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MF D P Congressional Challenge of All LOCAL AFFAIRS
Mississippi Representatives- and SNCC Campaign e ln the East Bay, a group of musicians At the Regional SNCC Conference in over the Christmas holidays, circulate is presenting five evenings of chamber music. Each concert will be devoteQ. to San Francisco November 14-.15 discus petitions to the constituents of each con different: aspects of the chamber music sion of possibilities of reducing Missis gressman asking the congressman to sup- repertoire. The first concert of sonatas sippi's· representation in the House of Iport the resolution and the challenge, Representatives via enforcement of the form delegations of citizens to see the and ensemble music for flute, cello and clarinet will be performed by Lucia Yates Fourteenth Amendment Section 2 was • congressman personally and urge him to enthusiastically received,. and we have 1 support the resolution delaying the seat- (flute), Phyllis Luckman (cello), Eugene now received details from Mississis ing and swearing in of the Mississippi Turitz (clarinet) and (pianists) Jean s jppi Freedom Democratic Party and ' representatives. Margen, Sharon Polk and Claire Shallit. National SNCC on the specific congres The grounds of challenge in this case It will take place on Saturday, January 23, at the home of Jean and Sheldon sionai challenge which FOP will make to are so fundamental, and the figures of Margen, 1521 Hawthorne Terrace, Ber the seating of ALL the Mississippi rep the Mississippi FOP's election so clearly keley (turn left 4 blocks east of Oxford resentatives on the grounds that Negroes indicative of the flagrant denial of the on Cedar). Guests are invited to arrive were unconstitutionally denied the right vote to Mississippi's Negroes, that those at 8:00 p.m. Refreshments will be served to vote 'in the primary and general elec 'I clail;Iling seats in the House of Repre- and the program hegins at 8:15 promptly. tions of 1964. sentatives from Mississippi on the basis The concerts will benefit SNCC, do FOP will challenge and contest the i of the 1964 elections should not be allow- nations are from $1.00 to $25.00 for each. ·seats of all the Miss issippi representa ed to sit pending the outcome· of the con tives pursuant to Title 2, United States ! gressional challenge. The following four Saturday evening Code, Sections 201 through 226. This A fact sheet on the statutory challenge concerts in the series will take place statutory challenge was filed by giving and information on the resolution to delay February 20 - string quartets and duos notice in writing. to the Mississippi mem the seating of the Mississippi represen for strings, flute and bassoon - at bers of the House and members-elect tatives on opening day of Congress will the home of Mt. and Mrs. Luckman, on December 3, 1964. Under these stat be available at each of the West Coast 668 Fairmount Ave., Oakland; utory provisions relating to contested Friends of SNCG offices. Friends of March 20 - trios for violin, cello and elections, all those served must answer SNCC groups should call public meetings piano - at the home of Ephraim &. the notice, either admitting or denying to explain, dramatize and publicize the Barbara Kahn , 2709 Claremont Blvd., the facts alleged by FOP, and serve a congressional challenge and- the resolu Berkeley.; copy of the answer upon the contestant. tion not to seat the Mississippi repre April ! 7 - ensemble music for flute w1thin 30 days. sentatives. As many members of each and strings and woodwind quintet - The statute provides that in all con community as possible should become a t the home of Mr. &, Mrs. Robert tested election cases there shall be ninety informed and write or visit the con Sicular. 84 2 Mendocino, Berkeley; days allowed for taking testimoney. This gressmen in addition to the SNCC delga May 29 - a recital of violin sonatas testimony may be taken at two or more tions. - at the home of Justin Shapiro, 39 places at the same time. Returned summer volunteers should Domingo, Berkeley. ·The testimoney will be .taken in Mi.s accompany SNCC delegations and other For information and reservations, call sissippi in January and February and groups to visit the congressmen. A list tt)e East Bay F riends of SNCC, 655-95,45 Friends of SNCC groups should give of the California congressmen, by dis or Phyllis Luckman, 652-9821. publicity to the challenge and urge public trict and party follows: •In the Mid-Peninsula, beginning with figures to go to Mi ssissippi tor taking 5 Burton (D); 7 Cohelan (D) ; 9 Edwards the New Year. all people will be per of testimony on the denial to all but a (D); 18 Hagen (D); 34 Hanna (D); 2 J ohn sonally contacted by the newly establish token number of Negro citizens of Mis son (D) ; 4 Leggett (D); 15 McFall (D); 8 ed Friends of SNCC chapter, from new sissippi of the right to vore for rep Miller (D); 3 Moss (D); 16 Sisk (D); 37 headquarters at 180 University Avenue resentatives in 1964 . Van Deerlin (D); 14 Baldwin (R); 1 Clau in Palo Alto. Before the testimony begi·ns however, sen (R); 6 Mailliard (R); 38 Martin (R); e Hegionally representatives frafu· •he a resolution will be introduced in the 12 Talcott (R); 13 Teague (R); 35 Utt local Friends of SNCC to the Newsletter House of Representatives on the opening (R); 36 Wilson (R); 11 Younger (R). All committee will meet early in 1965. Watch day of Congress, January 4, 1965, asking of the above except for Martin, Utt and the inter-office MEMO for meeting Jate. that the chailenged Mississippi members Wilson voted for the passage of the Civil ln the meantime local chapters might no: be seated or sworn in until the House Rights Bill of 1964. To all those congress consider suggestions for improving the rules· on the election contest after all of men who voted for the Civil Rights Bill it Newsletter. Suggested so far: each re the evidence is in. should be pointed. out that the seating of resentative take on the assignment of Northern Friends of SNCC groups must tvlississippi representatives is inconsist reading a southern newspaper or national begin immediately to make appointments ent with the 14th and 15th .Amendments periodical and abstracting or reviewing with their congressmen in each district and the Civil Rights BilL NEXT PAGE civil rights items for the Newsletter. CONTINUED political upse.ts that may have-repercus West Coast Conference. sions beyond s.tate lines. "In Alabamq. . , . Reference materials for swdy: 1961. ·voters were not able w vote for the OVER 750 CONVENE United States Commission on Civil Rights Democratic (presidential} candiqate, but SNCC's first westco~sn;opference, held Report P!l V9tiilg, t~les on Mississippi chose between the Republican c~ndidate ·on Noyember 14_.15 in San Francrsc.Q, ~y cOilnties; PJ?· 272-277; 1963 U. S.Com. ~ and a slate o:t.-tinpledg~d . electors .Ci:Pn- drew 0 ver 750 people into ~ weekend of mission (l!l 'Civi·l Rigf,its Report. statl:stics· trolled by.. Governor George Wallace. discussion and prpgram plani)i'ng, on Mi:ssisljlippi voter registration, p.34 · Governor Wallace was leit With the Ala- Bob Moses, SNCC- .staff worker and and list of suits flle!i by United States. bama Democr;1~s in the shambles 'of aRe- director of the Mississippi Freedom Proj~ Department·ot·Justice Til Mi-ssissippi on publican sweep Which, in ·tfie election of. ect, w~s the cen~er of tlie ·conference, discrimi.natoty registration and election five freshmen Republican congressmen, serving as the main speake.r, panelist practices, under 42 United States Code des.troyec! nearly a cennrry of .seniority and resource person. A:mong localfigures Sectiof! 196l(a), pp. 43-49. Also perti for three conservative Democrati-c con- who participated in con~ererrce workshops nent: gressmen, and put the GOP in charge of were Assemblymen Willie BroWn anc! T!i.e United States Court of Appeals ten county co!lrthouses. Probab1y only in Mervyn Dymally; political analyst Hal for the Fifth Circuit took judicial notice his battles agains~ school desegregation Dunleavy: jazz colUmnist Ralph Gleason; of the fact that "Mississipp\ has a steel has Governor Wallace served better the attorneys Peter Franck, Joe Grodins, bard inflexible, undeviating official policy cal!se he was against." . · J" ....ffi!:fn on and Ed . rer . , ~raiser of segreg3;_tion" in U.S. v. City of Jackson, In Mississippi; the report continues, the Lou Stein;. political leader Nancy Swa 1 ·318 p._2d l (1963). "U.S. House viCtory of a conservative - businessrr!.e.n Hal Light and Gus Ravetz; publican un.Se.at~ one of ~\J.e Democra s' and community leaden> Sue Bierman atJ.d ul t:r: a~ conservatives of long-standin Naomi Lauter.- Representative W. A.nhur Winste;td (op .IVIl~~spj::lk.E~UI!&.f>r1~om· ement posed by Mrs. ·Fannie ·Lou Hamer in the in Mississippi as an avenue fur people ElECTION RESULTS IN Freedom Party eampaign,) an irony re "to dete:rmine t!J.eir own lives." He de peated in severl!J, of the· southern upsets." scribed how Freeqorr! schools an\! the IHE SOUTH ANALYZED From these ang o.ther election res11lts Freedom Democrati~ Party are giving On Noyember 15 the Southern Regional reported, t.Qe Southern Regional Couneil people the organizatronal mearis to· do Council re1eased a report on ''What Hap make$ a few general observations: this - and "the sense of community" pened in the Sout!J?" in this year's elec~ "1. Effective Negro registration and that is growing out of their ·participation. tion, giVing ngJJres on the nul):lber of Negro participation in elections i's the best as On the possibiliry of organizational registell~ yoters and the impact they had surance that race will be eliminated as a allies, Moses asked, "What group can on the election results nationally and politically pr~fitable i:ssue, ... and that all Negroes ally With?'' Organized labor. • Loc;llly. The Council's Voter Educatfon the southern states ~11 be. freed from the the group usually .named in artswer to Project has been working for the past two threat of demagogic appeals to racism. this qtle~tion, he challenged as "part years, ln caoperation with civil rights 2. . Continued ~orts to achievethebasic of the establishment" and only concerned groups, to· accelerate 'Negro registration constitUtional righi: of the ballot for Ne with its own members, not giving any throughout the. eleYen southent states. groes is essential in ali eleven states, concern to people who ar·e not working. "The results of this concentrated.drive'' (ind is mqst notably needed in thof?e two A panel of lawyers, including former are. pointed up .. in the r .eport by noting states wliere the Negro eleciorate i.s most Justice Department Attorney Thelton that · ~ Be.tween 1952.and 1-962, Negro regis restricted.!(Alabama & Missisli.il)p_q This Henderson. Ann Gi·nger, Fay Stei)der: and tration inereas:ed from r.008,614 to only is not for the advantage ofany onepsli law stUdent Al Katz, was crit.ical of the 1,386,654. Fr,om 1962 to Fall, 1964, it · tical party over theother, but necessary Federal Government's hanl;lling .of c;:ivil rose to 2,164,200." Spread over the en for healthful se1f~government in the South rights tn the South. They agreed that and the nation. ~ire South, thiS' increase in the actual legislation ex_ists, and was already on rtumlier of Negro voters registered ts not *****' the books before the recently enacted warld-shaking: But the contrast of a 56 4, ln the pragma,tic terms of pbUtics, Civil Rights Law, to provide protection p.ercent jump in ·rwo years with a 37 per Democrats and the nation's majority owe for civil rights workers and loql Negro cent "norm.al rate of increase" 6ver a a greater debt to the Negro electorate. in citi;e;ens who are active in the movel):lent. span of ten years Is !3triking. the Sot,~th cha.n has so far been acknow The conference concluded with con ledged.. ,'' The report states that this increased sideration of a Negro~wnite alliance de Negro vote "was responsib1e for election veloping in the South. The Populist Move of. many local apd stare office holders ... ment, which in the 1880's and '9.0's had including some Negroes, The l.atte:t in Freedom is. a crime shown promise ofnurturing such an al cluded two justices of the peace .. a mem liance into a powerful furce in southern ber of the scl]ool ·hoard ·and a .member of in Mississippi politi·cs, served as the b<~ckground for the eounty board of revenue in Mac.on Since the beginning of Qctober, tl)is p<\nel discussion. County,, Alabama; a second. Negro senator eight people have been arrested lp The !)ext Newsletter Will carry de in Georgia. in a district where the ma .Belzoni, M.ississippi, for Ori:minai tailed reports of the conference discus joriry of voters are white; a member of Syndicalism, With, bail set. at $1,000 s ions and Bob Moses•· observations. In the state House of Representatives and a each. the meantime, workshop papers, along county judge in S)lelby County, Tennessee. The Cti.minal Syndicalism bill was with information on SNCC activities, are . It .was · x:-~sponsible aiso ·· fpr adpption qf a passed by the Mississipp.i legislature available from the Bay Area Regional constitlltiona1 amendment inAtkansas in the spring, along with other bills office: 584 Page Street, S.F. (MA6-Sl29). whi.ch sets up a permanent voter regi.s designed to thwart the Summer Proj tr.ation system fqr the first time, and ect. Now that national attention is eliininat~s the poll tax in all elections, somewhat averted from the s~ate and not juS:t federal elections as required by the program that grew out of the •o~•:o.t;o. .the Twenty-~ourth .Amendment.'' Summer Project; the local police In Alabama an¢! ·MiSsissippi. where are using tl}e )Jills passed in the Send your B.lue Chi!) Stomps., being ·~only relatively small gainS' were made" spring, to ind!tiidate locl!,l people and colleCted in a drive to get autos .and in the nrimber of Negroes who wene to workers involved in the movement. trucks for the Mississippi Projec~, to· ·the p0Hs •. the report reveals there were BOX 210, MILL VAltEY !rHREE VIEWS OF MISSISSIPPI • • • · (l ~tterviewed by a young New Zealander, and .his salary's not so high. So how does Klan's more anxious to keep me toeing Florence Jones, in Gulfport) he make the money. but by graft, and the line than it is to keep the Nigruh mostly it's the Nigruhs who pay him off. down. Now 1 may despise the Klan, be. This is a dry state, you know. Very for cause· the rank and file are ignoramuses, tunate for the administration. SometimeH but 1 can't afford to despise the White A FRENCH JOURNALIST they close down the colored. nightclubs Citizens Council which is a perfectly , "No, l don't. like this country," s.aid and bars and leaye the. white bars open, reE?pectable. body of pitizens doing the ·a 'Fl;e'n'ch journalist. . l'There's something just for spite. Another tlme the mere· same job hy more stibtle means. That t~r~ly wroqg about America. Ali t~eat to do that gets the right sort of W!lite Citizens Council represent!> the. .l\Jnerieanll includiqg the poor. have re money from the banowner. Maybe slav prevailing senti.meni: in this town. and fu~ to wake up and face the daylight. ery is over, but the Nigruhs are still public sentiment won't tolerate !lOY de n~,ey''ve . still asleep, d r e a m in g the being bought and sole!. In fact, they buy viation. James Silver was quite right Am-erican Dream. ln this country there and sell each other. And, you know, the:J;e to call his book on Mississippi "The are millions of ~he poor. Now in France are shops in thfs rown which refuse to Closed Society". there are also millions of the poor; but comply with the Civil Rights law - still Things have reached such a stage here the poor there know that if there are so won't serve Nigrilhs at the lunchcounter that not only 'SocialiSt' but also 'Liberal' many of them poor in a rich country - and the Nigruhs are still buying their and 'Moderate' have become dirty words. when times are good, then there's some~ goods in that store! I'm glad you people One of the newspapers the other day thing wrong with the system. So they are down here to teach them what their indicted a Southern senator for what {t vote to change it - probably vote Com own best interests are. called "the worst form of Moderation"! munist, or something like that. At any I guess you've · discovered how the And where semantics have gone haywire, rate, they protest. But the poor people Nigruhs are scared stiff to demonstrate. YO\l can be sure that the mentality of in this country present a pitiful sight: Martin Luther King pulls off a miracle the community has gone haywire too. If they ·still believe in the system. They're every time· he gets. a sit-in or a wade-in any single person was so fanatically op convinced that i! they're. not rich, or if or something of that o:r;der down here posed to change as is .. the state of Mis;.. · · their son doesn't grow up to be Presi in the South,· and you can't over-estimate sissippi, he'd be recognized as a path- dent, then they've failed .personally. Or, the importance of leadership in the Civil ological case. · ir that idea of pers.onal failure is too Rights Movement. Now the people In this So I'm asking you, when you've come hard for a poor Southern white to ac toWn are too scared even to try to find down here to work for the Nigrilh people. cept, then it's because there's a con out whether a number of these hotels who invited you to help them, to remem spiracy against him, of Communists, Jews, and. restaurants along the beach are open ber that the-re's just as much to be done Catholics, Negroes and Damn Yankees. to them. l know myself of quite a few for the whites who didn't ask you, and Don't you laugh. That's what he seriously white businessmen along the Coast for even abuse you for COriifng. You must believes. You go a,nd get talking to the whom the Civil Rights Bill was a god tell the Nigruhs that the whites, in deny crowd of poor whites roumj any country send: they wanted to integrate t h e i r ing them Freedom, have lost it for them store in any part of this state, and you'll clientele, and they dared not have said selves also, and their only chance now hear ·somebody swearing to Almighty God such a thing in public or they'd have is that the Nigruh, when he w.ins !)is that Mississippi is belng ruined by Lyndon been ostracized by the wbole town. But freedofll., will have learned this lesson Johnson, Martin Luther King and Khrush the Government has no:w obliged the.fll to from. the past and will be magnaminous.' chev. And these same poor crazy brain admit Nigruhs, and secretly, they could washed people keep on vOting for the likes n't be more grateful. Only, since the of Ross Barnett to preserve their state Bill was passed no Nigruh has appeared ANATIVE SON RETURNED from the Communist invasion I" There wanting to be served. They're too scared. (Newsweek Associate Editor Frank tbey are living on beans and grits in a This is a liberal town, as towns in Trippett, born and raised in Aberdeen, .shack with one window and voting ro Mississippi go, and they know it, and Mississippi, returned after tbre years to keep the cotton magnates in office!" yet they've been held down and knocked report on his home state. These are h.is about for so mafJY centurtes, that when words, excerpted [rom Newsweek.) the opportunity eomes to assert some- thing like equality, most of them would l:.verywhere in Mississippi the eco- A SOUTHE.RN LIBERAL mlss out on it. nomic .overtones of white supremacy are "Well, how do you Civil Rights workers Now you can help them to see all this, as audible as they .are insistent ('Now, find the G.ulf Coast?" said one of those and I can't. If l were sb !UUCh as to show my neighbor.'s maid,' says a Sunday rare men, a native-born white Mississip myself on the street in the NigTuh ghetto school teacher, 'gets $15 a week, hut pian who is a liberal. "I imagine you over the railroad track, the Uncle Tom& of course that's for seven <;lays'). find it much easier to work here than would make sure that the white corn- The Baptists put up their first church in the Delta. No Negro has ever been munity knew about this, and my friends in Mississippi in 1791 and led all other forced away from . tpe poll at gunpoint would start ro eye me, and pretty soon. fundamentalist denominations in provid in this town, and some white employers if 1 made 3 habit of it, I'd have no busi- • ing the theological myths that prop up have even encouraged their Nigrubs to ness left. the racial mythology. ln Jacks.on, 1 heard vote, so long as they vote for the can You might think that the Nig,ruh has that the Citizens Councils the6edayswere didate they're told to vote for_ Quite a hard time of it, and so he· has; poor helping the schoolteachers of Mississippi traditional here, you lcnow, for a can living conditions, poor education. _poor explain God's policy to third and fourtli didate to buy .up a few thousand votes, everything. B·ut his chief grievance is graders by giving them this script to and the Nigruhs can do with the money that he doesn't have Freedom; and l tell read: as well a.s anybody else. Of course the \'OU that the liberal white in this !>tate , 'We do not believe that God wants us money's taken away from them l:en time's tws l ~ss freedom. than he. If 1 wer.e to 1 . to live together. Negro people like to come our with my true sentiments in liye by themselves. Negroes use their over •. as SOOll as tl1eir candidate gets in 1 to office. No shetiff in this town retires public, I'ci have to arm mys.elf to the I own bathrooms. They do not use white with less than a fortune: he spends a teeth, and e\•en then [ wouldn't be safe j people's bathrooms . The Negro has his few n·undred dollars to get himself .in, sleeping in my own house at night. The. I CONTINUED NEXT PAGE A Native Son CONTINUED DOCTORS WHO PRESCRIBE FOR FRE.EDOM own part of town to live in. T his is called The Medical Committee for Human The MCHR has established itself in .our South~rn Way of Life.' Rights (MCHR) was established in. re seven communities in Mississippi: C.an MethOdically. resourcefully, and will sponse to a request from COFO in New ton, Clarksdale, Greenwood, Hattiesburg, fully. white Mississipi has subdued the York City on June 27, 19Q4. At that time Meridian, Jackson and McComb. Its per black man. And now. at last, t!Je black it consisted of a small gro1.1p of promi sonnel work on a rotating team. basis for man ·dominates the white. Even in tiJe nent doctors fro111 that city. Since July a:bout a week at a time, at which time a subjugation that continues. the Mississi the Committee's office has served as an new medical staff· arrives from the north ppi Negro dom,inates the. thoughts, the administrative center to channel doctors and the previous group leaves. They emotions.. the politics, tiJe conscience of from all over the country who wish to represent .J;Ilany fields of specialization. the white .man. By his presence lje dom go to Mississippi. By the· first of Septem~ ln the wee!<: of August 31, 'there were inates the economy. By his plight he her, a total of 98 medical personnel had two psychiatrists, two pediatricians, an dominates the present. And by America's worked for short periods on a rotating intern, a ·dermatologist, an orthopedic insistence on aitering that plight he dom basis in tiJe Summer Project. surgeon, a cardiologist and three reg inates the future. Because the medical ·staff is not li istered nurses. About this same number Just as it once took the Federal govern censed to practice in the sta:te, its con is present in tiJe state each week. ment to free the slaves , an_d '¥ill take tribution consists primarily· of advice Each indiYidual doctor arranges with it again to mee the Mississippi black and moral support. One of .the most im tiJe MCHR in New York for his tim.e in from subjugation, so in all lil