NEGRO PUBLICATIONS. Newspapers. When federal troops marched into Oxford, Miss., following the desegrega­ tion of the University of Mississippi in September 1962, the circulation of Negro newspapers across the country reached an all-year high. As the tension subsided and it became apparent that James H. Meredith, the first known Negro ever to be enrolled by "Ole Miss,” would be allowed to remain, the aggregate circulation of Negro newspapers dwindled again to an approximate 1.5 million. Since the end of World War II, when the nation’s Negro newspapers began a general decline in both number and cir­ culation, racial crises have been the principal spur to periodic —and usually temporary—circulation increases. The editor of a Detroit Negro weekly equated the survival of the Negro press with the prevailing degree of Jim Crow. "If racial discrimination and enforced segregation were ended tomor­ row,” he suggested, "the Negro press would all but disappear from the national scene.” While this statement is a deliberate oversimplification of the situation, it is borne out, to some extent, by the recent history of the Negro press. In 1948, six years before the Supreme Court desegregation decision, there were some 202 Negro newspapers with a total circulation of 3 million. But in 1962, according to the annual report of the Lincoln (Mo.) University School of Journalism, the number of Negro news­ papers—daily, weekly, semiweekly, and biweekly—had shrunk to 133, with a gross circulation of just over half the 1948 figure. The Pittsburgh Courier, which in 1948 boasted a national weekly circulation of 300,000, now sells about 86,000 copies in its various editions. The Negro press came into existence as a means of pro­ testing racial inequities and to serve as a voice for the ostracized Negro minority. As the newspapers broadened their coverage, they also became the medium through which the Negro community kept abreast of its social, religious, and business activity, areas of Negro life usually ignored by the general press. In recent years, northern urban dailies have begun routinely publishing news about Negroes; some papers, such as the New York Times and the Washington Post and weeks, racial desegregation in Tennessee will be totally accom­ Times Herald, include news and photos of Negroes in the plished, and there will be no need for a Negro newspaper. society pages. The effect on the circulation of Negro news­ In a move aimed at stemming losses of circulation and papers has been drastic. However, in matters of severe racial prestige, the Chicago Defender, one of the two Negro dailies crisis or controversy, Negroes still tend to distrust the view­ in the United States (the Daily World, published in Atlanta, point of the general—or white—press and turn to the Negro Ga., is the other), rehired Ben Burns, a white editor who press for what is considered a more enlightened and sympa­ had worked on the paper in the 1930’s and early 1940’s. thetic coverage of the news. Burns is one of the few white editors associated with the The 1962 Lincoln University report indicates that while Negro press. Negro newspapers are steadily declining in number, they are Of the half-dozen Negro newspapers launched in 1962, two again making modest gains in circulation. In 1961, for ex­ of the more important ones come from Chicago, and both are ample, there were 142 Negro newspapers (nine more than in weeklies. The Owl, a sixteen-page magazine-sized paper de­ 1962), but their aggregate circulation was only 1,470,038 voted to expose, was founded by Dan Burley, a columnist, (34,318 less than in 1962). However, a breakdown reveals humorist, and raconteur widely known in the Negro com­ that the most significant increases in circulation were made by munity. Burley died of a heart attack in early November, two papers like the Los Angeles Sentinel (28,457) and the Cali­ months after starting the paper. The other new Chicago-based fornia Eagle (20,550), which are located in areas receiving weekly is the national organ of the controversial Black Muslim huge numbers of Negro migrants. Of the thirty-one Negro sect. Called Muhammad Speaks, it is a twenty-four-page tabloid newspapers which ceased operation in 1961, all but four were with screaming front-page headlines and numerous illustra­ published in the South (twenty-two new Negro newspapers tions. Though given to sensationalism and rabble-rousing, came into existence during that year). The only new Negro Muhammad Speaks is much better edited and is supported by newspaper to invest in expensive press equipment was the far more advertisers than are many older and more respectable Illustrated News, a Detroit weekly which also had the dubious Negro newspapers. It makes a direct appeal to Negro chauvin­ distinction of being censured by the Michigan Fair Campaign ism and to Negro resentment of racial discrimination in Practices Commission for allegedly making "racist” appeals to American life. Under a headline reading "A House Doomed the Negro electorate during the election campaigns. In Nash­ To Fall” and the byline of the sect’s leader, Elijah Muhammad, ville, Tenn., a Negro weekly was born with the exotic name a front-page story stated: "We cannot deny the fact that the of The 780 Countdown. The paper’s founder, Raymond W. Christian West is responsible for this universal corruption in Powell, explained that its purpose was to "promote com­ the land and sea. From the same corruption that their hands munity welfare, build community businesses, protect people’s have wrought will come their doom. The Christians preach interests and Constitutional rights” for the next 780 weeks, or that which they do not do, and cannot do. Such as 'Love thy fifteen years. The apparent assumption is that after 780 neighbor.’ I have as yet to meet one who loved his neighbor 423 424 NEGRO PUBLICATIONS

as he did himself. 'Thou shall not kill.’ I have as yet to meet Magazines. In 1962, the world’s biggest, slickest, and such a Christian.” A headline below read in two-inch letters: richest Negro magazine grew even bigger, slicker, and richer. "Afro-Asians Tell Kennedy-Khrushchev: LET CUBA LIVE Ebony, which came into existence seventeen years ago as a IN PEACE!” Muhammad Speaks is sold on newsstands and monthly version of Life, attained a circulation peak of 752,- by hawkers on the street. It is also distributed by subscription 000 during the year. And though the advertising volume among the estimated 100,000 Black Muslims in the United (86014 pages) was some eighty-four pages less than the States. record i960 total of 944pages, higher rates brought in Compared to Muhammad Speaks, most other Negro news­ record advertising revenue for the year. papers are pallid in their approach to the problems of racial The rosy statistics which characterized Ebony, however, discrimination and civil rights. Nevertheless, Attorney General were not matched by any other of the small group of maga­ Robert Kennedy was sufficiently concerned about sensational zines aimed at the Negro community. The second most pop­ reporting of racial incidents to make an appeal to Negro ular and prosperous Negro-oriented magazine, Jet, continued publishers. Addressing the annual meeting of the National its decline from a peak 650,000 weekly circulation reached in Newspaper Publishers’ Association (NNPA) (to which pub­ 1955 following the murder of fourteen-year-old Emmett Till lisher Elijah Muhammad does not belong) in Washington, in Mississippi. Jet, a pocket-sized news weekly patterned after D.C., the Attorney General stressed the idea that Negro news­ the now-defunct Cowles magazine, Quick, sells approximately papers have the responsibility to report progress in removing 375,000 copies a week. Like Ebony and the monthly maga­ racial barriers in addition to making protests against existing zines Tan and Negro Digest, Jet is published in Chicago by discrimination. "I do not suggest that you be soft on prejudice the Negro-owned Johnson Publishing Company. or discrimination,” he told the Negro publishers, "but you In a move calculated to challenge Ebony’s near-domination have a duty to tell the full story. If your stories are sensation­ of the Negro picture-magazine field, the Good Publishing seeking, slanted, or vindictive, the Negro community will Company of Fort Worth, Texas, launched a major reorganiza­ mirror this attitude. If you dwell upon the remaining flaws tion plan and advertising campaign for its leading contender, and do not report progress as well, disillusionment will Sepia, a frank imitation of Ebony printed on offset presses in follow.” the firm’s home offices. The Good Publishing Company’s On March 16 the NNPA, which for the past twenty-four president, white Texas millionaire George Levitan, called in years has sponsored National Negro Newspaper Week, cele­ as consultants two former Ebony employees, editor A. S. brated the 135th anniversary of the Negro press in America. Young and artist Ben Byrd, and revamped the magazine’s According to the association, the first Negro newspaper was format. He also hired New York advertising representatives founded in New York City on March 16, 1827, by West to go after a larger share of the Negro magazine advertising Indies-born John B. Russwurm, reputedly the first Negro dollar. Sepia’s circulation is quoted at 100,000. university graduate (B. A., Bowdoin, 1826), and Samuel E. Like the Johnson Publishing Company, the Good Publish­ Cornish, a Presbyterian minister. The NNPA in 1962 pre­ ing Company produces four magazines: Sepia, Bronze Thrills, sented its annual Russwurm Award for "outstanding achieve­ Hep, and Jive. The latter three, as the names suggest, are ment” to Andrew Hatcher, White House press secretary. editorially lightweight, pulp-style publications of the confes­ In 1962, the Associated Negro Press (ANP), which has sion-show-business variety, each quoted as having a circulation its center in Chicago, enlarged its World News Service to of some 90,000. They do not approach in quality of style or include some 200 African newspapers. The ANP, founded by content their Chicago-published counterpart, Tan, which is as Claude A. Barnett in 1919, is the oldest and largest Negro slick a product as the general-circulation confession magazines news-gathering agency in the world. Three times weekly, the True Story and True Confessions. Some 150,000 copies of ANP supplies between seventy-five and eighty newspapers in Tan are sold monthly, almost without promotional effort of the United States with news stories, articles, syndicated col­ any kind from the publisher. umns, and features. The agency maintains full-time staffs in Negro Digest, which was revived in 1961 after a ten-year Washington, D.C., and New York, with correspondents in hiatus, is the only popular magazine in America directed every major city. The ANP’s World News Service was primarily at Negroes with intellectual interests. It also is launched in 1959 by editor Enoc Waters, Jr., who traveled to perhaps the only Negro magazine which consistently criticizes twenty-three African countries to establish contacts with Afri­ and satirizes its readers. While some of the magazine’s articles can newspapers. Last June, the Associated Correspondents are reprinted and digested from other publications and books, News Service—the first Negro wire service—was opened in Negro Digest differs widely from its original model, Reader’s Washington, D.C. Digest, in that emphasis is placed on original and often con­ In October the Negro press lost one of its ablest and most troversial articles, short fiction, poetry, and notices and reviews influential personages when P. Bernard Young, Sr., publisher of current books. In the year and a half since its revival, of the Norfolk Journal and Guide, died in Norfolk, Va. For Negro Digest sales have fluctuated between 40,000 and fifty-two years, he had brought out the Bay area weekly, 80,000, averaging 65,000. Unlike its sister publications, the expanding it from a four-page, 500-copy sheet to a standard­ magazine does not yet accept advertising. Negro Digest, the sized newspaper with the largest circuition (33,495) of any first Johnson publication and the first commercially successful weekly—Negro or white—published below the Mason and national Negro magazine, was first published in 1942; it Dixon line. Best edited of all Negro newspapers, the Journal suspended publication in 1951. and Guide three times won Willkie Awards for excellence. The Chicago and Fort Worth publishers, for all practical Most Negro newspapers are weeklies, but some of the more purposes, seem to have cornered the Negro magazine business. important ones are published daily or twice weekly. The Like Negro newspapers, Negro magazines generally have Chicago Daily Defender (21,194) and the Atlanta Daily suffered from the effects of racial integration. The large gen­ World are the only dailies. Two papers associated with the eral circulation magazines are devoting increased space to Atlanta Daily World are published twice weekly—the Bir­ individual Negroes and to the Negro community and reaping mingham World (9,800) and the Memphis World. In the a bountiful harvest of Negro readers. Last January, when the North, the Philadelphia Tribune (23,154) and two of the Saturday Evening Post came out with a cover story on "Our five editions of the Baltimore-based Afro-American are pub­ Negro Aristocracy,” Negro readers all but stampeded the lished twice weekly. With a total circulation of more than newsstands. The same article in a Negro magazine would 100,000, the Afro-American is the biggest Negro newspaper­ have met with mild enthusiasm, or with indifference, but its publishing enterprise. appearance in the Post signified a recognition by the white NEPAL 425

community apparently greatly desired by many Negroes. branches and activities across the country, The Crisis neverthe­ Partly because of the trend toward total coverage in the less also publishes current and historical articles concerning general magazines, no serious attempt was made during 1962 civil rights issues, Negro history, book reviews, editorials, and to introduce into the market a nationally circulated Negro news of Negro colleges. The Crisis manages to reach a com­ magazine. Rumors that The Urbanite, a 1961 publication that paratively large audience because a subscription to the maga­ had some success, would be reactivated proved groundless. zine is included with any NAACP membership of $3.50 or The New York-published, Loo^-sized magazine was founded more. The magazine sells at fifteen cents per copy or $1.50 by William M. Santos, a young Negro with more imagination a year. Hoyt W. Fuller than financial backing, and there was considerable hope throughout the Negro community that it would survive. As NEPAL. Politics. Nepal suffered from much unrest in slickly produced as Ebony, The Urbanite—as the name sug­ 1962. The king’s personal regime, established after his coup gests—was geared to the sophisticated, educated urban Negro d’etat in December i960, brought neither the promised and featured such innovations (for Negro magazines) as efficiency in government and administration nor any noticeable theater reviews by novelist James Baldwin, commentary by improvement in the standard of living. playwright Lorraine Hansberry, quality fiction, haute couture, During most of the year guerrilla forces, supported by and columns on food, wines, and travel. There was no effort opposition parties whose leaders are in exile in India, attacked to attract the mass Negro audience. Its failure—along with police posts, sabotaged government installations and communi­ the demise of Mode, an Omaha, Nebr., semimonthly in the cations, and spread propaganda by means of leaflets and clan­ image of Harper’s Bazaar—was attributed more to inadequate destine radio broadcasts. Most of these activities occurred in testing time on the market than to lack of appeal. border areas difficult for government forces to reach and close The new Negro magazines which did register a degree of to the safe refuge of Indian territory. success during 1962 did so by concentrating on local rather In an obvious attempt to maintain his popularity, the king than on national targets. Probably the most successful was released some political prisoners (but not former Prime Min­ Marquee, a pocket-sized semimonthly published in Chicago. ister B. P. Koirala) and restored some civil rights. He visited Though its format has apparently not yet been fully estab­ many parts of his realm but met with a number of unfriendly lished, Marquee is made up largely of gossip, social-club news, incidents and even an attempt on his life. provocative photographs, and upbeat features on show-business The king has sponsored a system of panchayat (village personalities. The magazine’s publisher, Donald Mcllvane, a council) democracy, which he claims is a form his people can commercial artist, turned to magazine publishing after Negro understand. By April about 4,800 village councils had been newspaper publishers declined to subscribe to his ambitious elected by a show of hands. These were in turn to elect rotogravure supplement, Tone. (Tone was published for a district councils, which would elect zonal councils, and the short period during i960 and 1961 as an independent maga­ zonal councils were to elect a national council by April 1963. zine.) Another Chicago-published pocket-sized magazine, Now, Nepalese intellectuals condemned this system as a fraud. Un­ conceived as local competition for Jet by former Jet associate disturbed by criticism, the king promulgated a new constitu­ editor Wesley South, was abandoned in midyear. In Novem­ tion on December 16. It declared Nepal an "independent, ber, a standard-sized monthly called Soul was launched in indivisible, sovereign and monarchical Hindu state” and con­ Pontiac, Mich. Like Marquee and Now, it features local centrated most of the power in the hands of the king, who gossip, club news, cheesecake, and blurbs on entertainers. nominates a council of ministers. Only advisory powers are Unlike the other two, however, it also publishes serious articles left to the national council. and fiction. None of the new magazines have been character­ India showed open sympathy with the banned Congress ized by a notable freshness of presentation, content, or view­ Party and its imprisoned leader, B. P. Koirala, and great con­ point, which might in large measure account for the cool cern over the king’s flirtations with China. It was feared by public response to them. some that the king would be unable to keep China’s machina­ The oldest continually published Negro magazines are tions in Nepal under control. Nepal accused India of "neo­ journals associated with educational institutions or race rela­ colonialism” and of encouraging and supporting Nepalese tions organizations. Perhaps the two most prestigious publica­ rebel invasions from Indian soil. tions of this group are the Journal of Negro History and the In April, the king and Indian Prime Minister Nehru met Negro History Bulletin, both published in Washington, D.C., in conference to solve these conflicts. But the king insisted by the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History. upon his right to deal with China as he saw fit, while the Both publications were founded by the late Carter G. Wood- son, widely known as "the father of Negro-History.” The HINDU PILGRIMS in Nepal cross a swaying suspension bridge over Journal, a traditional journal of historical scholarship, is pub­ the Kali Gandak River in the Himalayas on their way to a temple. lished quarterly; the Bulletin, which is standard magazine size and printed on slick paper, is less scholarly in approach, broader in coverage, and makes moderate use of historical illustrations, photographs, and maps. It is published eight times a year. Journals of considerable importance are also published at several Negro universities. Phylon, a "Review of Race and Culture,” is published at Atlanta University. The Journal of Negro Education, "a quarterly review of problems incident to the education of Negroes,” is published at Harvard University in Washington, D.C., by the Bureau of Educational Research. The Quarterly Review of Higher Education Among Negroes is published at Johnson C. Smith College in Charlotte, N.C. The best-known and most widely circulated of the Negro magazines of limited interest is The Crisis, the pocket-sized organ of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), published ten times yearly in New York. Primarily a magazine of record and report for NAACP 426 NETHERLANDS, THE

Prime Minister insisted that Nepalese political leaders had a NETHERLANDS, THE. Foreign Affairs. West New right of asylum in India. The meager result of the conference Guinea. The dispute between the Netherlands and Indonesia was an agreement to create joint commissions for the investi­ over the future of West New Guinea almost erupted into open gation of raids across the border. Yet the raids did not end war in 1962. On Sept. 26, 1961 Foreign Minister Luns of the until November, when the refugee organization in India an­ Netherlands informed the UN General Assembly that his gov­ nounced their cessation because of the Sino-Indian war. ernment was prepared to turn over control of West New Economic Development. Political friction did not halt Guinea to the United Nations. However, the proposal was the flow of aid and experts into Nepal. About 83 per cent of flatly rejected by Indonesia, and the discussions which fol­ Nepal’s development funds still came from abroad. The lowed were fruitless. United States was, as usual, the largest contributor, adding On December 19 President Sukarno called upon the Indo­ $3.6 million for the financial year to the previously com­ nesians to be ready for a general mobilization for the purpose mitted $11.2 million. India was second, followed by China, of "liberating” West New Guinea. President Kennedy and the Soviet Union, and Great Britain. Nepal has instituted acting Secretary General U Thant of the United Nations development plans devoted primarily to projects of long-range appealed to both countries to refrain from any action which benefit, such as roads, transport, communications, power, and might jeopardize peace. As a concession, Premier de Quay of basic industries. the Netherlands announced, on Jan. 3, 1962, that the Dutch government was dropping its demand that Indonesia accept Area and Population. Area, 54,000 sq. mi. Pop. (1961 cen­ sus), 9,400,000. Principal cities (est. 1959): Katmandu (cap.), the principle of self-determination for the Papuans (the 200,000; Patan, 95,000; Bhadgaon, 85,000. natives of West New Guinea) as a prior condition for negoti­ Government. New 1962 constitution proclaimed Nepal an "in­ ations. But, he remarked, this decision "does not detract from dependent, indivisible, sovereign and monarchical Hindu state.” our conviction that in the discussions we must consider the King, Mahendra Bir Bikram Shah Deva; foreign affairs minister, interests of the population.” To this, Indonesia replied that it Tulsi Giri; national guidance and home affairs minister, Vishwa would negotiate only if the Dutch agreed to transfer admin­ Bandu Thapa. istration of the territory to Indonesia. Finance. Monetary unit: Rupee = U.S.$o.i4. Budget (est. 1962- 1963, in rupees): revenue, 231,576,000; expenditure, 297,800,- It was reported on January 12 that Indonesian guerrillas 000. Development budget (July 1962-1965), 586,000,000, in­ were infiltrating West New Guinea, and on January 15 there cluding 480,000,000 in foreign aid. was an armed clash between Indonesian torpedo boats and Trade. Almost entirely with India. Dutch frigates, in which the former were routed. President Language. Nepalese is the main language; others are Newari, Sukarno ordered a general mobilization on February 24. In Maithili, Bhojpuri, Matadhi, and many different dialects in the the next six months attacks on Dutch New Guinea by Indo­ remote parts of the country. In accordance with the nationalist nesian guerrillas and paratroops persisted, without, however, campaign of the king, Hindi was abolished as an examination language in the university and on public signs. seriously embarrassing the Dutch, who gradually built up an Religion. Buddhism and Hinduism. armed force of 8,000 to 10,000 men in West New Guinea. Education. Literacy about 10 per cent among men, 3 per cent More serious for future developments was the strengthening among women. Tribhuvan University and Tri-Chandra College. of the Indonesian military and naval potential through the With American aid the number of primary and vocational schools acquisition of Soviet arms. is rapidly increasing. In the meantime, U Thant had again appealed to both sides Armed Forces. Army, 9,000; police, 5,000. WERNER LEVI to settle the dispute without bloodshed, and on January 17 he