The Chicago ‘Advance Team’: the Evolution of College Activists
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ABSTRACT THE CHICAGO ‘ADVANCE TEAM’: THE EVOLUTION OF COLLEGE ACTIVISTS The tumultuous years of the 1960s evolved from the thaw of the Cold War era. College campuses’ emerging interest in the Civil Rights movement was exacerbated by the escalating violence within the Deep South. By the time events from Selma, Alabama reached the living rooms and college dorm rooms in the North, waves of activism had spread across the nation. This study follows a group of college activists who traveled south, quickly adapted to movement strategy, and forged lifetime friendships while working for Dr. Martin Luther King’s organization, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Most of the core group stayed in the South in the summer of 1965 after completing non- violence training in Atlanta. Showing exemplary skills and leadership qualities, they would eventually form Rev. James Bevel’s ‘advance team’ within the Chicago Freedom Movement. This ‘elite’ unit fought their own battles against poverty, racism, and violence while in Chicago. Their story is one from below, and captures the heart and spirit of true activism, along with memories of music, rent strikes, a lead-poisoning campaign, and even a love affair, within the Chicago Freedom Movement in 1965-1966. Samuel J LoProto May 2016 THE CHICAGO ‘ADVANCE TEAM’: THE EVOLUTION OF COLLEGE ACTIVISTS by Samuel J LoProto A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in History in the College of Social Sciences California State University, Fresno May 2016 APPROVED For the Department of History: We, the undersigned, certify that the thesis of the following student meets the required standards of scholarship, format, and style of the university and the student's graduate degree program for the awarding of the master's degree. Samuel J LoProto Thesis Author Ethan Kytle (Chair) History Blain Roberts History Daniel Cady History For the University Graduate Committee: Dean, Division of Graduate Studies AUTHORIZATION FOR REPRODUCTION OF MASTER’S THESIS I grant permission for the reproduction of this thesis in part or in its entirety without further authorization from me, on the condition that the person or agency requesting reproduction absorbs the cost and provides proper acknowledgment of authorship. X Permission to reproduce this thesis in part or in its entirety must be obtained from me. Signature of thesis author: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I want to thank Ethan Kytle, Blain Roberts, and Daniel Cady for generously assisting me in many ways during my time here at Fresno State. The Department of History has given me the thirst for knowledge, and I am eternally grateful. Additional thanks go to Gary Rice and Maritere Lopez for their guidance and support. I also want to thank my good friend Jimmy Collier, who gave his insight and expertise into the movement, while extending a helping hand through his personal friends and colleagues, who lived through the struggle to share their memoirs. Collier’s undying message will always be, Peace and Freedom. TABLE OF CONTENTS Page CHAPTER 1: PROLOGUE ..................................................................................... 1 CHAPTER 2: INTRODUCTION, AMERICA AWAKENS ................................. 11 CHAPTER 3: BEYOND SELMA. SCOPE: THE SUMMER OF COMMUNITY ORGANIZING & POLITICAL EDUCATION ............... 20 CHAPTER 4: CHICAGO: THE WINDY CITY—THE ‘ADVANCE TEAM’ GRADUATES ............................................................................................. 50 CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION ............................................................................... 87 BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................. 91 APPENDIX: RELEASE FORMS .......................................................................... 94 CHAPTER 1: PROLOGUE Modern-day histories of the civil rights movement generally begin with the 1954 landmark Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education, and climax in the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which together unwound the noose of “southern-style racial segregation.”1 Other exhaustive studies are more inclined to extend their scholarship to the bitter end, focusing on the death of Dr. Martin Luther King in 1968 and the rise of the Black Power movement, which effectively splintered the non-violent philosophies of Dr. King and his framework of benevolent organizations.2 While these major political accomplishments changed the complexion of daily life in the Deep South, their deeper significance reflected the constant struggle faced by the poor black Southerner, who for nearly one hundred years lived with Jim Crow prior to these milestones being enacted into law. In retrospect and reality, these were in many ways the gratification of broken promises made during the period of Reconstruction, merely enforcing the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution.3 Existing scholarship of the modern-day civil rights movement is increasing in popularity, yet most studies are generally focused from the ‘top down’. The study presented here in contrast could certainly be considered an approach ‘from below’, through the lens of a small yet radical group of activists working under the supervision of Rev. James Bevel, while free-lancing as community organizers 1 Thomas J. Sugrue, Sweet Land of Liberty: The Forgotten Struggle for Civil Rights in the North (NY: Random House, 2008), p. xiii. 2 Renee C. Romano & Leigh Raiford, eds., The Civil Rights Movement in American Memory (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2006), p. xxi. 3 Bruce E Baker, What Reconstruction Meant: Historical Memory in the American South (VA: University of Virginia Press, 2007), p. 164. 2 during the Chicago Freedom Movement in 1965-66. The Chicago ‘advance team’ earned their name while technically working as foot soldiers under the umbrella of Dr. King and his Southern Christian Leadership Conference. This radical group of a dozen or so ‘foot soldiers’ grew to trust each other in the field, beginning with their involvement in Selma, Alabama, followed by a summer of voter registration drives in neighboring rural counties. As they morphed into the creative and ‘elite’ unit that they were by the time they were called up to Chicago, this group of college activists deserve recognition for their grassroots organizing in five different campaigns while working for the SCLC. Perhaps our study should be considered a history ‘from the middle’, covering the years 1965-1966, while in three different regions of the U.S. As it turned out the summer of 1965 would mark “the end of an era” of sorts. The “major non-violent, interracial civil rights protests” were a thing of the past. The March on Washington and the police dogs and fire hoses of Birmingham most definitely captured the nation’s attention, but the sympathetic eyes of the North settled onto the Selma-to- Montgomery march with more interest than any other “black-led political protest” of the era.4 The blood and dust had barely settled on the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama, when it was evident to mainstream civil rights organizations that the “tide of non-violent direct action” had reached its end throughout the South. It was time for the executive staff of the SCLC to “debate, discuss, and decide their options.” Dr. King and his executive staff retreated to Atlanta to rest tired and aching feet from the Selma march as the brass started planning a tour of the North, targeting the cities of Philadelphia, Cleveland, Detroit, and New York. Dr. King 4 Dr. Clayborne Carson, Martin’s Dream: My Journey and the Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr. (NY: St. Martin’s Press, 2013), p. 35. 3 had his eyes set on a large northern city where he would launch another meaningful campaign. Yet, for all his victories in the South, which brought down the “state sanctioned denials of basic” de jure “political and civil rights”, King would be up against a wall of resistance while tackling the “de facto segregation” and housing discrimination of the North.5 Bevel had moved to Chicago on his own immediately after Dr. King’s crowning speech on the steps of the state capitol in Montgomery after the victory at Selma. Bevel was anxious to reunite with his good friend and fellow American Baptist Seminary graduate, Bernard Lafayette, which turned out to be an alliance that may have been the “critical factor” in Dr. King’s decision to come to Chicago. Lafayette had come to Selma to help Bevel, and Bevel wanted to reciprocate. Lafayette was now chair of the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) which was one of many of community organizations in Chicago destined to be a part of the Coordinating Council of Community Organizations (CCCO). Lafayette’s wife, Colia Liddel, was a member of the West Side Christian Parish (WSCP) which would play an important role in the lives of the elite Chicago ‘advance team’ as she worked alongside her good friend, Bevel’s wife, Diane Nash.6 During the long hot summer of 1965, the SCLC field staff was busy with the Summer Community Organizing and Political Education project (SCOPE) deep within the rural counties of Alabama. The campaign focused around a voter registration drive similar to the previous Freedom Summer campaign in 1964 organized by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Back in 5 James R. Ralph, Northern Protest: Martin Luther King Jr., Chicago, and the Civil Rights Movement (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1993),