Citizens' Councils
With about 60,000 members across the Southern United States,[3] the groups were founded primarily to oppose racial integration of public schools: the logical conclusion of the Brown v. Board of Education ruling.The Councils also worked to oppose voter registration efforts in the South (where most African Americans had been disenfranchised since the late 19th century) and integration of public facilities in general during the 1950s and 1960s.The Regional Council of Negro Leadership (RCNL), a grassroots civil rights organization founded in 1951 by T. R. M. Howard of the all-black town Mound Bayou, Mississippi, was based 40 miles from Indianola.[18][19] Among its other activities, throughout the last half of the 1950s, the White Citizens' Councils produced racist children's books, for instance, teaching that heaven (in the Christian conception) is segregated.[25] Although the White Citizens Councils publicly eschewed the use of violence,[2] they condoned the harsh economic and political tactics which were used against registered voters and activists.The members of the White Citizens Councils collaborated in order to threaten jobs, causing people to be fired or evicted from rental homes; they boycotted businesses, ensured that activists could not get loans, among other tactics."[17] Occasionally some Councils directly incited violence, such as lynchings, shootings, rapes and arson, as did Leander Perez during the New Orleans school desegregation crisis.Among these are guns, bows and arrows, sling shots and knives.We hold these truths to be self-evident that all whites are created equal with certain rights; among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of dead niggers.[29] In some cities, the Councils published lists of names of NAACP supporters and signers of anti-segregation petitions in local newspapers in order to encourage economic retaliation.[34] In 1994, Beckwith was tried by the state of Mississippi based on new evidence, in part revealed by a lengthy investigation by the Jackson Clarion Ledger; he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.[39] Numan Bartley wrote, "In Louisiana the Citizens' Council organization began as (and to a large extent remained) a projection of the Joint Legislative Committee to Maintain Segregation."[40] In Louisiana, leaders of the original Citizens' Council included State Senator and gubernatorial candidate William M. Rainach, U.S. Representative Joe D. Waggonner Jr., the publisher Ned Touchstone, and Judge Leander Perez, considered the political boss of Plaquemines and St. Bernard parishes near New Orleans.The act read, in part: An Act to prohibit all interracial dancing, social functions, entertainments, athletic training, games, sports, or contests and other such activities; to provide for separate seating and other facilities for white and negroes [lower case in original] ... That all persons, firms, and corporations are prohibited from sponsoring, arranging, participating in or permitting on premises under their control ... such activities involving personal and social contact in which the participants are members of the white and negro races ... That white persons are prohibited from sitting in or using any part of seating arrangements and sanitary or other facilities set apart for members of the negro race.
Council of Conservative CitizensRobert B. Pattersonwhite supremacistsegregationistwhite backlashUS Supreme CourtlandmarkBrown v. Board of EducationSouthern United Statesracial integrationdisenfranchisedSt. LouisIndianola, MississippiplantationMississippi State UniversityJim Crowdisfranchised most blackswhite primariesVoting Rights Act of 1965Regional Council of Negro LeadershipgrassrootsT. R. M. HowardMound Bayou, MississippiAaron HenryracistAfrican Americanswhite peopleTom P. BradyLincolnJohn Birch SocietyJoseph McDowell MitchellKu Klux KlanRotary ClubJames EastlandJohn Bell WilliamsRhodesiaIan SmithheavenSegregation academyJackson areaschool desegregationsegregation academiesBienville ParishviolenceCharles PaynelynchingsshootingsLeander PerezNew Orleans school desegregation crisisNat King ColeBirmingham, AlabamaByron De La BeckwithMedgar EversMontgomery, AlabamaMontgomery bus boycottGarrett ColiseumDeclaration of Independenceabolish the Negro racearrowssling shotsknivesniggersvoting rightsmortgagesYazoo City, MississippiaffidavitsState Sovereignty CommissionRoss BarnettAllen C. ThompsonMontgomeryLouisianaState SenatorgubernatorialWilliam M. RainachU.S. RepresentativeJoe D. Waggonner Jr.publisherpolitical bossPlaqueminesSt. BernardNew OrleansLouisiana State LegislatureEarl Longdancingentertainmentsathletic trainingsportsBarry Goldwatermedia outletsGeorge WallaceWallace campaign by 1968Racism in the United StatesRacism against Black AmericansCivil Rights MovementTimeline of the civil rights movementStates' rightsDefenders of State Sovereignty and Individual LibertiesLazar, ErnieUniversity of Southern MississippiAnti-Defamation LeagueSouthern Poverty Law CenterRoberts, GeneHank KlibanoffThe Race Beat: The Press, the Civil Rights Struggle, and the Awakening of a NationAlfred A. KnopfCharles E. Cobb Jr.Beito, David T.Beito, Linda RoysterPayne, Charles M.Tyson, Timothy B.Blood Done Sign My Name: A True StoryDemocracy Now!University of Illinois PressDittmer, JohnWakefield, DanThe NationCarson, ClayborneGarrow, David J.Kovach, BillVollers, MaryanneLeonard, George B.Sitton, ClaudeDissentBagdikian, BenMcMillen, Neil R.Arkansas Historical Quarterly