LOOKS. LIKE A LONG, HOT SUMMER®
By Evelyn Sell
Negro militants are continually warned that protest demonstrations will lose them the support of their “liberal white friends," When the Brooklyn branch of the Congress of Racial Equality [CORE] announced its plans to tie up New York World's Fair traffic on opening day April 22, national leaders quickly denounced the idea as a serious blow against the passage of the civil-rights bill being debated in the U.S.Senate,
Newspaper editorials insisted that “civil wrongs don!t make for civil rights.’ FBI [Federal Bureau of Investigation, U.S. version of political police department] director J, Edgar Hoover warned about Gommnunist infiltration into the civil-rights movement, .Con~ servative Negro publications and leaders deplored the situation and urged their white "friends" to ignore the "hot~headed" militants,
Is it really true that intensified demonstrations will alien~ ate white citizens and endanger civil-rights progress?
Events since the World's Fair. opening prove that the continued struggle of the Negro people is forcing more -- not less --~ groups to take stands against. Jim Crow and-for first-class citizenship for all Amerioans. The recent actions of conservative, respectable church groups is a good example of this. 7
-. On April e7 Archbishop Toolen ordered the desegregation of all-Roman Catholic schools in Alabama and northwestern Florida, About 80 elementary and 13 high schools with 25,000 students are involved in this order which goes into effect in September, Also on April 27, the Southern Presbyterian Church ordered integration of its presbyteries in seven states, This order now integrates 43 Negro churches with the 2,560 all-white presbyteries in North and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisi- ANaAe-- , . ;
On April 28 leaders of organized religion demanded that the Senate pass the civil-rights bill -- right away and in full. An overflow crowd of over 6,500. Protestants, Catholics and Jews gathered in Washington for a "Witness to Racial Justice," They heard their leaders call for a crusade for equal rights. This meeting was only the beginning of a concerted drive by religious groups for passage of civil-rights legislation and for increased efforts to "further the Negro revolution,"
Church historians call these interfaith declarations an unusual departure from traditional practices. The Freedom Now move-~ ment has stirred religious bodies and leaders more than any other public issue in the last thirty years, One midwestern senator (name withheld by the newspapers) complained about "all those damn preach-
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ers" invading his office during the civil-rights debate.
As the Negroes continue to press their demands, church groups continue to give their support to speedy passage of the civil-rights bill in order to avoid "another long, hot summer over civil rights -with blood in the streets,
On May 5 delegates to the world-wide General Conference of the Methodist Church adopted a policy which called on all Methodist preachers and congregations to open their churches to all races and to work actively to remove racial barriers in all phases of public life, The conference, after strong grass-roots pressure, also adopted a plan to eliminate the church!s Central Jurisdiction which was set up for 375,000 Negro members, They will now be integrated. into the five: other jurisdictions which were drawn up on a geographical basis. On May 7 the conference set up a special fund to assist ministers and laymen who suffer hardships as a result or Joining civil-rights demonstrations.
Of course, not all members of the religious community agree with these procivil-rights proposals and sentiments, Negroes attempting to move into a Catholic neighborhood in Pennsylvania were stoned, An Episcopal minister in North Carolina quit the church and took part of his congregation with him in protest against the . national church's procivil-rights stand. Catholic leaders and newspapers denounced Alabama Governor Wallace's political campaigning in the North and urged their parishioners not to vote for the racist governor, "The archbishop can go to hell," one Catholic layman exclaimed while at a Wallace rally, “I'm not going to let him tell me how to vote," Wallace received a heavy vote in Catholic neighborhoods in Wisconsin and Indiana during the presidential primaries, .
The church leaders are now harvesting the: crop of prejudice and ignorance which they helped plant and nurture over many long years, They had made pious declarations about the brotherhood of: man but they didn't practice such brotherhood in the daily aotivi+ | ties of the church, The very fact that they must now call for integrated schools and congregations condemns them and reveals that these hypocrites practiced segregation for many years.
The sudden change of heart towards Negroes did not come from deep religious feelings but was forced upon organized religion by the overpowering, compelling strength and determination of the Negro struggle. Conservative religious leaders are now fearful that if some civil rights are not given voluntarily, the Negro revolt will roll inexorably on and take everything it demands even if this means a violent struggle,
It is not only religious -leaders who fear the coming "long, hot summer" of racial struggle, Liberal Senator Humphrey warns now that the civil-rights bill must be passed by July 1 "for one reason and only one, All the young folks will -be out of college by the
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end of June, And they're raring to go, The only thing they like to do is demonstrate against the present order, They are rebels, It's a part of the chemistry of a normal young fellow or young woman, And they're also idealists. And this civil rights movement with them has become a great movement and a great ideal,"
Humphrey continued: “Now if we don't: pass this bill, so that these young people know something has happened, there's going to be more trouble by accident in this country than anybody could have dreamed by purpose,"
Conservative Negro laader Whitney Young of the Urban League adds that as "the long, hot summer comes rushing upon us with whirlwind speed -- the Senate remains inactive and irresolute, . . Unless immediate and far-reaching steps are taken instantly by the President and the Congress, I do not think there is any Negro leader who will dare to say that he is responsible for his membership or that he could dare to speak for the Negro community. it
Yes, ‘they are all fearful and it. is this fear, and not any moderation or calm negotiations, that make them at last willing to give a little, The Negroes have waited too long however to be content with crumbs; they are too strong now to be stopped by half-way MEASUPOS «
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