbent 2nd Congressional District Congressman Representative Jamie

Whit ten (D-Miss.) .

Mississippi's first Negro woman candidate for Congress told the rally her platform was achieving "justice today for all Mississippians."

Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer, 47, of Ruleville, qualified to run in the

June 2 Mississippi Democratic primary. She plans to challenge Repre­ sentative Whitten's right to a seat in the United States House of Rep­ resentatives if she is defeated. Mrs. Hamer will also face Representa­ tive Whit ten in a "Freedom Ballot" vote, when disenfranchised Mississ­ ippi Negroes will cast votes in a mock election.

Mrs. Hamer told the campaign meeting she was demanding what belongs to her. She said she had been fired from jobs as a bookeeper and share­ cropper because she tried to regsiter to vote.

She was allowed to register in Indianola (Sunflower County, home of Senator Jar^es 0. Eastland) in September, 1963.

"You mast all help fight Jamie Whitten," Mrs. Hamer said, "so we can bring democracy to this country."

She is one of three Negroes running for Congress in the state. Her campaign will continue through the Delta.

Mrs. Hamer's campaign is being supported by the Council of Federa­ ted Organizations (COFO), a coalition of civil rights groups active in the state. COFO sponsored a "Freedom Vote For Governor" last November.

"That campaign was met with harrassment, arrests and intimidation from police" Mrs. Hamer said. She has asked Whitten to insure her cam­ paign will be protected by law enforcement officials. -30- NEWS RELEASE # 33 STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE. RELEASE 6 RAYMOND STREET, N. W. ATLANTA, GEORGIA 30314

MISSISSIPPI LEGISLATURE CURDS RIGHTS PICKETING

JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI, APRIL 2, 1964 - The Mississippi State Legislature has passed "an emergency bill" intended to curb civil rights activity throughout the state.

The State Senate unanimously passed, as did the House, an "act to prohibit unlawful picketing of state buildings, courthouses, public streets and sidewalks" on April 2.

According to the Jackson Daily News, April 2, State Senator E. K.

Collins of Laurel told the Senate the bill was "an emergency bill for

Greenwood." The bill is "designed to outlaw activity by civil rights groups" the Associated Press said.

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) has conducted intensive voter registration drives in Greenwood since August, 1952 and throughout the state since 1961. Daily picketing of the Leflore County

Courthouse in Greenwood resulted in the arrest of 14 SNCC workers March

31. The arrests were protested to Representative Jamie Whitten (D-Miss.)

Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and the United States Department of

Justice.

SNCC Chairman John Lewis said the new bill was "proof Mississippi is truly a police state." Lewis wired Mississippi Governor Paul John­ son asking that "in the interest of democracy" he send back with his objections this "repressive legislation, which denies the existence of the First Amendment."

The bill would make it a misdemeanor to picket "any public pre­ mises," city halls, courthouses, office buildings or any other state property or building. Conviction would be punishable by six months or $500 fine or both.

The bill was introduced in the House on March 25 - the same day as Greenwood's Freedom Day - by a representative from Forrest County, where a Freedom Day was held January 22. -30- NEWS RELEASE # 31 STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE. 6 RAYMOND STREET, N. W. ATLANTA, GEORGIA 3 0314

2nd GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI "FREEDOM DAY" SET

GREENWOOD, MISSISSIPPI - Voter registration workers have called for a

second "Freedom Day" here April 9.

On Greenwood's first "Freedom Day", March 25, over 250 Negroes

tried to register to vote.

"Police inteference x^ith voter registration workers has increased

since then", Sam Block, a worker from the Student Nonviolent Coordina­

ting Committee (SNCC) said. Several workers have been arrested, and

fourteen, jailed Tuesday, March 31, when they disobeyed police orders

to limit their picketing to one side of the Leflore County Courthouse,

are still in jail.

They have vowed to remain behind bars "until the United States De­

partment of Justice acts to secure our release and to insure that fur­

ther, arrests and harrassments do not occur."

SNCC Chairman John Lewis has called upon the Department of Justice

to arrest police officers who "intimidate, harrass and arrest Negroes who want to vote."

Lewis said the government had the power to make arrests when voter

registration activity is tampered with under the United States Code.

SNCC has been conducting a voter registration drive here since

August, 1962.

In 1960, only 472 Negroes were registered to vote in Leflore County,

according to tho United States Civil Rights Commission's report on Vo­

ting.

Ministers from the National Council of Churches arc in Greenwood to help SNCC workers organize the community.

SNCC has initiated a "One Man - One Vote" campaign in this state

and throughout the South calling for an end to literacy requirements as a bar to voting. -30- NEWS RELEASE # 34 STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 6 RAYMOND STREET, N. W. ATLANTA, GEORGIA 30314 LITTLE ROCK SCHOOL BOYCOTT POSTPONED LITTLE ROCK, ARKANSAS, APRIL 3, 1964 - Negro leaders here have "indef­ initely postponed" the first Southern anti-segregation school boycott set for April 6.

The boycott was halted when the Little Rock School 3oard conceded xtfith a five-point agreement.

The boycott had been called by the Council on Community Affairs and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) to protest "tokensism" in school desegregation here. According to spokesmen for the Council, the boycott was called off "pending the fulfillment of the Board's statement." Among the agreements reached by the Board's majority vote was the promise that all pupils in a given school would be eligible for activi­ ties and organizations without racial qualifications and that applicants for "central administrative" positions would be selected without regard to race. The Board also agreed to recruit Negroes for vacancies in ad­ ministrative positions. "All phases of instruction" in Little R.ock vo = cational schools will be conducted on a desegregated basis, the Board said.

Spokesmen for the Council and SNCC maintain the boycott may be re­ called if the agreements are not implemented. Fewer than 2% of Little Rock's Negro public school pupils now attend classes with white children. The school system was first inte­ grated by court order and troops in 1957.

The school stay-out protest would have marked the first boycott protesting school segregation in the South. School boycotts have been held in New York; Boston; Cambridge, Maryland; Chicabo; Chester, Penn­ sylvania; St. Louis, Missouri; and Washington, D. C. SNCC was invited into Arkansas by local community groups in the winter of 1962, and has conducted voter registration and direct action campaigns in Little Rock, Pine Bluff, Helena and Star City since then. -30- SEWS RELEASE 9 69 STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 6 RAYMOND STREET, N. W. July 28, 1964 ATLANTA, GEORGIA 30314

SNCC WORKER SUES WALLACE FOR $2 00,000

MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA - A white Student Nonviolent Coordinating Comm­

ittee (SNCC) field secretary has filed a suit in federal court seeking

$200,000 in damages against Alabama Governor George Wallace.

IO naiked in the suit, filed July 23 by SNCC staff memben: Rob­ ert Zellner, /re Alabama Ptiblic Safety Director Al Lingo, Circuit

Tii7»y vsur^j am Thetfords former Deputy Solicitor Maury Smith, Montgomery -eitry Recorder D. Eugene Loe, Detective Jack Snows and state investiga­

tor Willie Painter.

In his suit, Zellner charges them with false arrest and mali­ cious prosecution. He xjas arrested January 8, 1963 on "vagrancy" charges, while visiting the campus of Huntingdon College, his alma ma­ ter. Zellner said in his suit he was visiting "old friends and

acquaintances" on the college campus when Painter and Lingo pulled up and placed him under arrest.

He was charged with "vagrancy" and sentenced to 30 days in jail.

The charge was dropped when he appealed his conviction to the Circuit

Court.

Thetford, then circuit solicitor, and Smith then prosecuted

Zellner on charges of "false pretenses." He was charged with giving an $85 check to a Montgomery pawnshop to purchase a camera when he didn't have enough money in his Atlanta bank to cover the check. He was bound over to a county court and indicted by a grand jury. The case ended in a mistrial. -30- 3TATE COURTS TO HEAR ALABAMA FREEDOM WALKER CASES

NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA - The United States Fifth Circuit Court of

Appeals has upheld a District Judge's decision to let Alabama courts have a first chance at trying ten Negro and white "Freedom Walkers" arrested after they crcpsad the Georgia - Alabama state line last year In an order handed down July 21, the court affirmed U. S. Judge Frank Johnson's decision in a case involving Student Nonviolent Coor­ dinating Committee (SNCC) field secretary Robert Zellner. Zellner, four other whites and five Negroes, were arrested on breach of the peace charges when they crossed the Georgia line into Alabama May 3.

The group, composed of SNCC and CORE workers, was retracing the route taken by white Baltimore postman William Moore, slain near At- talla, Alabama on April 23, 1963 while he was walking from Chattanoo­ ga to Jackson, Mississippi. His murderer is still at large.

The marchers were convicted in state court and fined $200 each. After spending 30 days in jail - most on death row at Alabama's Kilby prison - they appealed their convictions and were released on bail. -30- NEWS' RELEASE _ -> — {jUf£] S TU D E N T - N ON VIOLENT C 0 0 R D IN A f IN G .COMMITTEE -6 RAYMOND STREET, N, W. - ATLANTA, GEORGIA 30314

WASHINGTON, D. C. - The Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating

Committee (SNCC) has asked the federal government to "protect the lives

and welfare" of voter registration workers and local citizens in Mississ­

ippi after the discovery Tuesday afternoon (August 4) of three bodies

(tentatively) identified as three civil rights workers missing since June

21. -; T" -

The three - Mickey Schwerner, 24, a CORE worker, and Andrew Good-

nan, 20, a summer volunteer, both white from New York city, and James Cheney,

21, Negro, from Meridian, Mississippi - were last seen alive by Philadel­

phia Sheriff Lawrence Rainey who jailed them on a speeding charge June 21.

Rainey said later he held the youth's for four hours, collected a fine, and

turned them loose. Their charred and burned station wagon was discovered 16 miles north of Philadelphia June 22.

Ray Moore, Special agent in charge of the FBI office in Jackson said the three bodies were being moved from a grave in a dam on a farm six miles southwest of Philadelphia between Routes 21 and 48 to the Univ­ ersity Hospital in Jackson where "competent physicians" would determine the cause of death. ~

FBI- Agent Neil Welsh in Meridian said a party of FBI agents discov­ ered the bodies while searching a thick wooded area. Special Agent Moore said the site was "a dam our boys had seen the first time over on the search and I guess when they went back through they sax^ no uater in the thing and said 'Well, let's take a look.'"

The text of Lewis' statement follows:

v^ Now we know without a dotibt that Mickey Schwerner, James Cheney and AndJfcrG-oodman, three brave and courageous freedom fighters have been murdered by sick men who are victims of a vicious and evil system. No American of good conscience can rest until the murderer or murderers are apprehended and brought to justice for this barbarous act. The federal government can wno longer afford to remain aloof while unprotected students and local citizens try to insure constitutional rights that never should have been' denied. America is burning its own cross on the graves of its children be­ cause it has not taken the responsibility for enforcing the democratic way of life. Apathy and noncommittnent by American citizens has produced and per­ petuated the lawless climate which persists in Mississippi. Mississippi is not a foreign country. ~ •---._ v Therefore we deman that there be massive federal intervention in the state of Mississippi to protect the lives and welfare of voter registra­ tion workers and the citizens of Mississippi. -3 0- ' ' "" SOU \\r~ i^JUi

SOUTHWEST GEORGIA SNCC. NEWSLETTER- . . "-? —^S^S&i^ 2?9| S, Jackson St. . 28 Feb. 1965 .'' H (* ""*• ^8** Albany, Georgia C >~ *? .•*-:'' - It's beqn -a long, time since .our last newsletter, mhd a lot has happened. '

Last summer began with an expansion into the whole 2nd .Congressional District—20' counties in all, about .5000. squafce miles -,-with pur: staff bf;.,25. based in -seven ';, cities. Our purpose wAs to begin some: district~x;ids political organization using Attorney'C.B. King's candidacy fpr Congress"as a,vehicle. •••;• •;-,' ,; \

'We didn't have enough people . or ,-v money,t yet',, somehow ,ln .the ; 10-, days before, the. books closed we were able tQ -y«l^4^*®^?"'^?CpljCI ^ei^i#*^^i^sJ^^^^g figure—since, very few of that number, were in'Albahy, but">rere;Aii.areas.where there,had been little;signi­ ficant voter registration io'ftbiS \pfetj|';fiae ""to;v«^^f|'6_unide4v%4jC' of. white reprisal.

There was.^steady-harrasgment. Hick Momeyer and,.Herraan Kitchens 5were s&ot at. , John Perd'ew was beaten twice, once by amqb,'-,ohce'':'inside. the ;Sumter County cpurthpuse, and be was Jailed,twice.' ; Grarfam^'Wlgplns-wis .beaten .and almost st*ranglpd by; a jus­ tice of the peace while in tree ^mi6i*;po^-c6*^"w^is©^ ;0n* numerous 'occasions our workers were picked up fpr •questioning or charged^with violations they didn't' . commit.-. r:; ",. '';.• '•/:•. >',..'"'"".'' .,, ','."•'.'.'-.••' '..• *& > • •• In the Primary, Attorney. King' came in ath out of' 6 candidates, with 8200 votes,-or one-sixth of "the total vote cast. We, have' reason to believe the.•-yote -should haver. been much higher. Poll watchers were,made,tg>\leave the polls; vote count'watchers, in;some cases, were not allowed,,.tp.wa'teli" the .counting.; many -people who. were regis­ r tered ..were. tpld. that their names weren t:on the'list. One poll watcher,, before she was made" to1 leave,- overheard" some,, people' being /turned iaway because, they couldn' t give an .answer tp the questipn, "Who 'did you vote for- in .th,e. last election?"'.;.. In ... several counties''the" polls were segregated. " '•] ' ;'*''''

We are convinced, that .'the., campaign was quite successful,., however. Attorney'King.; ' ., raised; solid is sup sVsuch as) exp^,hding the minimum wage tp cover agricultural and/,'; ' domestic' workers", magslve federal stidTto education,. & income tax reform.. He spoke*,. •'•» clearly to the facts',of .poverty in -the.;white, community, and the use ;tha£ politi-.'fl cians make''Br racist' propaganda to. hide the fact that whites' and Negroes in SW', ,t Georgia have exactly the same problems, 500 whites voted"fpr Atty..King,"in the.- -Primary.-'-a,.significant response. And most important, for the first time^.a ppli<- tical, organizatipn .has been formed.wlth representation from every; county ..in thet - Second""District,. ..;•-.,- ' .. } .,..-'--" f: :;- ' V. .• -.', •;*'•; ;'-; ,;:. " ':; -''. •JBBBHHHHBHHHHHS* " '.' , . ."".•;'':,.':' '% % ,,''• Much' to-our'-surprise, when the Civil Rights Bill was passed nearly'- every place of • public acepmmodation in Albany desegregated without incident. However£ in Americus, kO miles to the North, there were .near-riots, beatings,'and two weeks of white night- • riding,'shooting, and'vandalism resulting from the .attempt to desegregate a local.- movie* house.,, In the. rest of SW Georgia we estimate that most of the public" acepm- mPdations have nott desegregated .•. No changes have taken place in employment and '."• '.housing. '-- , • .''.:• •' ';•", ,:•- '',-. '- •'"-* •'.-.• . ,'"' .',.1 •••) ';; •'" :."••,.. . - • -..,.., ^ fl-:\l ,. In Albany,- the- firist* .second', and twelfth grades have, been reluctantly ihtegfatedy , Six Negro girls .are'now: attending Albany High and are doing well, scholastically. Their morale-is high in spite of harr'ass.ment from students (it. has tapered off a li^le-as ^ the year has/.progressed, fortunately, , though, on one. occasipnj-ttib football team surrounded1 them'.and began to-pelt them with.'? od'a bottles. The school board

. >'• •,;?:,, '••>. ,•; - • - .;:*.• v^ ?*; '*:.'. ,T. in Americus integrated the schools voluntarily this fall. So far, only a handful of high-school students have transferred to white schools* -JBBBBBX-5BBBBBBBB(- In August, the sixth incident of police brutality in a year's time occurred. An unarmed Negro man was shotgunned in the back from almost pointblank range, killing him. ^bat night, after a mass meeting that ended with a group going to City Hall to present a letter of protest, people in the Negro business distii.cl. (Harlem) smashed windows of white-owned stores, stoned cars driven by whites, 'and ijyrftfed in false alarms. For several weeks, Harlem appeared to be occupied by an army., Policeman with riot-guns and helmets walked in groups of four and six. Businesses were or­ dered closed at night. Harlem was sealed off every night during the week before the funeral, forcing people to come to rass meetings on foot in small groups on?7., At times a wave of 30 to ItO officers, shoulder to shoulder, would sweep t-hfcB!g*i Hcrlem forcing every person off the street. The officer who committed the brutalxcy has never been disciplined or suspended, and he is still on active duty. During this time the police attempted to put our two most active King-gor-Congress Campaign workers out of circulation by blaming them for the rioting. Donald Harris, project director, and Rev. Samuel Wells, a local minister, were charged with in­ surrection, a capitol offense in Georgia. In an attempt to quiet things, the Albany Police Department gave in a little and hired six Negro police (2 per 8-hr. shift) to patrol the two-block Harlem business district. ihey can arrest whites in that area, which is almost unheard of in the DeepSouth. •JBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBf- Since October, the insurrection statutes have been ruled unconstitutional, and so the state was forced to drop the cases. Don Harris went to Africa to help establish ties with the freedom movements there, and then left to go back to law school. Roy Shields, who had been working in Cordele, was elected to take his place.

At present, we're running projects in six counties, in Albany, Americus, Cuthbert, Cordele, Ocilla, and Moultrie. John Perdew married Amanda Bowen of Americus, and they're working in Atlanta. That leaves us only fourteen people and 2 cars (l wreck) and no money (Albany phones disconnected again, no heat; no water in Cuthbert; lights off for two months in Moultrie), to cover some 1*0 counties in two districts. Nevertheless we have hope. In Ocilla, they've staged a successful desegregation campaign on the only laundromat in town, though John Washington was beaten by whites and arrested in the attempt. Judy Richardson has set up a Freedom School (or Freedom Discussion Group) in Cordele, for older teens to come every Wednesday and discuss their problems and the problems of the South. In Albany, Wendy Roberts (who was Wendy Mann when she worked for SNCC) is helping, with the Albany Movement, to set up a combined Community Center-nursery school-library, which will also train people to operate such centers all over Geor­ gia. We've got a roomful ofbooks i» the new offices at 22QJ South Jackson St. which we will give them, along with another 30 cartons from the Park Avenue Synagogue in NYC. We still need more books for libraries out in the counties, though.'

Charles Sherrod stopped by after the SNCC staff meeting in Atlanta and suggested we work on filling the white schools with Negro pupils this fall. Because of the way the court order in Albany is worded, those pupils closest to the school, whether Negro or white, receive first priority on going to that school, so since, there is a hodge-podge of Negro and white neighborhoods, and since many white kids bus in from the county, if we can get enough Negro kids into each white school, we can force the board to send some white kids to Negro schools, which should make them upgrade all schools, for once. And maybe we can finally get something other than just token desegregation. Registration deadline is April 1st, so we're going to have to work fast. Mama Dollie is working on a committee to talk to all the parents of kids in grades 1-k and 11-?12, '.which will be affected next year. We're going to be hitting all PTAs in the area, and canvassing daily, • ,. ,

The biggest event in SWGa* lately has. been th§; school boycott in Moultrie, Colquitt County, William Bryant High,, the Negro school, lost its accreditation!; $ df lis--... .t buildings were sub-standard or condemned; 750 students were crammed "'nho spac5* :'.'or 500; only enough books for 600 students were provided, and only 60n Isiks, ti .;-.-..... were too few teachers, and poorly-qualified; when it rains, the campus is on*, r-.rge sea of mud, , It's, obvious the'school is grossly inadequate. 0n,F'e:r 3> tfjte ,st vie its spontaneously started" a boycott.".' The' next day they marched on the -.-ourthous"., --non sat in at the school, The cops dragged 60 out by the. arms, by. the legs, and ty^ljas heads, and took them to jail, '^he next day the students marched again.,. . The a-u;lts had been forced by their kids' actions to organize a Moultrie Movement*." They .-.'";" negotiated, and secured the release of all 60 with all charges dropped..:

The kids continued marching-and demonstrating. On three successive dayse they de­ manded applications for transfer to the white school, the, only adequate one ir.. ivewn. They were turned back by city and county cops, the GBI, and the "Blue Angels1'- (the haad-beating•shack, troops of the state police). ihen the school superintendent., threatened arrest "of parents of kids under 16, because "they were violating th,e " r Georgia truancy law. The parents and kids kept on with non-violent demonstrations. In three dayse, 3-80 parents and students (and about half.the SNCCers) were arrested/ They swamped all the jails of three counties. The President's Community Relations Service, the Georgia Council on Human Rights, the Moultrie Movement, and the Moultrie-Colquitt County School Board and the City Manager held almost continuous conferences, and an agreement, with specified dates of completion, was worked out. The board was also forced to.file a plan for desegregation of two grades by next fall, A.tty. King, is going to try to get total 12-grade desegregation, and he thinks the prospects are good, because the court must see that Bryant High is no good, After four or five days, everyone was released with charges dropped, which was one of the conditions of the agreement. The kids went back to school on Washington's Birthday, but if their school isn't reaccredited by April they're ready to march.

The s tudents have seen the significance: that it is possible for people working together,, even if they have no political power individually, to bring things to a grinding halt until they get that which is their right as citizens. What their parents had been unable to accomplish in ten years by going through the South's i:. "regular channels", they got in three weeks. "•'•' ""•' - .-—•

That's about it. Sometimes we don't seem to be accomplishing anything, but then along comes something like Moultrie to give us all hope. It may -be. slow, but- as long as the kids are unafraid we'll keep moving on. Freedom, the •Southwest Georgia SNCC staff, Fred Anerson Sammy Mahone Joyce Barrett Jim Parry Randy Battle William. Porter ' .Rev. Fullwood Willie Ricks •Stu Goldberg - . Roy Shields 'Herman Kitchens Isaac Simpklns ...Grady• Little , .- John "Cooley" Washington. Ramona-Lockett k WE NEED YOUR HELP 11 We need groups to adopt our projects, freedom s'Chools, and libraries by pledging funds to keep them running. We also need physical equipment listed below. Send shipments directly to 22Qi S. Jackson St., Albany (Please send prepaid, be­ cause we don't have any money to bail out collect shipments).

Books desparate need for books of Negro history and literature, especially unlir."' t:;1 copies of Langs ton Hughes' Pictorial History of the Negro in Ameri:./ , Good children's stories (like the Little ^olden Books or Dr. Seuss~J Good paperbacks, dictionaries, encyclopedias. Recent, up-to-date textbooks Subscriptions to magazines (Time, Life, Nation, New Republic, Saturday Fe--:-:•--,•'., NY Times daily and Sunday, etc.) (The community center in Albany could probably use subscription; :-.o. For more information, write Mrs. Wendy Roberts, c/o Attorney Ci; -,i.ng, PO Box 102U, Albany, Georgia)

Office Supplies (no quantities given, since we can use as much as is" availabL>s) working office typewriters (not portables, if possible) 1 good offset press huge quantites of mimeograph paper (this newsletter alone used two full reams) metal file cabinets desks office chairs (having a proper number of legs—not more than 300 years old) typing tables. mimeograph machines, manual or electric (the Negro community in -^mericus how prints several thousand copies of the Voice of Americus on a broken-down old hand mimeograph) carbon paper staplers and staples desk lamps mimeo stencils- envelopes rubber bands, paper clips, thumbtacks, tape, magic markers, etc.

Freedom Schools-Libraries 1 16 mm movie proiector and screen films portable blackboards, chalk,erasers working tape recorders and tape General needs This summer SNCC is planning on moving into all the Black Belt counties in the Deep South. The KKK and its sympathizers rule many of these counties still, •'•o prevent repetition of last summer's murders, we need to keep in touch with each other at all times. This means that we need to have citizen's band radios in­ stalled in our cars (assuming we get some cars), and at the project offices. These installations have been proven to be of incalculable value, but they cost upwards of $200 per unit. We don't have the money now to put them in, but we've got to have them. (Neither the police nor any other group can make you disappear completely, as they did with Chaney, Schwerner, and Goodman, if you're constantly in touch with your home base. It is for this reason that they are so important to have). SNCC SUMMER PROGRAM April 1965 The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee program for the summer of 1965 is generally one of expansion in the rural South. SNGC will, continue political work in the black belt counties of Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama and Georgia with the emphasis on building organizations so local leadership can emerge. The organizing efforts will include voter regis­ tration, testing of the 1965 voting bill, political education, freedom schools, and a special "Washington lobby" in support of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party challenge and free elections in the South. SNCC believes that local people should be able to make decisions about their own lives. Thus, a series of People's Conferences will be held in Alabama, Georgia, Arkansas and Mississippi. These meetings will bring together people from across each, state to share movement experiences and hold workshops on their problems. The meetings are also designed to provide local people with a forum where they can shape and direct programs, for the movement. SNCC then stands ready to provide field organizers, volunteers and other materials so that their expressed needs may be met.

WASHINGTON LOBBY Recognizing the importance and validity of .the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party challenge to unseat the five Congress­ men from Mississippi, SNCC feels that a concentrated three week "action" program in Washington, D.C. is essential to the success of.the challenge. It is also important that lobby activity be planned which forces national recognition of the need for new and free elections in the South. SNCC believes that the 1965 voting bill will not be meaningful unless it contains a provision requiring each state and its political sub­ divisions to hold new elections six to nine months after a federal registrar is appointed to alleviate discrimination in voter registration, 1,-000 students are now being recruited to work in Washington, D.C. from June 23 to June 23 and from June 2b, to July ij.. During each of these ten day sessions, sTiulIerh"ts~T7ill lobTry"'Congressmen after receiving instructions on lobbying techniques and information on the MFDP challenge. Volunteers :•• will evaluate their efforts sach day and will attempt to determine the. Congressman's position, whether further lobby­ ing is needed and whether people should return home to mobilize additional support in the home district. As work continues on the challenge, students will also be undergoing orientation for work in the South. This will include Negro history, freedom school workshops, discussions of community organizing, sessions on the political, social page 2 SNCC SUMMER PROGRAM

and economic structures in the outh, and on nonviolence and Soutr^rn law enforcement procedures. Some students will be assigned to work in the South if local people request volunteers. ARKANSAS The Arkansas SNCC staff is planning a summer program under local leadership supplemented by 50 to 100 volunteers. Political organizing will be done in 31 Arkansas counties.""A Freedom Center program will be implemented, in'rour cities: Pine Biuff, Little Rock, Helena and Forrest City. Classes will be held for young people and ddults on voter registration, political issues, Negro history, literacy and various skills. Community meetings will shape the growth of independent political organizations. The project will run from June 1 to September 1. MISSISSIPPI SNCC will work with the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party's summer program. Some 300 volunteers and 500 SNCC, MFDP and COFO staff members will do intensive political^ organizing^ The program will include holding workshops on political questions, building block clubs and strengthening FDP county organizations. The most important task will be to create an atmosphere where local people can develop leader­ ship skills. ALABAMA

Expansion will also occur in the AiaDama black belt. 35. SNCC staff workers are presently organizing in ten counties and by the end of the summer local movements should be active in ttoiple that number. The emphasis will be on opening up areas for further work, on the People's Conference, and as well on building organizations which are run by local people. J)\ SOUTHWEST GEORGIA \)A Organizing efforts will continue in this, SNCC's oldest : J~\ project area and new ground will be broken in adjoining counties, \ Economic, as well as political, organizing will take place. Programs similar to the development of a maid's union in Americus last summer will continue. A People's Conference will be held in May. MARYLAND - EASTERN SHORE The SNCC staff on the Eastern shore, in conjunction with the Cambridge Nonviolent Action Committee, will intensify organizing efforts on the Maryland Eastern Shore. 15^20 volunte_£J2s_are being recruited for work on federal programs, employment opportunities and political organizing. Further information on all these programs may be obtained by writing: SNCC, 6 Raymond St., NW, Atlanta lLj., Georgia re1 UJMJVIER S£J\V VJJII 0?POKTUMrr ' "FOP. YOUTH

Cy O nr\.P i I fe.CA . DM*

loortK or 1-W \X vv,Ta/io.«o_ LAv\, vc?V C_Yx>4_v eta* VETERANS ADMINISTRATION: BELOW is A LIST OF SUMMER SERVICE OPPOR­ TIONS AND LOANS OF ANY OFFICE MACHINES WILL TUNITIES FOR THE YOUNG PEOPLE OF GREATER SAME PROGRAM AS THE MEDICAL CENTER. BE GREATLY APPRECIATED. INCIDENTALLY, MEMBER CONTACT: LITTLE ROCK, THESE ORGANIZATIONS ARE GIVING 1 SHIP IN THE NAACP IS OPEN TO ANY LITTLE YOUTH THE CHANCE TO PERFORM VITAL SERVICES VOLUNTEER OFFICE, VETERAN ADMIN­ ROCK HIGH SCHOOL OR COLLEGE STUDENT. TO THEIR COMMUNITY. WE REALIZE THAT THERE ISTRATION, FR 4-3331, EXT. 2U7 CONTACT; MAY BE OTHER SERVICES THAT YOUNG PEOPLE MRS. FOSTER MORRIS THOMPSON CAN PERFORM, BUT THE OPENINGS LISTED HERE MO 3-1359 ARKA NSAS EN TERP RISES FOR TH E BLIND WERE THE MOST WILLING TO HAVE YOUTH VOLUN­ V TEERS. OLUNTEE RS 0 F ALL AGES A RE NEEDED STUDENT NON-VIO LENT CO-ORDINATING COMMITTEE IN T HE PROG RAM OF THE SOUTH WEST REHA; SNCC NEECS s TUDENTS TO CANVASS AREAS OF HOSPITAL VOLUNTEER PROGRAMS B I LITATIO N CENT ER. TH E FOLL OWING JOBS PULASKI COUNTY, ENCOURAGING VOTER REGtSTRA" CAN BE DONE BY VOLUNT EERS : READING, TI ON AND EXPLAI NING THE NEW VOTER REGISTRATION UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS MEDICAL CENTER: TAPE -RECORD I NG, TYPIN G RESE ARCH PAPERS TION LAWS. YOUN G PEOPLE WITH CARS ARE NEEDED TO HLGH-SCHOOL AGE VOLUNTEERS CAN DO CLER­ TEAC HING AM ATEU R RAD1 0; TEA CHING SWIM~ TO PROVIDE TRAN SPORTATION TO THE DEPUTY CL ICAL WORK, READ AND TALK TO PATIENTS, DIS~ MI NG , BOWL IN G , SKATI NG , DAN CING; AS- CLERKS OFFICE F OR THOSE WITHOUT CARS. As MEDICINE AND SUPPLIES. AND ASSIST IN SOME SIST ING AT PICN ICS . A LSO , V OLUNTEERS THERE ARE NOW N 0 REGISTERED VOTERS IN AR«AN~ LAB WORK(NOT RESEARCH). WITH CARS A RE N EEOED TO PRO VIDE TRANS~ SAS, THIS SERVt CE WILL BE VALUABLE IN EN~ QUALIFICATIONS: PORT ATION T 0 VA Rt OUS POt NTS I N THE COURAGING THE P EOPLE OF THE STATE TO TAKE A A STUDENT MUST BE FIFTEEN YEARS OF AGE CI TY PART 1N THEIR G OVERNMENT. OR OLDER AND WILLING TO DEVOTE SOME TIME CONTACT: EACH WEEK TO THIS SERVICE. ANTI-POVERTY PROGRAM JIM JONES CONTACT: OPERATION HEADSTART WILL NEED YOUNG •" BILL HANSE N VOLUNTEER OFFICE, MRS. PHILIPS, EXT. PEOPLE AS ASSISTANTS, BUT NO DEFINITE NANCN vY STOL LER PROGRAM HAS YET BEEN SET UP. WATCH Y . sW WEST NINTH FR 5-9031 U6g, YOUR NEWSPAPERS. ^poo U OF A MEDICAL CENTER, MOg-9^61 BOY'S CLUBS ARKANSAS BAPTIST HOSPITAL: URBAN LEAGUE" J< : HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGE STUDENTS DUNBAR AND SOUTH END BQY'S CLUBS CAN USE V STUDENTS MAY PERFORM THE SERVICES LISTED N ARE NEEDED FOR TUTORING, ORGANIZING ,- VOLUNTEERS TO TEACH AND SUPERVISE GAMES, "'. ABOVE AS WELL AS WORK IN THE LIBRARY. TEACH ARTS AND CRAFTS, AND SUPERVISE PLAY­ QjJALlFICATIONSi AND COACHING BASEBALL TEAMS, CLEARING AND OPERATING RECREATIONAL AREAS. GROUND ACTIVITIES. FIFTEEN OR GOING INTO THE TENTH GRADE. CONTACT: CONTACT: CONTACT: GEORGE I . HENRY SOUTH END BOYS CLUB VOLUNTEER OFFICE, ARK. BAPTIST HOSPITAL WILLIAM THRASHER FRU-3351 914 GAINES FR il-03^-9 FR h-$kok ST. VINCENT'S INFIRMARY; NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE ADVANCE­ DUNBAR BOY'S CLUD SAME PROGRAM AS THE MEDICAL CENTER MENT OF COLORED PEOPLE ( YOUTH CHAPTER., FR 6-1637 CONTACT: . . STUDENTS ARE NEEDED TO INSTRUCT MRS. EDWINA TAYLOR, ST. VINCENT S IN­ NEGROES IN THE USE OF TYPEWRITERS AND FIRMARY, MO II-U261 OTHER BUSINESS MACHINES. ALSO, DONA­ . O.W*. •e. AtO U-^Ho (* ARKANSAS STATEWIDE FREEDOM Meeting

FERNCLIFF CAMP

SMIIUT - ail a The State of Arkansas ranks fourty-ninth in per capita income in the United States. This You Can means that the people of Arkansas have less money to spend than the people of any state with WHAT YOU CAN DO.. the exception of one. These figures include all the people of the state...both black and white. Change As is true everywhere in this country, the Negro people are the poorest. These are some figures MEET. taken from the United States Census Report that describe just how bad things are in the State of Arkansas. In phi,jj.p5 pnnty (Mp'ena) 44% of the Kegro workers make less than $500 a_vear and This meeting is being called so that Arkansas 82% make less than $1500 a year. In Jefferson County (Pine Bluff) where Negroes are considered the Negro people in the State of Arkansas to make more money than in most parts of the state, 39% of the Negro workers make less than can come together to talk about the prob­ $500 a yeltTand~^fo% make less than $1500 a year. In Uocaln^County (Star CityJJiQ%of the lems that they face in their community and Negro workers make less than $500 a year_jnjy&%jiakejess than $1500a vjar^Jn^St. Francis to plan ways to bring about a change. At County" (Forrest City) 50% of the Negroworkers make less than $500 a year and 88% make less this meeting you *vill be talking and plan­ than $1500 a year. ning with other people like yourself about how Negroes can get together in a state­ wide effort to eliminate racial segregation , injustice, poverty, and unemployment from the State of Arkansas. Whtt Will Ferncliff Gain? Fertdale, Arkansas His Future (18 Miles vest if Little lick)

We will be at Ferncliff Camp from Be? Saturday morning (May 22) until Sunday afternoon (May 23). There will be time set aside for small groups to meet and talk. A few large meetings have also been planned. On Saturday night, James Forman of Atlanta, Georgia, the Executive Secretary of the There are almost one half mi I firm Npnrnps in Arkan^c Negroes make up a little over one Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, quarter of the total population j>f the state. In many counties in the state there aremore Negroes, will speak. On Sunday morning, after re­ than there are whites^ Phillips County is 58% Negro; Lej_County is 61% NegroTltTFrancis is ligious services, we-will come together and 57% Negro; Crittenden County is 59% Negro. In none of these counties or any of the other coun­ plan what we can do when we return home. ties that have large Negro populations are you making laws and deciding how your tax money is being spent. This is because Negroes in Arkansas aren't organized. If you are organized and voting together you can accomplish many things. If you are organized and voting you can get better jobs; you can get better housing; you can build better schools for your children to attend. This -is because YOU will be making the laws. In Pine Bluff Negroes are starting to show the Food and housing will be provided for power of their vote. In the Dollarway School District, which includes a large part of Pine Bluff, all people attending the meeting. a Negro, Arthur Miller, was elected to the School Board last September. These and more impor­ tant offices around the state can be filled by Negroes if you are willing to get together, organize, and then vote. THESE CANDIDATES WERE UNSUCCESSFUL BUT THEY MIGHT WIN THE NEXT TIME „ (^ Rev. J.D. Alexander . James A. Bags by Mrs. Florence Clay. William Green O^Rev . Ben Grinage City Council / / State Legislature Congress • State Legislature State Legislature West Helena Jefferson County First District Lincoln County Jefferson County SNCC IN ARKANSAS

POVERTY IN ARKANSAS The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) came into Arkansas io late 1962. Since that time it has been in­ strumental in integrating the lunch counters, theaters, hotels and motels in Little Rock and Pine Bluff. It has organized voter registration drives in Pine Bluff, Helena West Helena. Forrest City, and Lincoln TO REFUSE County. In November 1963 it organized the campaign of DR. W.L.Molette for City Coun­ tock To cil in Pine Bluff. In September of 1964 it organized the campaigns of James Bags by rST) and Rev. Ben Grinage for the State Legis-*"* lature from Jefferson County and William Green from Lincoln County. It also ran the campaign of Rev, j, D Alexander for the O West Helena City* Council" SNCC has organized the Pine Bluff Movement, the Westside Voters League in P\rWar\sa5 West Helena, the St. Francis County Devel­ opment Committee in Forrest City, and worked with the Lincoln County Civics Club. YOU SNCC For further information- Can Help Write or Call: James 0 Jones Rev. Ben Grinage Little Rock Office: Pine Bluff Office: 700 West Ninth Street 2006 West Ninth Street Change It Little Rock, Arkansas Pine Bluff, Arkansas FR 5-9081 JE 5-4436

Stanley Tillman SNCC is committed to working toward Howard Himmelbaum die day when all the people of Arkaoj Jerry Casey West Helena Office': can have a say about who mak^s—theiaws Forrest City Office; 528 Plaza (Ladino) Street and who raas their In c/o Clay's Funeral Home West Helena, Arkansas 116 N. Waters Street JU 5-3705 Forrest City, Arkansas ME 3-9787 ME 3-9759 ARKANSAS SUMMER PROJECT WHAT IS THE WHAT HAS BEEN DONE? SUMMER PROJECT? Voter Hegistration has nearly doubled in the communities in which SNCC has worked. Negroes are becoming aware of their potential power. For example, in Pine Bluff, Arthur jtfiller, of AAN College, was successful in his race for the Dollarway School Board. The The Student Nonviolent Coordinating percentage of Negroes in south and eastern Arkansas ranges from Committee (SNCC) has been trying to Z$% to 61%. Negro college students can help in organizing commun­ get the Negro people of Arkansas or­ ities in these areas. ganized and registered to vote so that they can have something to say about what happens in Arkansas.

This summer SNCC wants to get every eligible Negro in Arkansas registered, ARKANSAS

SNCC also plans to set up Freedom Centers in several towns where people can come together to talk about their NEEDS problems, to learn about possible so­ lutions, and to make plans for solv­ ing these problems. YOU

Freedom Centers will also provide re­ creational and educational opportuni­ ties for children and teenagers. You will be bringing people in these communities together to Possible discussion topics in Freedom talk about their needs and to plan with them ways of Schools ares What YOU securing these needs. African Culture You will be explaining to them the new voter registration amendment. You will be encouraging them to register. Negro History You will be explaining to them what they can do with will their vote once they are registered. Current Events If You have any special talents or interests such as arts and crafts or music, the Freedom Schools need you. be doing You will be working long hours for little money but a great deal of satisfaction. You will be living and working with people in their day to day struggle to make their community a better place to live. why a

Name voter registration

Address drive now ? Please send more information.

Please send an application,

Mail to: Last November 3 the people of SNCC Arkansas passed Amendment S>1 700 West 9th St. which provides for a new voter Little'Rock registration system! ra-5-9081 No poll tax. Feel free to call or drop in at any of the offices i You register only once for all elections. SNCC 2006 lest 9th St. V You must register 20 days Pine Bluff before an election in which JE-5-UU36 you want to vote.

The County Clerk is the new SNCC registrar. 528 Ladino lest Helena To qualifyi JU-5-370S 1. You must be 21 years old. SNCC 2. You must live in Ark­ 116 N. laters St. ansas 1 year, your Forrest City county 6 months, and i*E-3-9767 your precinct 1 month. ME-3-9759 V No literacy test or other requirements. USSISSffPi ARS, iiiiifi (fixcetp® from a SbKJC .-jR'e^eArcfc R#ett|- ''lsJstive",c*i?ipBigttSi;: $ijd |»,,fa^..;Seems to •Siat •*&,&. Carmfc is;., an er#loyie'«f «be The political and eeonoaic power of the : men whr. yur, ai profit! r >.r*S? ..-p. Roebuck function &S an. unofficial legislature itself, ilMaois-- Ceaa-»l< Raifroa&'^jtted £6 teUr'- St Co, and the Standard Oil of California with delegates from «U counties. Ji> the •••natioftsi- Paper Corp*)& - - - Stretdt like the tentacles of an octopus deef state, When yea consider itt fee iasurafie® aad fnto Mississippi and Alabama . , . -r#*J #tsa»'''m««"ia''me"tegislfl03re^---ftow>« 'fe¥'ceijte¥efHarlem"; " :.v'Se*rjsf.AriE8#tr^ • r ever, ,$M ~ali fe» corpsr^onlawyers-sad Not only do feey employ I Isjfge <$0ak of According' to one of their officers, they represente<| te fee MEG last .year,,$tk$&). tie workers in Mississippi, but they ajso by Armstrong'.«owoJ^8r Batmer H$jl, Jr., business men, ateig with th? Legi'slware's and two other hanks hold the mortgages on extremely obliging attitude toward Standard "use their wealth JO iidK> acu the govern­ sfcnost all of the rat4hfestedswm property Who served as president and spokesman for >0U In I96i, ifs n« asfed to imagine ment ot the state AtA to perpetuate rise in Harlem, Where do they get the money the group that year lad is still a djref^r. that thir'body isite'iarge-parfc-tiJe'crea- "Way of Life** which has beaten down Ne­ to Shanes tbeir slumlord customerss from An Armstrong attorney* Oliver M,Jiorhsby tftre of the octopus, Therej are by the way, groes and poor people in the state since the fee "small depositers'* (poor people} who \ of-Natche*,- served'..as. dfrector frsp.1963 it teSst- ^3 Cid^en's Cduneii members first planters <&me tw^-bandredveersago, contribute most of the money 'in ffie bank's to 196S. B,F» Ritchie $ Natchez aad a "serving k the L^islsture .., • * ^tsftdard: Ott -of C^tiforhia headquarters Harlem branches. In other words, Crandaii director of the intfrnatton*! Paper Co. The point to this aaslysis is feat corpora- ^Siif' PfaacSseo), one' of the' "five Standard and his friends are taking the money of poor interlocking directorates with Sears and doas (specifically S^rs, Roebuck ftCevand Oil companies--, ia the U,S„ If-fba I3ds people and giving it to slumlords,, who then Standard QM), haf served as ft director of Staadard Oil of CaBforftia) do sot simply largest corporation lis the country, ~ with carry on the game by overcharging the poor ' MEC . , . TW -AUstatP•: biSurance/Se^rs operate factories and department stores, sales of two bilKon dollars a year,.Sears who have been,.bottleup.iggfeeir.slums, lawyers are oh the, board of fee MEC, R.H. pay wages and issue dividend cheeks, it headquarters in Chicago).!*- the' world's Crandaii and Ms friends MVe made mis a Busby, president of the Sears-controlled shouM be obvious that the fact that Sears largest Tehain of retail stores^ With sates half-blllioa dollar game... McComb Manufacturing Co., Is aa.MEC of-oyer five billion dollars ayear, stores director. There are also several oil law­ aad Standard Oil have iavested money in in aU 50. states and many foreign countries, force in politics yers and petroleum distributors ©a feeMBC Mississippi iafhseaces the politics of Miss­ and almost a quarter .of a million employees, . . . in 1961 Standard Oil offered to build b#rd»;,.'. . _ issippi. Sears aad Standard Oil, as far as a $125 million refinery in SPasSagoula if the • ;,,, At least f oqr.state legisiaeors ia Miss­ we can see, have chosen to sappert the Miss­ J)ne in Tm W&tketM state legislature would do for them the issippi are employed by tbeSears-Standard issippi Way of life, which has broken and TV men who run Sears and Standard Oil following things; let them have some 3000 combine, two of theta through feetr private degraded so many millions of poor people control the Jobs and incomes of over twelve : j acres of land set aside for school construc­ law firms* J.A, Tmgpen of Bolivar County in the state... - ^ - "*"- thoosand people ia Mississippi .who work jta tion and exempt the products ofbilrefineries is a distributor for Standard Oil: W.G. (por fee full, more detailed text of this their plants In at least 27 Mississippi towns from property taxes. Burgin's Columbus law firm represents research paper see the January 23, 1956 and cities, "These twelve thousand people WetCOoverhbr Sarnett called the Legis­ Weyerhaeuser $ied" to Standard Oil^ W.M. Issue of fee KEY LIST MAILING, a maga- make up 1C% of all factory workers in the lature into special Session at taxpayers' Smith's firm represents Sears in Natchez; ziae cf the San FrandSco SNCC office^ state. Add to these thousands the countless expense, and they obliged by approving in workers"who pump gasoline from Standard 1 one day the necessary constitutional amend­ OH pumps and s«U goods In Seari Stores ment* which the voters of the state ratified, around the state, and you see that the men and then

MONTHLY REVIEW of November, 1966, Sukarno problem has, of course, been contains an excellent analysis of why the eliminated since the article was written U.S. fights in Vietnam. The article says, and, presumably, now, American business in part: "A look, at the map of the region can exploit the hospitality of the Malaysian is enough to show the central strategic government. Thank you, CIA. Taiwan "is position of the Vietnamese 'hump' which a stable and prospering nation where juts out into the South China Sea from many American investments are finding roughly Hue in the north to Saigon in the their most profitable ventures , , . . South. Any one wanting to build up a Operating a plant on Taiwan runs into strong counter-revolutionary base, and almost no labor problems in the normal pole of attraction in that part of the world sense. Chinese workers there in many would naturally select South Vietnam as cases consider two days off a month to the locus of the effort. And the historical be progress." background of faltering French colonial­ The Japanese textile industry is highly ism provided the Americans with the developed and the primary consideration needed opening, first for their financial of the government and the industry "is and political influence and later for their to extend automation, already the domin­ military take-over .... the days of the ant factor in the bigger planes, to offset older imperialisms in Southeast Asia are rising wages . . , Japan . . . offers splen­ numbered and the only alternatives before did promise for the long haul." the region are revolution or increasing In Korea "the trend is established for an dependency on American economic and and one worker. "No attempt was made," increasingly sophisticated Korean textile military power. If the revolution could says the article, "to sabotage the plant." industry .... The domestic market is be checked, the imperial fruits would The article concludes: "Until communist small, largely because of the impoverish­ ripen and fall of their own accord." aggression is rolled back inSoudi Vietnam. ment of the countryside, and ventures in Adding a kind of premature footnote to obviously this is not a healthy locale for Korea must give major consideration to the MONTHLY REVIEW analysis was the businessmen seeking new opportunities in die re-export potential," September, 1965, issue of TEXTILE IN­ Asia." The article does not again discuss The article goes on and on, recounting DUSTRIES, a leading trade journal of the "opportunities" in South Vietnam. the benefits oj. South Asia for American U.S. textile industry. The entire issue Taking up Malaysia, A.B. Cullison, the business. An "efficient and inexpensive was devoted to articles about the inter­ article's author, comments that in that labor force" in Taiwan; a "plentiful sup­ national expansion of the U.S. industry. country "American business finds a gov­ ply of inexpensive labor" in Hong Kong; It is well worth reading throughout for ernment and commercial community "up to five years free of taxes and duties" those who are interested in understanding hospitable to new ventures." But, goes in Malaysia. the mechanics of U.S. imperialsim. How­ the Malaysian analysis, "President Su­ Tt is this sort of information, right ever, one article, "InternationalTextiles: karno, of Indonesia, is disrupting the from the horse's mouth, so to speak, Far East," is of particular interest here. internal Malaysia markets with his 'con­ which gives the lie to the beneficent The article opens with a description of frontation' pressures, attempting to use rhetoric of American statesmen and their a Viet Cong attack on a textile mill near jungle guerillas and subversion to sabotage industrialist counterparts. The real goal Saigon. The guerillas killed four guards an otherwise stable economv." The of the U.S. in South Asia is the protifable exploitation of the labor .of the people in the "underdeveloped" countries; and the profitable exploitation of the markets of those countries which are "developed." A noble goal indeed, with which the mothers and wives and children of the THE MOVEMENT 5000-odd dead American soldiers may K~om comfort themselves during the lonely years ahead. f Tc THE HlPPlSS^WMI* M DECEMBER 135S

FISH >/£7 NEWS FROM STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 360 NELSON STREET, SW ATLANTA, GEORGIA FOR RELEASE FEBRUARY 14, 1966

Slater King of the Hunter Defense Committee and John Lewis, chairman

of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, joined with Dr, Martin Luther

King today to "urge Governor Sanders to initiate an investigation of the

Hunter brother's case and of the process of jury selection in Schley County,

Georgia," The civil rights leaders questioned the "validity and legality" of

the arerest andjpending trial of Chatlie and Willie Hunter who are accused of

killing a white policeman.

Charlie Hunter allegedly shot and killed city policeman John A. Hardin last

November 13th on a dirt road about a mile outside the Ellaville City limits,

The boy said he feared that Hardin was about to kill his brother Willie, 19»

Willie is also charged with murder.

Concerned c itizens in Southwest Georgia have formed the Hunter Defense

Committee to attempt to free these youths. Slater King, president of the

Albany Movement, is chairman of the group. He said the committee hopes to

include persons in other parts of the nation who have voiced concern about

the case.

Slater King pointed out that Officer Hardin and another man stopped the

Hunter brothers on the road outside Ellaville, although the policeman's

authority did not extend beyond the city limits.

The man with Hardin was identified as Kermit O, Green, a foreman with

the Georgia Highway Department who also acts as county jailer. Sheriff

William Mareene Ellis testified at a preliminary hearing that Green had no

authority to arrest anybody anywhere. The sheriff said that Green should have

been feeding prisoners in the jail about the time that he and Hardin

stopped the Hunter brothers.

The brothers said that Willie Hunter, who was driving their car, was slow in getting out of the vehicle after it was stopped. They said the policeman then hit Willie Hunter with a club while Green held a pistol and an automatic rifle. Charlie Hunter said that ye yelled to Hardin, "Don't hit him anymore. " The boy charged that Green pushed him back into th/e car while Hardin hit his brother with the club again. /

The Hunter brothers related that Willie was lying on the ground half-conscious, and Hardin was preparing to hit him again, when Charlie grabbed the pistol from Green and shot the policeman.

The brothers were taken to the Sumter County jail in Americus, where they have been held without bond. Their family has employed C. B. King, an Albany attorney, to defend the youths.

Attorneys for the Hunter brothers are challenging the system of jury selection in

Schley County. They say it results in the exclusion of Negroes, who make up 56% of the county's population.

30- News from STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 360 Nelson Street SW Atlanta, Georgia 30313 FOR RELEASE: February 21st, 1966 688-0331 MAN FIRED FOR ANTI WAR STICKER ON CAR WEST POINT, MISSISSIPPI : A young Negro houscpainter was fired from his job today for having a "Stop the War in Vietnam" sticker on his car. Richard Boyd, 26, told workers at the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) Center here that his employer, John Bryan, told him that white workers had threatened to quit if he didn't fire Boyd. Boyd had placed the sticker on his car last Friday, after discussions about the Vietnam war had taken place during a week-long "teach-in" on Negro history at the MFDP Center* And MFDP spokesman said that one of the participants in the teach-in had talked. ab>out Negroesrs role in the war in Vietnam and had distributed stickers. The spokesman said that Bryan and his brother "just about own everything" in West Point. The brothers operate a meat-packing plant and John Bryan has a housing construction business where Boyd was employed. Bryan told Boyd he would have to fire him because a white worker in the packing plant had threatened to quit. Boyd charged this same worker threatened to kill him in the summer of 1965 if he continued to participate in the civil rights movement. Boyd said, "I feel that people in Vietnam are the same as we are, fighting for their freedom. I can't see Negroes fighting over there who can't live when they get back to the U. S. " He also charges that a live telegraph wire was cut last night and left dangling in the street near his home of endanger himself and his family. The MFDP spokesman said there had been a lot of talkin the Negro community about the war in Vietnam. "People feel it isn't their war. They feel people who get sent off are the blackest and the poorest. "

- 30 - News from STUDENT NONVIOLENT COORDINATING COMMITTEE 360 Nelson Street SW Atlanta, Georgia 30313 FOR RELEASE: February 22, 1966 688-0331 c EVICTIONS IN CLAY COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI WEST POINT, MISSISSIPPI : The Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) here at the Mary Holmes College Community Center is preparing housing for four families evicted from the Bermuda Plantation. The evictions occured in an atmosphere of deteriorating economic conditions* John Buffington, Clay County SNCC worker, said, "the evictions are from a variety of factors. They can be traced back to wide scale irregularities in the Agricultural Stabilization and Conservation Service (ASCS) elections." Charges of rigged elections have been forwarded to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Although the MFDP ran its most intensive state campaign in the 51% Negro Clay County, no Negroes were elected despite the fact that several communities are 90% Negro. The evictions came after the ASCS ruled that crop allotments must be cut. On some of the Negro farms, allotments were cut in half. (Crop allotment is how much a farmer is allowed to plant. ) A SNCC spokesman said the evictions in Clay County are a reflection of the problem in Greenville, Miss. , and Lowndes County, Alabama. Mrs. Unita Blackwell of Mayersville, Miss, , said, "people are being frozen out. They are being pushed from the land for political reasons. This is part of a drive to reduce Negro political power in the State. " Whites have been shooting Negroes's livestock in rural Clay County commun­ ities. White voter registration of 4, 000 is being challenged by rapid increase in Negro registration, now standing at 3, 000. Buffington said, "whites are scared of the increase in Negro voter registration, but the intimidation is bringing the Negro community closer together. " He said SNCC workers in the area are collecting supplies to help the evicted sharecroppers. One of the evicted families, that of Mrs. Y. Marble, had sharecropped on the Bermuda Plantation. Because they didn't borrow money during the year and bought their own food, they were surprised at the end of the year when the plantation owner said they owed $215. They made twenty bales of cotton last year of good grade which brought $170/bale. They were told to pay or leave. John Buffington said he thought economic conditions were worse now than when he first came to the community two years ago. - 30 - October 4, 1966

The Council on'Huiaari "Relations ' of Greater Atlanta is'a'private, independent voluntary membership organizations dedicated to the principle of equal opportunity of all people, and operating in metro Atlanta area.

Our concern in Lynwood Park is for those now living in substandard housing to have an equal opportunity for safe and sanitary housing, both for their sakes and for the well being of the county. Present conditions not only constitute health and safety hazards but also produce tensions which often erupt into violence and disorder.

We see nothing to encourage the expectation that those now in substandard housing can support enough standard private housing to look to private activity to meet the needs. There is noevidence that the picture reflected in the 1960 census has improved, and that picture was one of median family income for Negroes in that census tract of SgJ^S— (The median family income for the total population for that census tract was over 37000); The median value of most of the non-white owner occupied houses was less than 35000 and the median rent was 341. Of the 354 non-white males employed, 109 were service workers and 165 laborers. Of the 279 non- white females employed, 224 were household workers* These are not jobs with expectations of great wage increases.

We believe that if the housing needs are to be met, there must be one of/or a combination of the various federally assisted housing programs - housing assistance, rent supplements, non-profit development, etc.. Any of these, however, depends upon the existence in the county of a Workable Program certified by the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development. As of October 3, 1966, DeKalb had no such program and had none submitted for review to the Dept. of Hud, according to their regional office. The last one had been sent back with certain deficiencies noted.

The most urgent and crucial action before the county in housing is to pre­ pare and submit such a Workable Program.

We call on other groups and individuals to join us in urging the Chairman and members of the County Commission to direct the county administrative officers to give this matter the highest priority possible, and we note that the Commission ±B schorlulftd to hnlrl its regular mooting on Tuesday, October 11, 1966.

' Con'd -2-

This incident has been repeatedly described as a riot. There appear to be as many different definitions of "riot" as there were spectators at the scene on Tuesday, numbers of whom say that it was not a riot. There was no looting, no shooting, no battles, Perhaps this was due to the competence of the police in preventing a riot for which they deserve the same praise as for stopping one. One newspaper reported that "by 4:20 p.m., the point at which the disturbance turned into a riot"... without any explanation of what happened at 4:20 to turn the disturbance into a riot. We urge the Police Committee of the Board of Alderman to prepare and make public a complete report of events as they occured so that they can be evaluated calmly and objectively. The question might be raised as to whether it was necessary to shoot in a residential neighborhood in the middle of the afternoon to.serve a warrant on a robbery suspect. Any charge of police brutality should be carefully considered, regardless of any brutality displayed towards the police. . Whether charges of police brutality prove to be accurate or not, the fear of it is a real factor in the conditions which make for-riots.

The community might well take this as an opportunity to examine.and evaluate the entire police recruitment and training programs and the capability of the city ip perform the required police function with the present level of the police budget.

•• • As much as we deplore violence in any circumstances, the Council on Huinai Relations of Greater Atlanta does no£ adcept the explanation that "SNCC members were directly responsible for Tuesday's rioting". - SNCC members were not'responsible for the police shooting which precipitated the gathering in the streets. v SNCC members were not responsible for threat of rent strikes in that area a year ago.

SNCC members were not responsible for street demonstrations in the area during the summer«.

SNCC members are not responsible for people living in houses which the housing code finds unfit for human' habitations

SNCC members are not responsible for children attending school half of a day, in a building schedules for repairs in the' 1963 bond'issue but which was by-passed.

SNCC members are not responsible for parking space for 4,000 cars in the middle of an area which has1 no parks for children to play in (and to whom the income derived from the stadium is very remote)..

SNCC members are not responsible for the recent incident in that same neighborhood involving police officers and the wife of a ballteam member, an incident which rightly or wrongly, has been described by "responsible Negroes" as a white wash of the police department. STUIiEHT NONVIOLENT CQOEdlNATlNG CO .LilTTEE 360 NELSON STHEET S.V.. ATLANTA, GEORGIA 30313 July 26, 1967

STATEMENT *IM)E nY SNCC CHAIRMAN H. RAP BWW'HIHWTBS BEFORE HE WAS >w».srnLD _ D4- THE,.jiKSiiXitflTCai^ JLX, .AIRPORT, JULY 26, 1907

I am charged with inciting black people to commit an offense by way of pretest against the law, a law in which neither I nor any of my people have any say in preparing. The law against which the protest was directed (the law whicn denies freedom) is the law which established this country. I consider myself neither morally nor legally bound to obey laws made by a body,in which I have no repre- sentation. That tae will of the people is the basis of the autho­ rity of government, is a principle universally acknowledged as sa­ cred throughout the civilized worid and constitutes the basic foundation and is legally bound by the laws governing tbis country. It should V,Q dually understandable that we, ss black people, shoul; auoot the attitude that we are neither oorally nor legally bound to obey la\:s which were not made with our consent and which seek to oppress us. NOT can we be expected to have confidence in courts that interpret and enforce such laws. The white man makes all the laws, .be drags us before his courts, he accuses us, and he sits in judgement over us. Do not deceive yourselves into believing that penalties will deteT men from the course that thejr believe is right. History shows that penalties do not deter men when their conscience is a- roused, nor will they deter my people or the colleagues with whom I have worked, be stand on the eve of a black revolution, basses of our people aee on the move, fighting the enemy tit-for-tat, responding 2 to counter-revolutionary violence with revolutionary violence, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, and a life for a life. These rebellions are but a dress rehearsal for real revolution. Neither imprisonment ncr threats of death will sway me from the path that I have taken, nor will they sway others like me. For to men, freedom in their own land is the pinnacle of their ambitions; and nothing can turn men of conviction and a strong sense of freedom aside. lore powerful titan my fear of the dreadful conditions to which I might be subjected in prison is »y hatred for the dread conditions to which my people are subjected outside prisons through­ out this country. I hate the practice of race discrimination, and in doing so, in my hatreo., I am sustained by the fact that the over­ whelming majority of mankind bate it equally. There is nothing any court can db to change in any way that hatred in me; it can only be removed by the removal of the injustices and the inhumanity which exist in this country. be seek to renove that injustice from tne political, social and economic life of the United States. A stable and just society cannot mount a successful offensive action against a black youth who breaks a window and at the sane time plead that it is powerless to protect black youth who are being raurdered because they seek to make American democracy a reality. Each time a black church is bombed or burned, it is an act of vio­ lence in our streets. Each time a black body is found in the swamps of Mississippi or Alabama, that is violence in our land. Each time black human rights workers are refused protection by the government, that is anarchy. Each time a police officer shoots and kills a black teen-ager, that is urban crime, be see America for what it is, and we recognize our course of action December 6 , 19 6 7

A message to the people of Nashville from: the Southern Conference Educational Fund (SCEF) the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) the Southern Student Organizing Committee (SSOC) Concerning the McClellan Investigation Since November 1, 1967, a Senate subcommittee headed by Sen­ ator John McClellan, Democrat of Arkansas, has been conducting an investigation supposedly aimed at uncovering the causes of last summer's city uprisings — the so-called "riots,"

We think its purposes. aEe different.

"One Side, Lady We're Looking For A Conspiracy" FACT: The official name of the committee conducting the investi­ gation is the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations of the Committee on Government Operations. This is the same Senate sub­ committee that McCarthy used as a platform and an excuse for the witch-hunt in the fifties.

FACT: The committee has until January 31, 1968 to complete its study of "big city riots." (The hearings began on. November 1, 196 7.) But so far, only two cities, Houston and Nashville, hav, been covered.

FACT: Neither Houston nor Nashville has had a "community riot" comparable to the uprisings that occurred in many other cities last summer.

The Mayor of Houston, Louie B. Welch, testified before the comm­ ittee that the TSU (Texas Southern University) incident was not a "riot" but a "gunbattle between police and students." But McClellan told the Mayor that: "What happened at TSU is the crux of why we're here."

And James A. Neal, an attorney for the city of Nashville, told the committee that only 500-600 persons had participated in the events of the night of April 8, 1967 — the so-called "Nashville riot." Other witnesses offered even lower estimates.

THEAF*&|lMtaiCAN FACT; All but one of the committee's witnes­ NOVEMBER 18, 1967 ses to date has been [ J allied with the power structure. And an al­ The McClellan Investigation arming amount of the testimony has been giv­ Senator John McClellan, the Sen­ tent recreational facilities. en by police officials. ate's- chief investigator, has turned As the great ferret-outer of. Wrong­ his attention to last summer's ghetto doing and defender of the status quo, outbreaks, having concluded in ad­ his interest is centered wholly in who vance that ttey are the work of "out­ dared make such violent protest FACT: One of the comm­ side agitators" aided and abetted by against the terrible plight of the dis­ ittee's star witnesses anti-poverty workers. possessed. was Captain John Sorace Armed with a slush fund of $150,- For this problem created by angry 000, the dour-faced Arkansan, after disturbers of the peace, the crusader of the Nashville police only four days of inconclusive tes­ from Arkansas has a solution: "We force. Sorace testif­ timony has already reached the an­ hear a lot of talk about rats today. ied that what happened ticipated erroneous verdict. We've got a lot of human rats who. Slum dwellers, he is convinced, also need elimination." the night of April 8 would never protest their miserable Just how this process of wholesale would never have occur­ jxistence unless black power mili­ elimination — by rope, by electric red if members of SNCC, tants and federal poverty workers chair, or by gas — would be carried stepped in to lead the way with in­ out was not made clear. SSOC, and.SCEF had not flammatory speeches, tossed molotov No doubt members of the Senate, been in the city. •cocktails and hurled bricks. far more sophisticated than Mr. McClellan, thus has let it be known McClellan, have already concluded he's not the least bit interested in entrusting an investigation of urban The Nashville Banner of what caused the holocausts in New­ problems to a backwoods-oriented November 2 2 quoted the ark, Detroit or Milwaukee. Complete­ chairman was a shameful waste of following exchange: ly ignorant of the despair that is the tax money. daily potion of ghetto residents, he The McClellan probe is certainly the Chairman: In view couldn't care less about rat-infested, not the answer to slum troubles. If of your testimony3 what ramshackle housing, about inade- anything it will add more fuel to rag­ you have stated here o ate education, and about non-exis­ ing flames. (continued) and what information as you have and knowing your community down there as you do, would this rioting have occurred exoept for this outside interest with the SNCC group which came in there, the leaders3 including th'e local leaders} and these oth­ er organizations iSSOC & SCEF] that you have testified to here who participated in these meetings, do you believe any rioting would have occurred?

Sorace: No, I do not.

We think that the conditions of people's lives are the cause of their discontent. ^d we know that outside agitators did not do this:

Nor did they create the slums or start discrimination or cause unemployment. These are the condi­ tions that lead to up­ risings.

SLUM HOUSING is a very serious problem in Nashville, especially in North Nashville. Only 21% of the homes in that area are owned by the people who live in them. The Tenness­ ee State Advisory Com­ mission to the U.S. Civil Rights Commissi­ on reported last Feb­ ruary that "there ex­ ists in Nashville con­ ditions of segregated

and substandard housing similar to those which, in other cit­ ies, have been cited as contributing causes to riots and civil disorders." DISCRIMINATION IN EDUCATION, as in housing and other aspects of life, is rampant. Today, of 141 public school facilities in Nashville, 83 are still segregated, and of the 58 that are in­ tegrated, 2 3 have only one teacher of a different race. BUT JOBS ARE THE BIGGEST PROBLEM. Negroes are last hired and first fired, in Nashville as elsewhere. A recent U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission survey of 37 Nashville busi­ nesses and industries employing 12,618 persons found only 68 black people holding white collar jobs. On a national level, the average life-time income of a Negro college graduate is e- qual to that of a white person with an eighth-grade education.

Many prominent people have criticized the conspiracy theory of the uprisings which the McClellan committee professes. Sometime ago, Dr. R. Grann Lloyd, director of A&I's division of business made the statement that:

"The conditions which breed discontent existed in ab­ undance prior to last April. They still exist . . . Some actions and statements by local officials since the riot have probably strengthened the possibility of further unrest." Roy Wilkins of the NAACP said of the McClellan investigation:

". . . Congress is not enacting a program to tackle the real evils which are at the root of urban unrest. It prefers to fence with partisan politics and with the opponents it has conjured up: agitators, ^Commun­ ists and people-who-won't-work. . . Never mind the facts. . . Facts may demonstrate the need for schools for housing, for jobs, and better police methods."

And about Captain Sorace, The Nashville Tennessean commented:

". . . Some people get the impression. . . that Mr. Sorace is trying to scare them into paying more taxes to hire more policemen to fight his "Communist men­ ace" . . i how he comes by some of his information might in itself make an interesting congressional in- vestigation. . . "

WE CHARGE that Captain John Sorace is using the McClellan comm­ ittee for personal glory and advancement and to legitimize a police state in Nashville.

WE CHARGE that the McClellan investigation is being conducted so as to smear and destroy not only individuals and groups engaged in the struggle for social change but the poverty program.

V7E CHALLENGE Sorace and the other officials of this city to an­ swer these charges and to talk about the real causes of the up­ risings .

r.\TE DEMAND that our government take meaningful steps to deal with the problems that are at the source of the discontent in the cities of America -- slum housing, discrimination, and lack of jobs.

For further information wri Box 640 3, Nashville, Tenn "December 22, 1967

COMMUNIQUE NO. 1

FFOM: SNCC, THE VOICE OF BLACK LIBERATION

SUBJECT: THE PREVENTIVE HOUSE ARREST OF CHAIRMAN H. RAP BROWN

Since September l8, 1967, H. Rap Brown, Chairman of the Student Non-Violent

Coordinating Committee,, has been a political prisoner in New York City, forbidden

to travel by a court order, which, if disobeyed, would result in the forfeiture

of $15,000 bond and Brown's imprisonment. This tactic of PREVENTIVE ARREST is be­

ing tested by the Federal Government as a way of dealing with those whose opin­

ions they do not like. It is the same tactic used in a cruder form in the Union

of South Africa and call their "house arrest." Whether it is called "house ar­

rest" or "preventive arrest," the result of the two is the same: an individual's

movements are restricted to a proscribed exea for an indefinite period.

Upon examining the facts in the case of H. Rap Brown it becomes clear that

the conscious intent was not to jail Brown on various false charges, but simply make it impossible to travel around the country and speak. This would hurt not on­ ly Brown, b*»t the organization for which he is Chairman and principal spokesman, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee. Thus, by moving quietly and through the courts, the Government hoped to stop Brown and SNCC without creating a public outcry.

The facts in the case of H. Rap Brown are simple. On July 2k, 1967, Brown

spoke in Cambridge, Maryland. He left the city the same evening on his way to

Washington, D.C. A while after he had left Cambridge the Pine Street Elementary

School, which has a history of being burned, was burned again. The next day the

State Attorney of laryland issued a warrant for the arrest of Brown, charging him with inciting the people to burn the school. Later the same day, the Federal Go­ vernment warrant was issued for the arrest of Brown, this one charging him with lea­ ving the state of-Maryland to avoid arrest on the first charge. The Federal charge made him, of course, a fugitive from justice. ®

-2-

Brown learned of the warrants for his arrest, and, on the following day,

. .arranged through his attorneys to turn himself in to the F.B.I, in New York.

•On July 26, Brown was leaving Washington, D.C. for New York to turn himself

in,- when, he was arrested by the police at Washington National Airport and imrne-

•4tately turned over to the F.B.I. The F.B.I, vrs fully cognizant of where

Brown.wa& going and for what purpose, but they chose to abrogate the agreement

that had been worked out between them and Brown's attorneys, choosing instead

to make It appear that he had been trying to run away.

He was taken to a detention cell in the U.S. Post Office Building in Alex­

andria, Virginia, held for six hours and then released. Tr~ Federal govm-xm&at

had decided to drop the charges of "flight from prosecution"-"ags2j3£$ Mm,,

However, when Brown walked out of the Post Office Building, he was arrested

on the steps by Alexandria police, who charged him with "flight from prosecution"

under a Virginia state law. The Federal Government had bowed out to let the

state government do the same work, knowing that in a Southern court, there was

much less chance for Brown to receive a fair hearing than in Federal Court.

He was taken to the city jail in Alexandria, Va., and after some time was

released on $10,000 bond. Then, the Governor of Maryland asked the Governor of

Virginia to extradite Brown to stand trial on the school-bur^'. • ng charge. The

Governor of Virginia honored this request, Brown was once again in jail, but his

return to Maryland was prevented through legal action taken by his attorneys. 0n# September 18, 1967, Brown was released from jail on yet another $10,000 bail on the condition that he would not leave the eleven counties of the Southern District of New York, except to travel to consult with one of his attorneys.

Shortly thereafter, Brown was once again arrested on a charge of carrying a weapon while under indictment, was jailed in New York City and released on $15,000 bond. The restriction on Brown's right to travel was appealed to the Chief Jus­ tice of the U.S. Supreme Court who turned down.the appeal. -3-

It Is clear that if H. Rap Brown is going to be released from his "jail" in

Nwr Yerk, It will or&y^bortsgegijse^yf pressure put upon the Federal Government. .-

This is an iapertfflrt>e8se, because if the Federal Government succeeds In keeping

H. Raep Brown "jailed," overnight, militants will find themselves arrested on

false charges and released, with the condition that their movements be restricted

to. a proscribed area. It happened to Bill Epton, Black liberation fighter from

Harlem, in 1964, when he was arrested on charges of inciting to riot during the

Harlem rebellions of that summer. It happened to John Harris, Black liberation

fighter in Los .Angeles, who was arrested for leafleting, released and now restric­

ted to California. It happened to male Oquendo, Black draft resistor from Sir>ok-

lyn, who was convicted for refusing to serve in the Army, released on appeal and

in now restricted to the borough of Brooklyn, New York.

It Is clear vhat the Government is trying to do. It is our responsibility to

stop them. If they succeed in keeping H. Rap Brown, one of the most well-known

Black leaders, restricted to New York, they will have won and will then be able

to move with impunity against any militant in the country.

WHAT YOU MUST DO:

1. Send a telegram immediately to SNCC, 100 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10011

requesting H. Rap Brown to speak in your community. The United States Government

is trying to say that Black people in the United States are not interested in the

words of Chairman Brown. We know this is a lie.

2. Write letters of protest to Chairman H, Sap Brown protesting his illegal

"house arrest." Your letter may be used as an affidavit which we will attach to his appeal to the Supreme Court to overturn the racist decision of the Virginia cracker judge.

3. Circulate and get signitures for the Citizens Amicus Brief in Support of H, Rap

Brown's Appeal from his^ail Restrictions. it-. Send a contribution to the National Office of SNCC, 360 Nelson Street, SW. At­ lanta Georgia. Your dollars will help SNCC carry on its political work toward

Black liberation. -RXmCA-L REPRESSION IN TUX AS SNCC AND 3D5 GRGANIZEHS JAILED. QQmikJ£X+S PHOnlSE FULFILLED

While all our attention' was focussed on the Democratic convention in- Chicago, Governor Connally took the opportunity to fulfill his promise to crush Texas SNCC; while he was at it, he also went after members of SDS and Afro-Americans for Black Liberation. SNCC has been gaining strength in Texas and is now doing organizing work in at least seven cities around community control issues. Organizers have been subject to constant harass­ ment,, which has now intensified.

Organizers in Austin, Dallas,. Houston, and Killen have been jailed on various charges (some have already been sentenced),, most of which arose out of demonstrations or organizing activities. In Austin, SNCC,. SDS, and Afro-Americans for Black Liberation demonstrated at a gas station about a month ago. The owner, an open racist,.refused to serve anyone with long • hair or a beard. Lary Jackson, head of Austin SNCC, was arrested on a trumped-up assault charge. When he was arrested the other demonstrators — about 20 of them'—sat down; they were arrested under a Texas anti-labor law that prohibits obstructing the. labor of others.. .Lary was. sentenced to 2 years probated and a $500 fine.. .Many.of the others are still in jail-, unable to pay bail, awaiting trial.

In Dallas, SNCC led demonstrations demanding black control of "supermarkets in ghetto areas. A number of people were arrested; Ernest McMillan, SNCC Field Secretary, and his aide received ten-year sentences within the past week for ^destruction o.£. private property i^orth over $5®* - -- (that is, dropping merchandise). Lee Otis Johnson,, head of Houston S^CC,. has been harassed ever since he first came to Texas. Last week he was sentenced to 30 years on a trumped-up narcotics charge. His wife Helen is now on trial, charged x^ith assault, and may receive a life sentence. In Killen, near Fort aood,. the Summer of Support ran a coffee house which offered GI counseling. The Killen City Council had it closed last week as a "public nuissance." Fifteen people, including its head, Josh Stroud,, were arrested.. Some were SDS organizers,. some were with SNCC. They are still in jail.

More busts are expected. Those already jailed have been harassed by unreasonably high bail and lack of funds for legal defense. They need money-—at least $3,000—and.our political and moral support. Recent events in Chicago and Texas indicate that the Establishment is not going to permit freedom of political expression.. It is vital, therefore, that we insure this freedom for ourselves: we must unite, in suprort of our brothers and sisters in Texas.. Cl]x/c ^ *- v^/v^ now -'or Wire mon SNCC, '3 H fiose^ooj Av^/ International Affairs Commission

300 NINTH AVE(28th_ST) NEW YORK, NY. 10001 (212) 255-9829

July lU, 1969

Brothers and sisters; Earlier thes year,shortly after returning from a somewhat extensive tour of the Internati­ onal Arena, I wrote a position paper entitled "1969-Year of Pinal Revolutionary Preparatio ns", which in part was reflective upon those International travels as well as my own comm­ ittment to our struggle here. In that paper I tried to point out several things, hut perh­ aps the most important, if any, was that I see 1969 as the year of Final Revolutionary Pre parations. ihis dees not mean that the revolution will begin inl970. It does mean however, thai that this is the year to get every fiber, every sector pf our people ready, for the struggle thi that lies ahead. While traveling abroad, I was asked by many different people what was the nature of the Black Student Movement on the college campuses and if I agreed with the things they were strugling for. I gave my understandingof the nature of things and while I agreed with the things our Brothers and sisters on the campuses are struggling for, I know that these are neces8ary,yet not s*fi#*stejrt.It has long been my desire to see all Black Students attending the the more than 100 different Black colleges and universities in the southjwaging a struggle there, taking them over and making them viable and relevent institutions for our communiti es. Realizing that this is not totally possible however, it has been my position that Students should be waging a struggle for complete and totally free education, with a stipend being paid to them while attending so that they are free of financial problems, no matter where they are. Shat the students spare time after classes and on weekends should be spent in the community, passing on the knowledge they have gained from their studies and dealing UJU tttft with the very basic problem of Illiteracy among some of our people.

Yet, hov does all of this relate to you as lav students and the concept that this is the year to get "every sector of our people ready"? Simply that, I think as lav students, your type of expertise plays a most impor­ tant role and particularly at this phase of the struggle. Let us examine some facts of history, for a moment. The first rule of revolutionary strug^/ gle is that a Revolutionary must remain free in order to fight his enemies?. The systematic structre of oppression that ve are fighting, clearly under­ standing this, has made thi3 high priority on its list of obstacles toward stopping us, Mike Kronsky of SDS spelled it out for all to hear, a few months ago. He contended that the Nixon Administration would use state and local laws to hang - up known activists vith minor and petty charges, in order to got them off the streets. I vould add to that by saying that Nixon probably hopes to hang-up Brothers with petty charges in order to get a criminal records on them, so that in the long run they can be put away for much longer periods for the slightest so-called legal offenses, say for example: loitering or spitting on the streets.

-r In any event, it is happening. Pvecently, three Brothers who are staff mem­ bers of the National Black Economic Developement Conference- were tried, convicted and sentenced to one year, for intorupting a church service in New Orleans, La., while attempting to present the Black lianifesto to the congregation, Lee Otis Johnson is facing thirty years in Houston, Texas, for the alledged possession of one grain of mara^uana. Donald Stone of SNQC in Atlanta is about to be tried and sentenced to three years for his participation in a demonstration before an induction center in Georgia, a fey years ago. Stone has been told that he can get off with one year for "good Behaviour". I need not remind you of the Panther 21 or the Har­ lem 5 or the much earlier publicized cases of Brothers Huey P. Kewton, Max

\ I \ \ \ P_age Three

Stanford, Herman Fergueson or H. Rap Brown, which I am sure you are all fa­ miliar with. Even now as we talk, the HUAC commission, under the name-guise of the McCleanen Commission, an already proven illegal commission, is invest­ igating people and groups at hearings in Washington D.C., for the purpose of ensnarling other courageous Brothers and Sisters in their vicious "legal" traps. Even white radicals are not immune, for Mark iiudd of N.Y, SDS vas ar­ rested a few weeks back, upstate New York; not to mention the feeble bust of the SDS leadership in Chicago recently.

Moving on though, 1 feel it incumbent on me to cite the case of Sister Mae Mallory, who was arrested in Cleveland, Ohio a few \*eeks ago, for attempting to bring some resemblence of Justice to the trial of Brother Ahmed Evans, as she and others tried to enter the court room to show their concern and sun- port for the Brother. I have been told that Sister Mae is facing one year for some silly charge of disturbing the peace or contempt of court. Why how could anyone who believes in any kind of Justice have anything but contempt of that court, for the way they are railroading th^rt Brother into the elec­ tric chair for something he didn't do? As a matter of fact for the record, let me state here and now that Black people, and anypeople of good will across the nation and accross the entire world, should show such contenrot for that court in Cleveland for its complete and hollow mockery of any sign of Justice in the case of Ahmed Evans, that they should storm the courthouse and stone by stone, bring it down upon the heads of those who are conducting it.

For those of you know Sister Mae Mallory, it should not come as a shock to you to find- her in this situation of helping a Brother. She is in fact, the same Sister who helped Brother Robert Williams a few years ago and paid heavy dues for her efforts. In view of this past history, it should not sur­ prise you also, that the racist court system in Cleveland is doing its worst Page Four

to see that she serves time. She is indeed one of the most courageous fight­ ers, male or female, that our struggle has the honor, to have in it. I have.. touched on only a few cases Brothers and Sisters, in spite of both my limit­ ed knowledge and the shortness of the hour, I assure you there are many, many mere.

In cur struggle, we have sometimes been accused of being reactionaries, mean­ ing that we wait until things happen before we decide what to do. Perhaps to some degree this is true. Yet if it is true, then we must also examine why it is true, for the only crime about making a mistake is net to analyze it. And in that examin ation I am sure that several reasons will unfold: yet here, I wculd like to relate to something I once heard William Kunstler say: "I have very little trouble with the laws in regards to my clients, but my greatest trouble comes with those who interpret those laws." Hew let me net be misunderstood here tonight, I consider the lows of this decadent society unjust, in every form. Let there be no mistaking that5 and I can call too heavily upon history tc voice my opinion of the revolutionary rights of an oppressed people in order to lift the burden of unjust laws from their heads-. From documents that go back into the dim recesses of antiquity, rirrht up to the more modern rhetoric of the U.S. constitution itself-, X can hack- up my position with respects to casting off tyranny. That the laws are un­ just is a reality, yet an even greater reality is what can be done about the double-jeapqrdyy' we as Blacks, face, at the hands of those who unjustly interpret these unjust laws? It is my contention that we must have a force; a legal force, highly organized and exceedingly skilled in its manueverg as it strikes back at the many legal entrails that wculd engulf us all, in its insidious clutches.

We need these legal envoys, not one or two, but ten or twenty, who are e- quipped with the tools to research and investigate extensively, any legal Page Five situation as they collectively attack it. I am positive that most rf the white racist judges who convict the Lerci Jones' and Ahmed Evans1 are not one-fourth as sharp on their legal hocus-pocus, as the good Brother, Judge- Crockett in Detroit is on his. They don't have to bo. Yet, if you here, would take advantage of this shortcoming on their part by discovering the numerous loop-holes, lies, distortions, etc., as an organized collective legal force in any given situation, then like Judge Crockett you would be assisting in bringing true justice to courageous Brothers and Sisters like Mae Mallory and Ahmed Evans; and a just defeat to the likes of these who have so viciously condemned thorn.

This, should be your work while you are law students. In fact, this should be your FIELD WORK and law schools should give you credits toward your de­ grees, for this type of field work. You should demand it. After all, some of you spend your summers working at correction centers in tho ghettos. What a- bout the political prisoners faced with absurd charges, excessive bails, little or no finances, shortages of legal assistance and a strong sense of dedication toward the liberation of cur people, who live in those ghettrs?

And net just the political prisoners, but the poor Black masses as well. For a long time now, stme cf us have been talking about returning tc the scuth around an Agrarian Reforms Program. The Blxk Manifesto's first program speaks about a Southern Land Bank project tc deal with the problem cf the land for Black Farmers. Some cf knew that much cf this land is local, federal and/cr state owned and some of it can be obtained by paying up menial back taxes, while others will require legal struggles as well as physical ones. We need an organized legal ft rce tc chart a ccurse, st that these legal struggles are waged intelligently. And new that the cencept cf reparations has boen^ opened up mcrally, thrtugh the Black Manifestc, we need that legal f~rce to open it up legally as we prepare to demand reparations from the U.S. Govern- Page Six

ment and all ether racist institutions in this country, whe have exploited us historically for ever two-hundred years. And we need the legal free ty investigat and through its disc veries cf international laws, raise the r-r- litical consciousness cf cur people, that they might understand that rur struggle Is one fcr human rights and net simply civil rights, frr clearly cur histcry as oppressed people in this ceuntry is indeed, a violation rt all human rights.

It is then, in tho spirit cf this understanding, that I offer the following resolution to y.u here tonight, and hope that ycu will adept and support it. Perhaps it is net by chance that we have gathered here en this day fcr this purpose. Fer tcday is Bastille Day in France. A Bastille is a defensive tcwering fortress, which in France years age was used as a prism. On July lH, 1789, the people cf France stcrmed the Bastille and completely demolish- ed it. They did sc because it was being despcticly used aganist them. This resolution in its program, talks about the building cf 0 legal defensive tcworing fortress, a Black Bastille if ycu will. Yet, net fcr the purpose cf despotism, but rather to help in freeing these who are victims cf it.

THE RESOLUTIOK

1. Be it reselved, that we Black Law Students, gathered here : n July I1!-, 1969 at tho Rutgers Lav; Schcol in Newark, Now Jersey, dc hereby officially declare curselves hereafter tc be: the National Black Law Students Re­ search and Investigation Ccuncil(N-BLS-RI) charged with the task ef en­ listing Black Law Students from accrcss the naticn, inte cur ranks. 2. That Task Fcrccs, cempvSed cf at least ten r mere law students be im­ mediately established wherever possible, tc systematicly begin tc re­ search and investigate the situation cf all Black political prisoners now incarcerated and/or cases pending. a. Due te the immediate urgency ef his situation (September 23, X69 - ex- Page Seven

ecutien date), the first cf these Task Forces will be assigned tc Cleve­ land Ohio, immediately tc assist in the liberation cf Brother Ahmed Evans, Sister Mae Mallory and all others connected with the case. This first Task Force should place itself at the disposal of Ahmed's attcrney, Brother Stanley Tolliver, who in spite cf limited reseurces and countless racist odds, is waging an outstanding defense. b.Rutgers Law School should be approached for the purpose -f securing funds to begin the implementation cf this immediate Task Force, as well as any other a-propiate agency. c.To insure the continuity cf these Task Force .-rejects, the Nati-nnl Black Law Students Research and Investigation Council should join with the Nat­ ional Black Ecenemic Developement Conference thr ugh its United Black Ap­ peal program, for funds. It should also lend its expertise wherever poss­ ible, tc the ether programs of the Black Manifesto.

3.That a National Advisory Committee(NAC) cempesed of the following Black Attcrneys be established, to act in a consultant capacity to the National Black Law Students Research and Investigation Council: LEN HOLT of San Francisco STANLEY TOLLIVER of Cleveland KEN COCKREL ef Detroit FLO KENNEDY of New York HOWARD MOORE JLl. cf Atlanta FLOYD McKISSICK cf New Yc rk The Henorable Judge Crockett cf Detroit, should serve as the Executive cf tlis Advisory Committee.

1+-.That an International Affairs Office(IAO) be immediately established and charged with making application fer N.G.O.(Non-Government Organization) status with the United Nations under article number 71 cf the Charter ef the United Nations and Statue cf the International Ccurt ef Justice. That the IAO examine the concept cf reparations under international lavs and in relationship to the violations of the U.N. Charter on Human Rights.

5.That whenever possible, a Newsletter titled the Black Legate, be estab­ lished for the purpose of explaining the werk ef the NBLSRI Council and Page Eight to bring its much needed and most important information, to as broad a range of our people as possible.

It is recommended that Brother Al Slacom be appointed Coordinator of the Task Forces and immediately commence to serve that funstion.

It is further recommended that Brother Ollis Douglas be appointed Coordinator of the Inter national Affairs Office and immediately begin to serve that function.

In conclusion, Brothers and Sisters, let me state that there can be no question as to the validity of this eesolution. we are not robots, and certainly we are no longer slaves to anyone. It is our revolutionary right as well as our uncompromising duty as well, to organize ourselves into forces f@r our peopled liberation.This is our year of "final preparations),' and if we are not for ourselves, then who can be for us?

Speech and Resolution presented to the General Meeting of the Black Law Students, July 14,1969 at the Rutgers Law School in Newark, New Jersey.

Presented by Irving Davis, Director of Inter­ national Affairs for SNCC.

Note: This resolution was adopted by majority vote of the Blacfc Law Students present with the exception og part (© b) which should be deleted. Brother Ted Miller * $f the law school replaces Al Slocom as Coordinator of the Task Forces and has already begun to serve that function. Contact SNCC for more information. ,7 International Affairs Commission

300 NINTH AVE(28th_ST) NEW YORK, N.Y. 10001 (212) 255-9829 For Immediate Release S.N.C.C. Re-structures

-Results of the SNCC annual fune Staff meeting, held"in "New York City this year found'H. Rap Brown once again "being elected Chairman of our organization'. The staff meeting was held at the Washington Square Episcopal CgUTch, 36 W. Uth St. between June 16—19.

-OUr organization has changed its name to the Student National"Coordinating Commi- tae.still retaining the initials S.N.C.C. but denouncing any relationship to the concept of nonviolence as a solution to the problems of oppressed people.

-There has also been a change-over in the administration of SNCC. The new struc­ ture consists of: (A) The creation'.bf a Revolutionary Political Council which replaces the old SNCC Central ©ommittee as governing body, (B) A Propoganda Network, under the direction of Phil Hutchings, former head of SNCC. • - •. (c) The "building of an all-Black Political Party. And the R.W.C., which has var­ ious functions under the new structure.

-Other noted changes are the selection of Irving"Davis' as the Director'of SNCC's International Affairs Commission. He replaces James Forman laa that position, who "because of extensive duties with the "Black Manifesto", can nolonger serve in that capacity. Forman still remains a SNCC staff member, However.

-Jimmy Johnson, 'formerly of the "Ft. Hood- 3", was named to head' up NBAWADU," SNCC's draft program. Johnson is presently in Vietnam, representing'our organization for the release of American POWs, an arrangement made recently by Dave Dellinger of National Mobilization.

New Programs

Some of the new programs we iiope to advance forward in the coming months, "will be a People6s Medical Center, with absolutely free medical care for poor Black People and a People's Sewing Center to build on the concept of Black People controlling their own productive forces, as well as freeing the potential productive forces of Welfare Mothers, These first two programs will be launched in Brooklyn, as models for the other Black Communities to follow. Another program of prime, importance is an Agrarian Reform Plan t-. deal with the plight of Black Tenant' Farmers "$"& the South'. The International Affairs apparatus will direct its attention to violations of the U.N. Charteriioh" Human Rights, working with Black Law Students.' Finally, 'SNCC is determined that "Ahmed"Evans' •' "b1. roast not die.'J" We plan to launch a massive campaign'toward that effect, with hopes of obtaining enough support to save that Brother's life. We call upon all people of good •will to join with us in the struggle to free Ahmed Evans. i International Affairs Commission

SNCC 300 ttbrtk Avenue. New York.N.Y. 10001 (212) 255-9829 SNCC's INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS PROGRAM

As most everyone knows by now, SNCC declared itself a Human Rights organization in 1966.

Keeping with the spirt of that understanding, we acquired Non-Government Organization(NGO) status with the United Nations. In I967, our position paper presented before the special committee on apartheid, became a document widely discussed by many. In 1968, our second position paper ( copies are availables upon request ) presented before the same committee, shared equal impact with the first.

This year, we're convinced that its time to raise certain questions regarding the human rights of many other areas within the Third World and in conjunction with raising questions, there must be follow-up work, programmaticly. The struggles of so-called Por­ tuguese Guinea, Angola, Mozambique, are our struggles as wellj we recognize this brother­ ly relationship and intend to relate to it.

Thusa it becomes our duty to educate our people about these struggles, that they might support them whenever and whereever possible. In order to do this, a massive educational- propaganda campaign must be waged. Films, reports, communiques, pamphlets, etc., as well as research and investigation, are imparitive in this effort. Needless to say, the expen­ ses for this type of work is outstanding. Our meager expense account for the International

Affairs Commission is practically depleated and the program begins in September. Won't you please help? Contributions made payable to SNCC will be acknowledged and appreciated,

"Sours in the Struggle,

B. Rap Brown Chairman SNCC BLACK POLITICAL PARTY

A viable Black Political Party has been attempted many times by SNCC, Now we have decided to launch an all-inclusive Black Political Party ourselves. This Black Political Party has many functions. It will not be a political party in the traditional sense of Democrat and Republican parties. The Black Political Party's only association with the established party "system" of the U.S. Government will be to further expose the contradictions of that system as we did earlier in past years. The Black Political Party will serve such functions as: Survival during police repress­ ion, political education, the martial arts, food, clothing, shelter, and -anO u?.timatnj Revolution.

All persons and indigineous groups will be primarily channeled into a workable Black Political Party. We are presently training political cadres of organizers, con­ ducting political workshops with other indigineous groups, and internal political ed­ ucation on theory & practice of a Black Political Party.

We need contributions to make this Black Political Party(Which will encompass other ideologically correct orgazinations), a reality. Won't you please contribute generously to unity, and such an important objective as we arc attempting to undertake? Please make all checks payable to SNCC. All contributions will be acknowledged.

Yours Jjt the struggle,

H. Rap Brown Chairman

For further information;

Contact; SNCC 300 Ninth Avenue New York, N.Y. Tel: (212) 255 - 9&29 International Affairs Commission

300 Uiwik Avenue. New York, NY. 10001 (212) 255-9 829

SNCC'S AGRARIAN REFORM PROGRAM

The Agrarian Reform Program is the concept of uniting working tenant farmers and shae- oroppers of the South and Southwestern United States, into a co-operative farming sys­ tem for the purpose of establishing: 1) A common means of production 2/ A "socialized" use of agricultural machinery and livestock by pooling the laid being acquired. 3) An organized method of the farmers controlling their own productive(work) for.es thereby enabling them to deal with the problem of acquiring the basic necessit­ ies of food, shelter and clothing. In conjunction with this, the program will seek to raise the political consciousness of this segment of the population , clearly understanding that they are by far, the truly dispossessed of the society. One need only point to the fact that in South Carol ina, 13% of the black babiessuffer from intestinal wor&o duo to eal-nutrituon, not to mention the extremely high death rate. SNCC is determined that something must be done!

Plans as to how the program will function are far too extensive to detail in this brief announcement. Those wishing to learn more about it, may write the SNCC office at the above address. Briefly though, the program will comtain three functional aspects, they are: 1) Land purchases ~a) Fund raising drive b) legal battles- law students will aid greatly in this struggle 2) Organizers As always, SNCC workers will be active in tikis effort. Students recruitment will once again be encouraged, 3) Political Education Cleeses The problem of illiteracy must be dealt with first, then a correct political idealogy will prevent the rise of opportunistic individuals and keep the people on the righrfe^track,-60-e">,? *>"*:t' • "' " ' '"'•"" This program can and mugtbe a success. We have the determined workers to make it a success and we're sure others will join this struggle. Yet, the finances needed for this endeavor are great and this is the major priblem. Won't you please help? Funds are desperately needed now. No amount is too great or small. Contributions should be

made payable to SNCC and all contributions will be acknowledged and appreciated.

.Rap Bfown ~) Chan man July 24, 1969

iv SPdCIuL &*SS

C-iiJi*IGK and also that ycu pass along this copy of the resolution to socio Law Student in your area,

SivCC is determined that: Aliped Svans must not die! Cur Chaiman, H. Rap Broun, has declared that this should be a nation; 1 campaign to save the Brother's life and in order to do this, wo need your help in whatever ..anncr you wish to participate,

.i& need to spread tho news and gain the support of masses of people if wo are to be victorious in the campaign, Jon't you please inform your friends and contacts about it? Be sure and tell them what they can do to help and for additional infornation don't hesitate to contact us. As always, funds are always needed and appreciated.

Those who wish to contribute should send all contributions to the

.Jli-iO) iViyS.j JHFiiNSii FliSU 6311 ^JlfcCY A7ji, CLufc.L*u*D 6 , O-IIC TiSL: (216) &:1 - G332 For information contact -attorney Stanley Tolliver ct sane itddrcss,

AKU/QU

II, liAP 3RG.JK QtiFENSS t\j,0 300 WINTH aV3. Mil YuuK., Lut* 10001 TSL:(212) 255 - 9S29 liemcmber: mu a UHITiD FOUCJi CAN INSURE VICTORY! U! U!