SCLC Chapter 5

JAMES SIMONS

Interview 0177James SimonsWhite » male

Side 1 & 2Macon, Ga.

SCLC student volunteer

A: At our school two days after the incident at Selma,there was a rally where a number of my teachers spoke andone teacher, my philosophy professor, spoke very inspir-ingly about this not being a time for words, but rather atime for action. And that the words were rather emptycompared to the people at Selma and those who had beenbeaten. And it was a few weeks later that Martin LutherKing came and spoke at our school and he announced thebCOPE program. At that time I had already decided thatI wanted to spend my summer down South and when he announ-ced the program, well it just seemed like the ideal sortof thingl So it was just a week or so later that I wentdowntown for the Western Christian Leadership Office andsigned up for their program and it was a week later thatpeople started joining from our school. -But I wasn'tofficially associated with the U.C.L.A. branch until Igot here.

Q: Do you go to U.C.L.A.?

As That's right and I'll be going to Berkeley next semester.

Qs Oh, really? How come you decided to change?

A: Well, there are a lot of things that I didn't like aboutU.C.L.A. I had been going to Berkeley originally but I wasforced to drop out in the middle of one semester because ofhealth problems, and I came back. And I went the next threesemesters to U.C.L.A. And now I want to take my last twoyears up at Berkeley.

Q: You're going to be a junior?

A: That's right I'm going to be a junior.

Q: What are you majoring in?

A: Uh, philosophy

Q: Have yoiialways been majoring in philosophy or haveyou changed?

A: When I started off I was a mathematics major and I tooka year of math but I enjoyed philosophy quite a bit more.

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And I might make math my minor because at these campuses .there's a lot of emphasis on mathematical philosophy, log-ical positivism as it's called.

Qs Ughl Is that the kind of philosophy you like?

A: Well, I really don't know enough to say what I like ordon't like because I have junior standing - 60 units - butI only have been going for three semesters. I've had verylittle philosophy; half my time has been spent in symboliclogic courses so I've had just a year of the standard lowerdivision courses - history of Greek, modern philosophy,and last semester I took my first upper division coursein exis*tenialist philosophy. The professor in that classwas the one who - was the man who made the speech that dayat school that I was talking about.

Qs Do you think that studying philosophy, other than justhearing that professor speak, had anything to do with yourwanting to come down here? Do you think that you wouldhave while you were majoring in math?

A: Uh, I think that it almost had nothing to do with it.Not really, I've read things ft some literature has influ-enced me more than the philosophy that I've read so far.I really don't think that the purpose of philosophy isn'tnecessarily to commit oneself to action, I'm afraid. That'sa logical positive approach to philosophy to exclude anysort of idea such as that.

Qs What kind of literature do you read?

As A few things by Satre, not his philosophical works, itimpressed me. He was active in the resistance during WorldWar II when Paris was, you know, that controlled the Nazis.And writes very beautifully about those days. Men had theirlives on the line everyday and the idea - he develops in thiscontext - his idea of freedom. The fact that every freethought d,r/uing those times was like a victory, and that ul-timately every man does have a choice. He can always chooseto say no to the conquerer. And, anyway, it was this idea.I was impressed by his experience and somehow the situationseemed rather parallel in many instances. There was a greatdeal of personal danger in theSouth although not where I am.But I didn't come here for personal danger, but the exist-entialist idea of making a choice and making a commitment.Some of those ideas.

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Q: How long have you been down here?

A: I've been here - this is my fifth week down here. Fourweeks in Macon and one week in Atlanta* where we had anindoctrination or preparation. We had a week of ratherintensive schooling - classes started at nine o'clock inthe morning and went on until ten o'clock in the evening.And we had many guest speakers, field workers in the civilrights movement who spoke to us about every conceivableaspect. Besides that we had this orientation. We had ses-sions of small groups with 8 or 9 or 10 where we discussedthe problems, we conducted imaginary interviews, and wehad field workers come in and answer our questions. Andpresent us with their views which were acutally much morefruitful than the speeches by some of the major civilrights leaders. We had, during this week, we had manywe]_l-known men - Michael Harrington spoke and let's see,naturally Martin Lulferh King spoke twice and his secondcommand R%5 Abernathy spoke, as well as Reverend AndrewYoung, and other men prominent in the civil rights field,lut, although there were, as I said, amy well-known menand a number of historians - I can't remember at the time -the speaker who drew the most attention and who made thebest speeches twice was a man who works for SouthernChristian Leadership Leadership Conference named ReverendJames Bevel who made two speeches - onw was prepared andthe other was off the cuff. And I think that if you wouldask the people in Atlanta that they would almost unamim-ously.agree that these were the two finest speeches of thewhole week. Absolutely, beyond a doubt, the most incred-ibel speaker I ever heard and extremely moving.

Q: I read about him in -he used to work for SNCC, didn'the? I Miink I read about him in Finn's book about SNCC.He participated in a lot of the early demonstrations,

A: That's right. He's been in this movement for aboutten years now. He's 29« I know, I was talking to a girlback in California on the phone just recently and I askedher if she knew him because she had been in the Mississippifreedom rides back in the early days and she said yes, thatshe was very familiar that he had been with them and lastsummer down in Mississippi in the &QM.FQ project he was omeof the men who talked to them and tried to explain the sit-uation down in Mississippi.

Q: What did he speak about to your group?

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A: Well, he spoke - the speech I remember most vividlywas about - well it was a rambling speech on many topics.One thing I remember vividly he described when some civilrights leaders from up North had invited he to come andlobk at Harlem and they spent a day or two walking him allaround Harlem and shw/oing him the slums and the povertyand the misery that people lived in. And he said thatwhen I saw this I never felt so depressed in my life. Andthen he said that once the people in Harlem find theirdignity, they're going' to burn down Harlem. And they'regoing to refuse to live in a place like this, and they'regoing to burn down Harlem, and get out. And they're goingto, I think he said, sleep in the park until something isdone about this situation. And it's the fact that whenthe people as a whole, or the Negro as a whole, work to-gether for their demands then nothing is going to stopthem, for example, he said that if the people want to chave a socialist government, Rockefeller may run as a Rep-ublican but he's going to be a socialist, -^nd And if thepeople don't vote under although the man may be runningunder the socialist party he's still going to be followingracist policies. And that it's, you know, completely inthe hands of the people what and how much is going to hap-pen. 'That was part of it. I can't remember too much more.

Q: What did you think of the orientation in general?

A: In general, I think the orientation could have beeneffectively cut down to almost half the time - to three orfour days. There were a number of speeches that were al-most superfluous for the purposes. There were quite afew speeches near the end on the labor movement and a lotof these men spoke at great length and much of it was onthe good old days of the labor movement, the glory days inthe thirties, how tough they had it too which is trueof course, but plans that seemed a little bit far fetchedfor our snort stay this summer - getting people organizedin unions and this and that. And the historians' speechesI thought weren't too terribly useful. 'They were likerather shoddy first day introduction lectures in a coll-ege course. One useful historical speech was about thereconstruction where this man Methalf I think his name was,debunked a lot of the myths that the young Negro that acouple of them took over the South during the reconstructionAnd the Negro had euch great power and the myths of thecarpetbaggers, but all these so-called facts were just mythand that the Negro is power empjty after the reconstruction.It was very short lived and things almost went back to theway they were immediately which a lot of us didn't under-stand. Now, this was useful because a lot of white Southerners might maintain that the Negro got considerable power

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it might go back to the way it was during reconstruction -the same methods as perpetuated in our public schools todayin many of the school books, especially in the high schooland junior high school level. And that with these factswe could engage them in debate or at least try to open theirminds a little bit to the situation.

Q: Itlseems like well John and I have been working in Miss-issippi for the last couple of weeks and it seems like incomparison to some of the kids that are working over there,your group seems kind of conservative. I mean how are yourown political views?

A: I was hoping you would ask about that. How about myp6litical views but our group? Because that is just whatI Was thinking of as I was going over the last question.This group is decidedly more conservative, less flamboyantand all the other adjetives than the CJC&FO group in Missi-ssippi. And there are a lot of reasons for that. v First ofall you would have to say that SNCC is considerable moreto the left than this group. At least they believe muchmore in direct action than the Southern Christian Leader-ship Conference. Secondly, the people participating inthis program, a good majority of them were selected bytheir schools, and I'm sure from what I hear that fromour school, there were many more rejected than accepted.we have 17 here and that there were twice that many re-jected. And I suppose any girl who went in there withterribly long hair and any fellow with a beard would havehad a very hard time. And one of the things that theywrote in Newsweek was that there were no beards to befound in Atlanta. There was only one out of 400, ratherincredible. And not even a random sample actually. Andso the group is I think you would have to say conservativeby civil rights standards and they - and my group speakingcandidly, itvjwas quite a bit too conservative for my tastes.Some of these girls who were so conservative in our grouphave been to me and others quite disappointing because theycame down here with certain preconceptions. Two of themwanted to teach freedom schools and they weren't able todo this and so they had done very little. Much of ourwork has been going down town and talking to people and theyfind it hard to get used to this kind of work..And it ishard for a girl. But even the job of walking the streetswhich is a dull uninteresting to canvass voters, they havenot been participating in this. And I think possibly ifwe had gotten a little more liberal type of girls becauseI know two of the girls are from very conservative familiesand though they believe in liberal causes they have a lotof conservative traits in them. And peronsally, not too

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much interest to chip in and get their hands dirty - someholding back. And I can't say that's a conservative trait.I have no idea of what the traits of a conservative are, butthat's my speculation. And actually this situation heredoes not call for a direct aotion approach. Someone saidSNCC would be no more applicable here than the Urban Leaguein Mississippi which I think is true. And probably theSouthern Christian Leadership Conference is just right fora city like Macon so it hasn't harmed us here. We havedone very well, compared to a lot of the other groups, al-though we are larger and in considerably easier CircumstancesMy political view point, I'm a democrat. I'd guess you'dhave to say a liberal Democrat, but actually a very naiveliberal Democrat. I haven't done a lot of soul searchingin looking for a political creed. A number of my friendsare of a very radical nature - spcialist or communist orien-ted. And I've been endevoring to try to communicate withthem to understand what complaints abou t the system andto try to understand how they can propose to change things.As it stands naively I'm against socialism because I dothink that what you'd say a pure state of socialism wouldcreate, I think, unfortunate bonds on personal freedom -individual liberties. But some men I respect very much aresocialists - Bertrand Russell is a socialist and I agreewith more than 99# of what he has to say and Michael Harr-ington, very intelligent and concerned man, is also a soc-ialist. But as Harrington said in Atlanta, although I'ma socialist I can't make the mistake of a lot of other soc-ialists make to be unwilling to compromise. He says I'maware of the fact that I have to work with the DemocraticParty even though I'm a socialist. There's no use trying torun away from reality. If I hope to do anything for thecause and working for it, then I'm going to have to give atremendous amount because, quite frankly, the people inthis country do not want socialism. The workers do notwant it and the general do not want it. So I've just beenrambling on here but...

Q: Oh, that's all right. well, how about in some - a lotof people are beginning to connect the civil rights move-ment with things like the peace movement and the get outof Vietnam movement and things like that. What do you think

about that?

A: Well, I think that it would be unwise to associate thetwo. Martin Luther King has been speaking out more and more

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on the idea of negotiating in Vietnam. Now he hasn't saidanymore than negotiate I don't think. He hasn't calledfor a cease-fire - a unilateral cease-fire or anythinglike this. But there is a wide spread though shallow su-pport of our Vietnam policy. Something like 65% of theAmerican people - the latest poll I read. And if theywere to speak out too strongly on this - the war on Viet-nam, against it I think that a lot of public favor wouldbe lost. I'd advise against it myself, but naturally inany liberal organization you're going to find definatleya majority of the people in SNCC against the war - prob-ably 90/fe majority. -&nd in this organization you probablycouldn't find close to $0% against the war. And of courseI don't think they should hamper anyone's individual de-sire to protest or do what they want. But I think thatit would be unwise for the organization to draft resolutionsor take stands on the issue.

Q: What do you feel yourself?

A: This is another point where I'm a naive Democrat. Iintend fully well to lock myself in a library one week andstudy the situation in depth. I really - I could almostsay I have no opinion - not because I haven't thoughtabout it but because I've heard so many conflicting ideasas to whether the people want us there or not, would theissue of free elections, which we have suppossedly stopped,Eisenhower made a statement that yO% of the people don'twant us there even the South Vietanese. Of course theissue of our brutality towards the captives which we indir-ectly support, of course, and how I - wight now I'm sortof inclined to agree with Lippman's attitude that we -it's really impossible for us to try maintain a sphere ofinfluence in Asia. That that is rightly Red China's sphereof influence and that this is a throwback to the nineteethcentury if we think that -we can maintain power in Asia. Thatthat's a thing of the past. That just as we have our sphereof influence in South America and Russia has her sphere ofinfluence in Eastern Europe, so Red China is really thethird major power in the world is going to definatley demandand get her sphere of influence in the Far East.

Q: How do your a(prents stand politically?

A: Well, only my father is living and he's I must say, lesscon cerned about politics than even the average American. Andas long as I can remember he hasn't voted. And he's a sj^aes-man, a real estate salesman who does very well economically,but he just intellectually or civicly he's never been oriented

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And he would have to be sort of classified as a wishy-washyDemocrat, but he never studied the issues too deeply. Hewould be for medical care. He's a little touchy about civilrights, especially about demonstrations, and he's for in-cresing security and he's for cutting foreign aid. So he'sall over the place.

Q: What did he think of your own participation in comingdown here?A: Well, he had different attitudes at different times.The first two months before countdown he really didn't be-lieve that I was going to come and sure it was all rightwith me. ,-And as time went on and he began to realigce thatI was csrsfcjus about this idea, he stiffened up quite abit. Then we'd have arguments. And then he said well, I'mjust concerned for your safety and other times he wouldmake wild statements about how the Civil rights leaderswere embezzling funds. Strange prophesy and other chargesof this sort which I laughed at at the time. And then..

Q: Did you try and discuss it with him. I mean....A: Yeah, we tried to discuss it and he sort of had thenaive idea of most Americans that "I'm for everyone having

their rights, "but he would never he the man to get out andwork for anyone elses, unfortunately. For example, the bigproposition lk last year in California, although he didn'tvote. I think if he had voted he would have voted yes, forexample. So his concern was largely for my safety and itwas sort of annoyance that I was going away and leavinghim this summer.

Q: Do you live at home?A: That's right. I liveAwith my father for the past yearand a half.

Q: Where did you live before then?

A: I had been living at home until I went away to schooland then I was just away for that brief period then Iwent back for that last period.

Q : How about your friends, people at home? What do theythink? Other people that you're close to, what do theythink about your coming down, coming to the South?A: Well, all my friends - well they could be divided intotwo groups. One is that it's a good thing that I'm doingit myself. I've known a couple of people who were downwith SNCC in Louisiana; I know someone else who is workingfor VISTA in Harlem. So .^.Saturally there's no question of

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approval or disapproval. It's, you know, you're doing theright thing. That's all there is to it. You don't haveto talk about it; it's accepted behavior. And the otherit's also accepted behavior but "gee, I don't want to godown there and get my head shot off or God I just thinkI'll hang around this summer although I think it's a greatthing you're doing, please don't get hurt, you know I'mbehind you all the way." And no one said to me that you'restupid to go down there or anything like this. I don'tthink any young person in college with any understandingof the issues could hardly ever say that it was a stupidthing to down here on the basis of the issues other thanpersonal safety. Even a conservative who was informedwould have to admit that there was much to be done and thatthis is a true case of private initiative. People are will-ing to go down and do it themselves without thegovernemtn.So at least we are in agreement there - agreement on bothsides.

Q: How old are you?

A: I'm 19.Q: Did religious motivations have anything to do with yourcoming down?

A: No, not at all. I've been an atheist for as long as Ican remember.

Q: Really?

A: That's right. My father is Jewish, although he nevergoes to church. And my mother was protestant and they wereuh, they both prrfessed to believe in God - my mother is deadnow, add I do remember when I was very small praying veryfervently at night. But I'm sure that from 10 or 11 on Ithat the idea of Gods seemed a little more inprobablje. to meand I never worried about it much at all.

Q: How do you feel about working in such a Christian ori-ented organization?

A: Well, actually the Christian part of it has very littleeffect upon me. Like there was no what would be put cru&lyGod talk in Atlanta. lo one was telling you you were doingGod's work - not even half as much as Lyndon Johnson's lastspeech. That God would smile about our work here; there'snothing of that sort even from the Reverends. I might bewrong but someone told me that this Revenend James Bevelwho I was talking about earlier is not even necessarily abeliever in God, but he's a reverend because he does believe

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in the Christian ideal of universal love and love for everyman. And that he became a reverend m otivated by this idea.And I think haat expresses adequately many people in theSouthern Christian Leadership Conference. Maybe not...

Q: You were saying something about the higher ups in theorganization.

A: I was just going to say that this idea of love ratherthan a belief in God, I wouldn't apply this necessarily tothe higher ups, especially King, Abernathy, and Young. I

c ant speak for them. But I got this feeling that thsi wasthe case with many Of the field workers. But of coursemany Jd the students who were there that I talked to wereChristians were not believers by any means. They weren'tmembers of any religion but $ust people who were concerned.

Q: What do you think about most of the other people whoaare working in your project? I mean how prevalent Mo youthink the religious influence ia among the students who areworking for SCOPE?

A: Well, I got to know a sampling of people in Atlanta, nota terribly big amount. I didn't meet anyone who was deeplyreligious. I did with the exception of one reverend there,and our group I'd have to say that there are 3or k people

w ho you'd have to call religious in the sense that they doperform all the services of their religion. I know 3or kor 5 others are like myself who have no professed belief.And then there are a number of others who would classifythemsleves as Christian or Jewish. You know on a questlon-aire sheet, but of whom you couldn't really say are practic-ing Christian and pracltcing Jews^

Q: You said that your father isn't very religious?

A: That's right. He < considers himself Jewish although hehasn't been to temple since I've been born and...

Q: Do you have any brothers and sisters?

A: No*. I'm an only child.

Q: Are you very close to your family? I mean do you cons ider yourse1f . . . ?

A: Yes, I'd say I'm close to my father if I can judge bysome of my other* friends relationships with their fathers,I'd say that I'm closer than most, expecially since my mother'sdeath.

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Naturally, we've drawn much closer.

What has been your reaction so far to the work you've beendoing down here? Was it what you expected?

A: Well, it wasn't really what I'd hoped for or expected.We had been hoping for Arroyo County, but I'm not so surewhy any more.

Q: We?

A: Uh, the group as a whole. We were told that we weregoing to Beach County which is a rural county and but wewere assigned to Macon, the city of Macon. And I think atthe time I can remember that I was pretty disappointed be-cause the idea of walking up and down the streets did notappeal to me terribly much. Talking to people, I had donethis kind of activity back in California on the No on Ikcampaign. And it seemed that this sort of arrangement wouldpreclude any well I'd say lasting relationships with any ofthe people. But I've become pretty well settled down, ofoourse, being here four weeks. And there's enough varietythat I'm satisfied. Somehow I donj-t really feel that I've^gotten the taste of what the real civil rights movement means.This is a very good situation as things go in the South. Themayor and the police chief are moderates who are not tryingto oppose us but actually have given us some assistance.And so we haventt run into any organized opposition. And somehow I feel just a little too close to being home to feel thatI'm really working for freedom. It's more a question of work-ing against apathy which is be found everyplace. Ra#£her ■

that going against opposition, brutality - there's not thathere.

Q: What other kinds « you said that you had been working onproposition Ik campaign. Were you doing more or less thesame kind of thing that you are doing here?

As That's right. In Los Angeles we had a very active cam-paign to register Negroes to vote No on the issue. And weworked all the year before the election and rather a basicjob was done. Seventy-five percent of the Negroes were reg-istered in Los Angeles County - the highest figure in history.But, of course, it wasn't nearly enough. The issue was de-feated two -to - one in the election.

Q: Was that the first time that you had come in contactwith Negroes or have you seen much type of discrimination oranything like that?

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A: Well, there was - that was just about the first contact.I lived in the San Fernando Valley which now has a millionpeople and no more than 500 or 1000 Negroes out of the wholemillion. And they're all in one or two blocks. So a childgrowing up in the valley, he could easily grow up his firstten or fifthteen years without ever seeing a Negro. And Iwas very much in that position, unless he went downtown togo see a ball game. And so this was my first contact withNegroes - this working on proposition.

Q: You don't live right in L.A. then. You live in...

A: Well, it's Los Angeles City. Well, where I live it'sNorth Hollywood and it's very close to downtown. You canget downtown on the freeway in fiffefrteen minutes and it'sright over the hill from Hollywood. So it's centrally lo-cated. It's the part of town closest to Hollywood and downtown.

Q: Well, where did you go to high school? What kind of ahigh school was it?

As Well, it was right in the middle of the city, HollywoodHigh School. Actually one of the best high schools or ratherone of the better high schools in the city because it was -the high schools in Los Angeles and I suppose everywhereare going to be good almost in direct proportion to the amountof wealth in the community around it that the high schools onthe West side were all better. And that's where you'll findevery student who went to Harvard and every student who wentto Yale and nine-tenths of th<se who got merit scholarships -not necessarily because the schools were better equipped butbecause the better teachers gravitated there and the students

just naturally get into better.coming from better backgrounds

Qs Well, was it an integratedmuch . . " ?

high school? Did you have

As Oh,' it was integrated. We had two Negroes out 0r...

Qs How big?

A: Two thousand.

Qs Two thousand, that's not really too big.

As No, it was small as high school went - you know, one ofthe smaller ones. It's right in the middle of the city andthere's no room to expand there in blocks where land costs

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millions of dollars per block - right in the middle of Holly-wood - just a block away from Hollywood and Highladd - oneof the biggest intersections in town.

Qs Well, getting back to what you're doing down here, whereare you living?

As I'm living with a Negro family as everyone else is. It'snot a family, it's jsjut one woman in a very nice spot - oneof the nicest Negro sections of town Circle in a verynice house which I think would cost approxiamtely about $30,000back in California. It's somewhat of a letdown, maybe that'sthe word, from what we were told to expect.

Qs Which was what?

As Well, you know, living with the people. But, r of course,she is a distinct exception in this town - very distinct -one of the wealthiest ladies in town. And I don't think itwas such a good idea to place us there but the only troublewas that not so many people wanted to take us and so she vol-unteered to take six in her one place. And we've been re-placing other people as time goes on, but I'm still livingthere with one of the other original ones and someone elsewho has moved in. There's just three of us now.

Qs Is she the only one there or do you have contact withother people who live around there? Or are you just moreor less by yourselves?

As Well, we're while I'm there we're by ourselves. We don'tspend very much time there. We eat dinner there and sleepthere and go off in the morning. And no contact with theneighbors, really. We played football with some of the neigh-borhood children a few times and that was fun. But most ofthe kids we know are from the real Negro community - Pleas-ant Hills in East Macon the ones who have been volunteeringwith us. The kids over on our little block which is only ahalf circle block, have not helped us. And I don't thinkhave any interest. They are the rich kids in other words.

Qs Well, what about the Negro people you have been workingwith? Have they been about what you thought you'd be like?

As Well, I've come in for a few surprises. First of all Ithought there would be a more of a widespread resentmentagainst white peop'ele. I was expecting that the Negroes wouc^Lhave a great deal of distrust for white people. And that many

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would think that I was sort of a primma donna coming downhere and aaying that I wanted to hfclp them. The collegeboy spending a summer and everything else. But happilythere's been almost non of this. People have all beenfriendly with just a few exceptions arid many have been, youknow, extremely warm and kind. Just as one example, on Julysth we had a freedom day to celebrate the first year of thecivil rights bill and there was a big picnic that day andI just remember eating the most wonderful food and everywoman with a basket invited me over basket to share thelunch. And, you know, everyone knows us and is wonderful tous. So there's been very little resentment.

Qs What other kind of surprises?

As Well, we were feeling wuite a bit more resentment forthe white community. I mean it just goes to show that whenthere is decent leadership and there is a moderate community,people do respond to the norms of fche community. And if thereis some sort of a tradition of being fair and being moderatethere, you're not going to find many crackpots around. Therehave been a few crackpots from the white community. I meannot from the white community, I mean scattered whites. Afew people came up to one of our volunteers and told him theywere going to beat him up and if the policemen had been rea-sonably hostile, one of our fellows was arrested for a coupleof hours because he was interf erring with police businesses.He was making a phone call in a barbar shop. But generallynot. One thing that is sort of curious is that when I camehere I was sort of oblivious to the stares. For example,when I was waking with canvassing downtown and that involvesmany times walking around with one of the Negro girls who'sworhing with us. And so the first week or so I was walkingaround and the stares seemed to me very comical and veryfunny. And now it seems as time goes on that I'm becomingmore sensitive rather than less less sensitive to the stares.And I find myself staring back and getting bothered and irr-itated when I see these long eyed stares. One very curiousthing about the white SuHgtherners that was a big surprise tome was that they are just about the most physically repulsivepeople I"ye ever run into in my life. Quite frankly thisidea of the Southern Belle must be - is one of the great myths.I haven't seen what I would call one attractive, intelligent,or charming Southern girl since I've been down here - absol-utely not a one. And, for example, when I saw you just walk-ing down the street I immediately saw an intelligent kind offace and I said that girl can't be from Georgia and I was

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right of course. And the women around here are pale, sicklywhite. Sickly white pasty bloated with self-satisfied lookson their faces - pasty is the word and they just look likethey're ready to that burst and blubber would flow out ofthem in all directions. They are repulsive and the men arejust as bad.

I know what you mean about the men; they're all so fat.

As Yeah, just terrible.

Qs Oh, I was curious about something you said earlier* aboutthat you thought you would find more resentment among theNegro people - a college boy, you know, coming down to helpthe Negro. What prepared you to expect that?

As Well, this was just one of my own preconceptions. That'sall it was. I talked to a couple of people in Atlanta andthey told me there wouldn't be much resentment but I didn'tbelieve it really. I was convinced it would be. But I foundthere wasn't and it was just as people told that you're downhere to - people know that you are down here to help them andthey do and they are friendly and one thing I was reallyworried about was would they really listen to a young personlike mys]\ef - 19 years old who looks even younger than 19.And he told me yes. They will listen you. They listen toyou oftentimes quicker than they will to people their ownage. And I found this hard to believe. But that's alsobeen true to a certain extent. When you talk to people, whenyou're trying to explain to them - if you're courteous withthem and listen to them, they are equally courteous with you.And there is no idea of condensation on either side.

Qs What kinds of things have you done? What - why don'tyou just describe what a typical day of your work would belike.

As Well, there's really no such thing as a typical day be-cause the activities may be completely varied from day to day.The thing we've done most often up to now is - has been can-vassing to register voters. We started out this summer goinghouse to bouse in Negro communities and making arrangementsto pick people up and take them down to the courthouse sothey can register. And this was reasonably successful. Itwas hard work - time consuming and a lot of the people didn'tshow up even though they had made promises. We made up app-ointment slips and asked them to call us if they couldni't comenut even this didn't help very much. One day we had 200appointments made - the biggest figure so far and only 60 out

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of 200 showed - just 30 per cent, really disappointing forpeople who have promised you they would come. So, we de-cided to expand, and we decided canvassing the streets down-town, especially after the word came that you didn't have toregister at the Courthouse and the City Hall, but just at theCourthouse. And this eliminated... quite a bit of walking.We were shuttling the people between the Courthouse and theCity Hall, but this made it very simple. And... we went downto a... whe-... a Negro part of downtown, where alot of menhangearound, called Broadway, and., the first day or two wewere just scooping the people in to register as fast as theywalked down the street. But... just about now, about two anda half, three weeks later, we, we've hit what I call saturationpoint on downtown, and., we're not getting the people at one-tenth the rate we used to. So now we're going to have totry something else, try to organize... voter registrationwithin the Negro community., communities themselves, have thepeople in the community... set this up, take the people down,and... set up a structure on their 0wn....

Qs Yeah.

As ... with our help.

Q; Why do you think this was this mass failure to keepappointments that you found?

As Well, there were a number of reasons. First of all, ...well, one concrete reason is that people would make appoint-ments to get rid of us, and., then when the time came, theyjust wouldn't keep them. They'd be gone, they'd be at work.Many - many people said, "Yes, I'll be here at ten o'clock,"and they went to work at nine o'clock. Uh, and., some ofthem said, "Yes, I'll come," just because they're embarrassedto say they couldn't read or write. There were some ofthese. But this wasn't the - this wasn't the most importantthing, although it's interesting. It was mainly people whosaid, said it to get rid of us. And... there were* I mean,one or two cases of genuine ... reasons why they couldn'tcome. The baby took sick - but mostly it was the fact thatthey didn't want to be bothered... They said it to get ridof us and when the time came, they just didn't want to bebothered, and., they told us to come back another day.

Qs Uh, most of the work youre doing - I mean, you're doinga sort of standard program that most of the SN-, SCOPEprojects are carrying out, I mean, the voter regis-, the, theidea of voter registration and the idea of trying to get asmany registered as possible....

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As That's right.

Qs Isn't that right?

As That's right.

Qs Has there been any... opposition in your group, I mean,people wanting to do it differently? Or have you had anydesire to do things -to do different things, or to do thingsin a different way?

As Uh.... Well, as I said, a, a number of (Northern ?) girlsI was working with weren't too excited about voter registration,they wanted to work with children. And... since there's noone forcing them to do anything, they haven't done much.And., everyone more or less wanted to go Into this idealrural town, and get to know the people, and., have everyoneon your side, and... live with the people... eat with them,go to church with them, and... try to organize some sort ofcommunity sense within a small., within a small town. But..all this becomes alot less important in a, in a big city of135#000 people. And., the contacts you're going to be makingdowntown are... momentary, as you go around canvassing inthe Negro areas, there, these relationships last for mereminutes. And so., this idea of really getting to know thepeople has been, you know, a complete failure. It hasn'tapplied in this case. And a few people have said, everybodyhas been disenchanted.... 'Course, the productive ones have,you know, reoriented themselves, and are, you know, workingall the harder. But... you know, our, our leader in factsaid, "If I knew it was going to be this way, I wouldn'thave come, quite frankly." And...

Qs What way? You mean....As Registering voters, walking around door-to-d00r....

Qs So - well, what have you thought so far of the, thelocal leadership? I mean, like - it, it struck us as oddthat you had a project set up where you had your own leader,and everything.

As Uh f you mean our own local leader 0r...?

Qs I mean having Joel, instead of working under peoplehere....As Oh, oh, we11...

Qs Or is that really how it works?

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As I think every group has its own leader, but... the localleadership situation here is.. ... rather interesting. Thereis one man, a very ... dynamic man, named Bill Randall, whois the Negro leadership in this community. There's no man,Northern man of one-tenth the stature. He's a.... tremendously,he's a very dynamic man, and... the kind, someone said, youknow, if you were white, you would have been mayor ofBoston... by now, or mayor of New York. ... a tre-, he hasa tremendous sense 0f... how to use, how to wield and usepewer, and... when they had the bus boycott here in 1962,he was able to organize it, 97$ successful the first day, and100$ effective for the remainder of the, of the three weekperiod. He's the one who runs the Negro newspaper in town.He runs the mass meetings. He's organized the mass meetings.He's at the forefront in., attaining jobs, in desegregatingthe libraries, the public facilities; he has been the manaround whom the movement has centered in this community..He., he had a construction business, heavy constructionbusiness., before he got in the movement. And he was, his firmwas maling/So a quarter million dollars a year, and he wasdoing very handsomely. And when he got involved in thismovement, of course, he lost all his white contracts, and.,the business is gone, and., he... the newspaper makes barelyenough for him to break-even..

Qs Um-hmm.

As But... he., is a dedicated man..

Qs What about., how will things get done after you allleave in... in fall?

As Well, I'm - myself, I'm very pessimistic about howthings are going to go. There are a num-.... there are twoor three ... young men who are working with us... most..our most., energetic volunteers, who are going to try tokeep things going after, after we're gone. But.. I'mafraid J-t's going to be..harder, much harder for them todo anytlng, because in a city this size, you do needtremendous numbers. And if they're going to school, they'llhave alot of hours where they won't be available. And...the work now is really getting hard and sticky, becausethe people who are easy to register have been registeredalready. And there's a solid twenty-five per cent of thepeople... I believe youre never going to get registered.And... it's pretty hard to get those who, you kknow, havethe training, can read and write, and., the energy to getdown there, and haven't registered. There just aren'tthat many of them.. There's vast numbers of old sickpeople, who can't read and write, and many young people,

0177-19

who can't read and write. And., this, this might bepartially eliminated after the voting bill passes, but..

we're trgring to set up in the various Negro communities,... leadership boards, 1.... for all those, all those peoplewho are interested in continuing voter registration andcommunity organization. Now, this program is - is prettymuch in its infancy, and not too much has been, and.,poss-, well, possibly I'm alittle more pessimistic thanthe average member, but... I'm, I feel right now. thatwhatever is going to be done after we're done i§ /going torevolve around Mr. Randall. And., that there aren't goingto be that many people who are really, who are going to beable to fi11,.... fill our vacuum (Laugh) (unintelligiblephrase) """"Qs What are your own plans for the future, as far as themovement is concerned?

As I, uh,.... well, I had, yes, I had a couple of definiteideas that., wherever I go, whatever I do, now I know I amgoing to be committed in the movement. When I go back toschool at Berkeley, which is rather - a hotbed, 1., intendto be aci|tve there, in whatever there is to do, which Idon't know if it's very much. There - there- they had someactivity in the town of Berkeley., last year, and they hadt he Board of Education, a very liberal man against a veryconservative man... there, there, you know, many things...I'm ... going to be down here again next summer...

Qs You are?

As ... with., not with Southern Christian LeadershipConference, but with SNCC, an organization whose philosophy... comes a little closer to my own, I'm afraid.... Uh,as I said, I don't really feel I got the taste of themovement yet. And I just feel that., wherever I am,or whatever I wind up doing, that., that I'm going, I'm,not even by choice anymore, going to be one of the peoplewho's going, you know, have to be working. I certainlydon't hope that, I certainly don't expect myself to be the.,business man who contributes ten dollars a year....

Qs What do you think, you will be doing?

zAs ... to the cause. ""Qs What do you want to do, I mean, as far as occupation..?

As Oh, well, 1.. I really don't know... I always wanted tobe a professor, a professor of philosophy or mathematics,

0177-20or something along those lines, but.. ... that seems verydistant right now. I'm rather cynical about professors ofphilosophy, and exactly their... ah, their power to do muchgood in the world, and... I'm., very cynical about most0ther...... occupations. Possibly some sort of, some ""line of social work. The only problem with that is 1...don't find much enjoyment in workin g with ... uh, for example,with children, who don't catch on to quickly. I mig&t be alittle more impatient than I should be.

Qs Have you given any thought to future family life?

As Future family life? You mean my father?

Qs No, I mean, are you going to get married, or """" do youwant to settle down, or travel around, or what?

As Oh. Oh, well, all this is so conditional. Uh, there,it wasn't... but six months ago that I felt very stronglythat.. I was going to try to save up some money and go toEurope for., an unlimited amount of time, and... just walka bicycle around... But... now I feel that... I feel prettystrongly that I won't be doing this in the immediate future,that., there's... too much to be done within our country, toreally run off, and., waste time in Europe, that., that.,there just aren't enough people concerned, aride. * I have tobe one of the few.... anyway, about my 0wn.....

END OF TAPE