Pillar of Fire (102 page)

Bevel obtained: Int. Hollis Watkins, June 21, 1992; “Report on meeting at Wesley Methodist Church,” March 18, 1963, A/SC41f7.

80 percent by the estimate: Hearings, House Judiciary Subcommittee No. 5, May 28, 1963, p. 1260.

“This is why you have”: Ibid., p. 1259.

“We killed two-month-old Indian babies”: NYT, April 6, 1963, p. 20.

“The chances are that”: Andrew Young to “Reverend and Mrs. James Bevel,” Feb. 21, 1963, A/SC41f5.

“Are you from Greenwood?”: Int. June Johnson, April 9, 1992.

more than six hundred sharecroppers: Zinn,
New Abolitionists
, p. 88.

“We just mean to register”:
Story of Greenwood, Mississippi
, Folkways Record FD5593.

destroying four stores: Hearings, House Judiciary Subcommittee No. 5, May 28, 1963, p. 1285.

galvanized many sharecroppers: Branch,
Parting
, pp. 712-25.

on February 25 and 26:
Story of Greenwood, Mississippi
, Folkways Record FD5593.

federal staff investigator: Chester Relyea of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission was arrested at the Greenwood bus station when he arrived on March 15 to investigate the cutoff of surplus foods and the lunch programs in the local public schools.
New Orleans Times-Picayune
, March 21, 1963.

Kennedy himself pushed: Cf. RFK “Speak to me” note on Burke Marshall's memo to RFK dated March 7, 1963, Box 16, Burke Marshall Papers, JFK.

Medgar Evers reported: Evers monthly report dated March 6, 1963, III-H-155, NAACP.

cosmetic salve: Harris,
Dreams Die Hard
, pp. 37-38; Meier,
Black Protest Thought
, p. 334; Evers to Gloster Current, Dec. 24, 1962, and Current reply to Evers, Feb. 26, 1963, III-H-155, NAACP.

Evers pushed New York: Evers,
For Us, the Living
, p. 252; int. Myrlie Evers, March 13, 1989; int. Andrew Young, Oct. 26, 1991.

Ponder heard Bevel: Annell Ponder, “Greenwood Citizenship Report, March 1963,” A/SC41f7.

Septima Clark: Clark,
Echo in My Soul
; Clark,
Ready from Within
; Branch,
Parting
, pp. 263-64, 381-82, 575-78, 654, 899; Septima Clark Oral History, 1983, HOH.

first church-based literacy classes: Annell Ponder, “Greenwood Citizenship Report, March 1963,” A/SC41f7.

more than 150 sharecroppers: Ibid.

“Who is going to believe”:
Greenwood Commonwealth
, March 20, 1963.

set fire to the COFO office: Hearings, House Judiciary Subcommittee No. 5, May 28, 1963, p. 1295.

all eight women: Annell Ponder, “Greenwood Citizenship Report, March 1963,” A/SC41f7.

Moses made occasional remarks:
Story of Greenwood, Mississippi
, Folkways Record FD5593.

officers with guns: Zinn,
New Abolitionists
, pp. 91-92.

Sudden spasms: Forman,
Black Revolutionaries
, pp. 296-98; Branch,
Parting
, pp. 717-21.

Negroes scattered: Branch,
Parting
, pp. 719-20.

Cleveland Jordan half dragged: Ida Mae Holland eyewitness report dated March 31, 1963, A/SC41f7.

Medgar Evers earned thunderous: Medgar Evers special report dated April 1, 1963, III-H-155, NAACP.

“the court must decide”: NYT, April 4, 1963, p. 10.

“(b) suit”: Under the 1957 statute that applied to voting, the Justice Department filed civil suits under Section 1971(a), which prohibited discrimination, and under Section 1971(b), which prohibited intimidation of prospective voters. “We called them (a) suits and (b) suits,” recalled John Doar. The (b) suits were more difficult, more controversial, and rarer. Int. John Doar, May 12, 1986.

any trace of euphoria: Branch,
Parting
, pp. 723-25.

vacuum of public order: Int. John Doar, Oct. 29, 1984.

point of rebellion: Int. John Doar, Oct. 25, 1983.

Johnson boldly told Moses: Int. June Johnson, April 9, 1992.

Greenwood supplied sixty: Forman,
Black Revolutionaries
, p. 305.

symptoms of nonviolent combat fatigue: Branch,
Parting
, pp. 732-34.

“It's still not clear”: Forman,
Black Revolutionaries
, pp. 305-7.

Hamer signed up: Mills,
Fannie Lou Hamer
, p. 51; Annell Ponder, “Greenwood Citizenship Report, March 1963,” A/SC41f7.

skeletal visage of Kennard: Kennard was released on January 28, 1963, as recorded in the
Hattiesburg American
of the next day. Research courtesy of Jan Hillegas.

what transfixed Victoria Gray: Int. Victoria Gray Adams, May 14, 1991.

hitched a ride alone: Int. Victoria Gray Adams, May 14, 1991.

6. T
REMORS
: L.A.
TO
S
ELMA

Bevel was in Birmingham: Branch,
Parting
, p. 734ff.

Walker's tactical innovations: Ibid., p. 730.

Bevel showed a film: Int. James Bevel, May 16-17, 1985. The film was an NBC White Paper entitled
Nashville Sit-ins
, produced by Bob Young, who later produced the 1964 feature film on the movement era,
Nothing but a Man
.

not just the older teenagers: Argument over the use of children in demonstrations from Branch,
Parting
, pp. 747-55.

line of fifty teenagers: Ibid., pp. 756-802.

trampled the chain-link fence: Int. Andrew Young, Oct. 26, 1991.

“Now this ‘male Negro' business”: Testimony of Lee Logan, May 6, 1963, BTT, p. 718ff.

all-white jury was probably best: Int. Earl Broady, Nov. 4, 1990, and March 25, 1991.

begin to admit: Ibid.

For a month now: Jury selection in the Muslim trial began on April 8, 1963. The last verdicts were announced on June 14, 1963.

up to 250 armed deputies: ANP news release dated June 17, 1963, b384f8, Claude Barnet Papers, CHS.

“Your Honor”: BTT, p. 723.

“might pull a Muslim”: LAT, May 6, 1963.

“As a Muslim”: BTT, p. 1303.

“Just for the record”: BTT, p. 365.

Kuykendall was to remain: Int. Paul Kuykendall, Feb. 7, 1992; int. Jesse Brewer, June 13, 1991; int. Samuel Hunter, Feb. 6, 1992; int. Frank Tomlinson, Oct. 15, 1991.

fn “The average so-called Negro”: Malcolm X interview on the radio program
At Random
, March 3, 1963, FMXNY-3434.

Muslim witnesses denied: BTT,
passim
; int. Wazir Muhammad (Randolph Sidle), March 27, 1991; int. Karim Muhammad (Troy Augustine) by Jonah Edelman, June 14, 1991.

“We are not sitting idly by”: Branch,
Parting
, p. 778ff.

Zeno testified: BTT, pp. 1397-98.

no human being could endure: Ibid., pp. 2590-91.

admitted feeling resentment: (Defendant Nathaniel X. Rivers), ibid., p. 1867.

“Are you a registered”: Int. Amelia Boynton Robinson, Aug. 7, 1990; int. Bernard Lafayette, May 28, 1990.

Lafayette canvassed: Int. Bernard Lafayette, May 28, 1990.

and other pastors refused: Ibid. Also Chestnut,
Black in Selma
, pp. 160-63.

“They don't feel disposed”: Int. Rev. L. L. Anderson, May 27, 1990.

“I understand you call yourself”: Ibid.

“No, no, brother pastor”: Ibid.

Tuesday evening, May 14: Tabernacle mass meeting from Chestnut,
Black in Selma
, pp. 163-65; STJ, May 15, 1963; Forman,
Black Revolutionaries
, p. 318. Also int. Bernard Lafayette, May 28, 1990; int. Rev. L. L. Anderson, May 27, 1990; remarks of Bernard Lafayette at Session No. 3, Part 1, of the Trinity College SNCC Reunion, April 14-16, 1988, transcript courtesy of Jack Chatfield.

758 racial demonstrations: Branch,
Parting
, p. 825.

7. M
ARX IN THE
W
HITE
H
OUSE

“I cannot condone”: Branch,
Parting
, p. 761.

“extreme and extremely dangerous”: AJ, May 10, 1963, p. 26.

“School children participating”: Branch,
Parting
, p. 762.

“making a fool of himself”: LAT, May 5, 1963.

“any man who puts”: Lomax,
When the Word Is Given
, p. 85.

“You can't call it results”: Malcolm X interview on WUST radio, May 12, 1963, FMX-64.

“Grievances of the Two”: MS, June 21, 1963, p. 1.

more stories about race: Rough news comparisons drawn from
New York Times
index entries for “Negroes,” “NATO,” “TV and Radio,” and “Malcolm X (Little)” as follows: 1962 NYT Index, pp. 582, 643-50, 709-15, 900-907; 1963 NYT Index, pp. 489, 535-59, 596-604, 774-80; 1964 NYT Index, pp. 592, 656-91, 750-58, 1000-1005.

nine per week: Muse,
American Negro Revolution
, p. 39.

“have moved out in front”:
U.S. News & World Report
, July 29, 1963, quoted in ibid.

“doomed to founder”:
National Review
, July 2, 1963, pp. 519-20.

“The Peace Corps has won”: Bill Moyers to Shriver, May 15, 1963, Box 41, Moyers Papers, LBJ.

“You have me reeling”: Ibid.; int. Sargent Shriver, June 29, 1993.

President Kennedy met privately: Branch,
Parting
, pp. 796-809.

“might tear up that paper agreement”: White House meeting, May 12, 1963, Audiotape 86.2, JFK.

“We ought to have him”: White House meeting, May 20, 1963, Audiotape 88.4, JFK.

chorus of Baldwin's choosing: Branch,
Parting
, pp. 809-13.

Kennedy marked Jones: Ibid., p. 812.

Kennedy hurled his conflicted energies: Burke Marshall Oral History, LBJ.

On May 29, Johnson: Transcript of the May 29, 1963, meeting of the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, office files of George Reedy, Container 7, LBJ.

“‘Why should we hire Negroes?'”: Branch,
Parting
, p. 807.

“Can I obtain from you immediately”: Page 26, transcript of the May 29, 1963, meeting of the President's Committee on Equal Employment Opportunity, office files of George Reedy, Container 7, LBJ.

“period and paragraph”: Ibid., p. 68.

Antonio Taylor of New Mexico: Ibid., p. 86.

magnified his humiliation: Edison Dictaphone Recording of LBJ-Sorensen conversation, June 3, 1963, p. 14, LBJ.

distinguished public appointees: The public appointees to the employment committee included United Auto Workers president Walter Reuther, industrialist Edgar Kaiser, Dean Francis B. Sayre of the Washington Cathedral, and Rabbi Jacob J. Weinstein of Temple KAM in Chicago. Rabbi Weinstein recorded his impressions of the tense meeting in a letter to his friend Arthur Goldberg, then the newest Supreme Court Justice, about the meeting. “For 4½ hours we really sweated it out as Lyndon Johnson and Robert Kennedy engaged in a sharp dialogue,” wrote Weinstein, “the one defending the Committee against the other's sharp probing into its methods.” Jacob J. Weinstein Papers, 14f3, CHS.

the Memorial Day address: Vice President's Daily Diary for Thursday, May 30, 1963, LBJ. Also programs, invitations, and memos in Statements, Box 80, LBJ.

berated his staff: Int. Horace Busby, Feb. 12, 1992.

“One hundred years ago”: Statements, Box 80, LBJ.

To the end of his life: Int. Horace Busby, Feb. 12, 1992. Cf. “The President wanted you to have a copy of his 1963 Memorial Day speech….” Harry McPherson to Adam Clayton Powell, Dec. 26, 1968, White House Central File, Name File, LBJ.

Not once had he been consulted: Burke Marshall Oral History, LBJ.

briefing notes over the shoulder: Lee White Oral History, fifth interview, March 17, 1970, JFK. Also Lee White Oral History, Sept. 28, 1970, LBJ; int. Lee White, Dec. 13, 1983.

the Vice President wilted: White House meeting of June 1, 1963, Audiotape 90.3, JFK.

personal nemesis, Robert Kennedy: Johnson refers to his conversation with Kennedy in Edison Dictaphone recording of LBJ-Sorensen conversation, June 3, 1963, pp. 6-7, LBJ.