Student Non-Violent Coordinating
Committee
Background Information
Director: Ruchi Gupta
© 2009 Institute for Domestic & International Affairs, Inc.
This document is solely for use in preparation for Rutgers Model Congress 2009.
Use for any other purpose is not permitted without the expressed written consent of IDIA.
For more information, please write us at [email protected].
SNCC in the Civil Rights Movement______________________________________________ 1
Mission, Message, and the Problems to Come __________________________________________ 1
Chronology __________________________________________________________________ 3
1875 - Civil Rights Act of 1875 _______________________________________________________ 3
1877 - Black Codes Give Way to Jim Crow Laws _______________________________________ 5
Late 1877-Present - Jim Crow Laws __________________________________________________ 6
1910-1940 - First and Second “Great Migration”________________________________________ 8
9 April 1947 - Journey of Reconciliation ______________________________________________ 10
1954 - Brown v. Board of Education Heard ___________________________________________ 11
1955 - Montgomery Bus Boycott Begins ______________________________________________ 12
1957 - Civil Rights Act of 1957 ______________________________________________________ 14
1960 - Greensboro Sit-Ins __________________________________________________________ 15
15-17 April 1960 - SNCC Founded___________________________________________________ 16
Members of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee _______________________ 17
Ella Baker _______________________________________________________________________ 17
John Lewis ______________________________________________________________________ 18
James Forman ___________________________________________________________________ 19
Diane Nash ______________________________________________________________________ 19
James Lawson ___________________________________________________________________ 20
James Bevel _____________________________________________________________________ 21
Marion Barry ____________________________________________________________________ 22
Bernard Lafayette ________________________________________________________________ 22
Julian Bond _____________________________________________________________________ 23
Stokely Carmichael _______________________________________________________________ 23
Robert Parris Moses ______________________________________________________________ 24
Fannie Lou Hamer________________________________________________________________ 24
Cleveland Sellers, Jr. ______________________________________________________________ 24
Goals of the SNCC as of 1960 __________________________________________________ 25
Desegregation ____________________________________________________________________ 25
An End to Disfranchisement________________________________________________________ 26
Direct Action with Focus on a Non-Violent Approach___________________________________ 26
Challenges Faced by the Committee _____________________________________________ 27
Summation of Key Points __________________________________________________________ 28
Discussion Questions _________________________________________________________ 30
Works Cited ________________________________________________________________ 31
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SNCC in the Civil Rights Movement
Mission, Message, and the Problems to Come
As the year 1961 begins and the United States sees a continuation of segregation,
disfranchisement of minorities, racial discrimination, and violence, the Student NonViolence Coordinating Committee (SNCC) has emerged as a recognizable presence
among grassroots organizations fighting for racial equality. The organization's primary
task currently is that of combining its message of non-violence with a decisive and
effective course of action. While SNCC is at the forefront of youth participation in the
civil rights movement, it also brings together members of various activist groups from all
across the country in order to form a representative voice for freedom fighters of different
ages, backgrounds, and concerns. As a result of the multitude of perspectives within the
organization, however, it has become particularly necessary for SNCC to establish an
integrative policy on all the issues that the organization wishes to address. By
incorporating an assortment of viewpoints into one clear methodology, SNCC can more
easily pursue the solutions it seeks. The dilemma in the past year since its inception,
therefore, has been SNCC's marked inability to combine conflicting interests, concerns,
and proposed solutions into a cogent policy that accurately conveys its plans of pursuit.
Without such a unified message, SNCC cannot truly (and non-violently) bring significant
attention and action from both Congress and the American public at large.
The history of racial discrimination in the United States is long and conflicted, and
provides ample material for members of SNCC to reexamine in order to best inform
themselves on the way racial constructs in the country were first forged. The importation
of African slaves in the seventeenth century first institutionalized the prejudices and
racism that exist today. The Civil War and the Thirteenth Amendment effectively
abolished slavery, but the Black Codes and later, the Jim Crow system, deeply entrenched
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2
racism into the framework of federal and state law, most especially in the Deep South.1
Those discriminatory constructs exist to this day, and as such, ideology that enforces the
inferior social, economic, and political position of African-Americans to white
Americans continues to prevail. Legal segregation in public places means that AfricanAmericans cannot dwell in the same space as their white counterparts even to eat, go to
the restroom, or visit the park; though the 1954 Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board
mandated the desegregation of schools, a lack of enforcement means that even a Supreme
Court decision cannot overcome the racial bigotry that still saturates much of the public
consciousness.2 The disfranchisement of African-Americans is also a historical element
of racism that persists today. Though the Fifteenth Amendment prevents any state the
right to deny any man the right to vote based on his race, laws are crafted to make it more
difficult for minorities to register in the first place. Everything from literacy requirements
to elements that tap into the economic shortcomings of poor whites and AfricanAmericans prevents them from coming to the polls, consequently making it difficult for
people who represent their interests to be placed in power.3 Along with disfranchisement
is the similar issue of social and economic prosperity for African-Americans. As racial
prejudice embeds itself into the country's laws and consciousness, the invisible line that
separate whites from everyone else means a lack of job opportunities and class issues,
which in turn put African-Americans in particular at a severe social and economic
disadvantage. Detrimental above all, however, is the violence that characterizes the fight
for civil rights. White supremacist groups and individual violence has seen resurgence in
recent years, though in the past there has been no shortage of mass riots, beatings,
lynching, and murders revolving around racist intent.4
1
"Racial and Ethnic Discrimination-Further Readings," http://law.jrank.org/pages/9625/Racial-EthnicDiscrimination.html (accessed 12 January 2009)
2
Ibid.
3
Monnet, Julien C. "The Latest Phase of Negro Disfranchisement" http://www.jstor.org/pss/1324271?cookieSet=1
Harvard Law Review, Vol.26, No.1, Nov. 1912, p.42 (accessed 12 January 2009)
4
Stephens, Judith. "Racial Violence and Representation: Performance Strategies in Lynching Dramas of the
1920s," http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2838/is_4_33/ai_59024886, African American Review, Winter 1999
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With a history so rich with conflict and a present that is increasingly volatile,
SNCC’s non-violent call to the people is especially resonant among those who wish to
peacefully instigate change at a local and national level in order to see eventual social
progression without more bloodshed. In order to accomplish its goals, however, SNCC
must first reflect on its own conduct and its place within the civil rights movement. In
regards to the deep South especially, it has become clear that although the common point
of agreement in SNCC’s ideology was originally a rhetoric of non-violence with a focus
on human freedoms, its members have different ideas of how to best approach the
problems that they must address as well as varying levels of understanding concerning
the resistance they stand to face. Now, as the violence in the South increases, SNCC
meets to reevaluate its goals and actions in the context of its past, present, and future in
the fight for civil rights.
Chronology
Understanding the history of civil rights legislation as well as the history of racial
discrimination in the United States is absolutely imperative to shape an understanding of
the present state of events in the country. At many points in time, segregation and
disfranchisement have been challenged; however, both elements of racism continue to
persist. In order to change the future, it is necessary to examine and learn from the past. It
is the responsibility of SNCC in particular, therefore, to demand policy initiatives that
incorporate the best of what has been tried before, while ensuring that the worst of past
mistakes are not committed again.
1875 - Civil Rights Act of 1875
Introduced by Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner and Representative
Benjamin F. Butler in 1870, the Civil Rights Act of 1875 was the only piece of civil
rights legislation of its kind to be passed into Federal law until 1957.5 The Act mandated
(accessed 12 January 2009)
5
“Civil Rights Act of 1875,” Spartacus Educational, 10 January 2009,
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4
that all citizens, heedless of race, skin color, or prior status of servitude, were entitled to
non-discriminatory treatment in public accommodations. Under the law, places such as
“inns, public conveyances on land or water, theaters, and other places of public
amusement” were required to give equal service to all those who wanted to make use of
the privileges and advantages of these facilities.6 Sumner and Butler intended for the Act
to desegregate commonly segregated public arenas, as well as discourage racially-based
discriminatory practices in the same places. To that end, the Act outlined monetary and
criminal punishments for breaking the law. Lawbreakers, once found guilty, could face
fines from anywhere between five hundred dollars to one thousand dollars. Those who
defied the Act also faced thirty days to one year in jail as a possible consequence, an
unusually harsh result on an already unpopular piece of legislation for the time.7
In spite of the penalties the Act put forth, however, the law was rarely enforced
and thus, perpetrators were rarely prosecuted. In 1883, the Supreme Court officially
overturned the Act, claiming its unconstitutionality.8 Supporters of the decision pointed
out that the Thirteenth Amendment prohibits discrimination from the state rather than
from private citizens, and the Act did not attempt to regulate state action but rather the
conduct of individuals.9 The Supreme Court’s decision outraged the black community, as
well as many whites, who felt that the ruling went beyond merely implicitly condoning
segregation and instead actually legalized the practice. One famous dissent by a man
called John Harlan likened the discrimination allowed by the dissolution of the Act to
placing blacks again in a position of servitude, or slavery. Therefore, he claimed, the Act
in fact upheld the Thirteenth Amendment and was not in actuality “repugnant to the
Constitution.” It was, he claimed, the federal government’s duty to ensure the equal
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAcivil1875.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
6
“Text of Civil Rights Act of 1875,” George Madison University,
http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/122/recon/civilrightsact.html (accessed 12 January 2009)
7
Ibid.
8
“Civil Rights Act of 1875 Declared Unconstitutional,” PBS.org, 2002,
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_uncivil.html (accessed 12 January 2009)
9
Ibid.
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treatment of all individuals in public spaces.10 Once the Supreme Court overturned the
Civil Rights Act of 1875, however, it would be another fifty-two years until another civil
rights legislation of its kind would be heard. Ultimately, the 1875 Act served as the initial
precursor to later, similarly revolutionary civil rights legislation.
1877 - Black Codes Give Way to Jim Crow Laws
First established during the presidency of Andrew Johnson, the Black Codes were
a set of racially discriminatory laws that were mainly passed at a local and state level in
the rural South. A model for the Jim Crow laws of later years, the Codes imposed severe
restrictions on freed slaves, regulating labor opportunities and social conduct. Such rights
as sitting on juries, testifying against white men, and voting were forbidden to blacks, but
the harshest provisions of the Codes made work especially tough for former slaves. The
Codes, coupled with a lack of wage-earning possibilities, forced many blacks to become
laborers on Southern farms, thus reverting Freedmen to their previous positions of
servitude. In fact, in some states under the Black Codes, these laborers were to be called
‘servants’ while their employers were to be called ‘masters,’ essentially maintaining the
same power relations as before the abolishment of slavery.11 Ultimately, the Codes sought
to recreate the status quo that Southerners desired.
In many Johnson-appointed governments, the Codes did succeed in keeping blacks
in an inferior social and legal position. Interpreting the laws as an attempt to circumvent
the outcome of the Civil War, however, legislators in the North became increasingly
enraged by the Black Codes.12 After their victory in the 1866 elections, Radical
Republicans placed the South under military rule and repealed the Black Codes.
Following Reconstruction and the Compromise of 1877 (a deal struck in the election of
Rutherford B. Hayes, the outcome being Democrats taking control of the South again in
10
Ibid.
“Black Codes,” Spartacus Educational, http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USASblackcodes.htm (accessed
12 January 2009)
12
“Black Codes,” Handbook of Texas Online, http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/BB/jsb1.html
11
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return for recognizing Hayes’s claim on the Presidency), a new set of discriminatory laws
took hold, however: the Jim Crow laws.13 The emergence of the Jim Crow laws in the
wake of the suspension of the Black Codes is not altogether surprising; once the
Compromise of 1877 was struck, any burgeoning efforts towards racial equality and an
end to segregation were overruled by the new power holders in the South: white
Democrats.14 With the southern Democrats so fully in control by 1890, the introduction
of Jim Crow laws firmly set the tone for continued racial inequality and discrimination.
Late 1877-Present - Jim Crow Laws
Named for the 1832 “Jump Jim Crow” song and dance caricature of AfricanAmericans, the Jim Crow laws are a collection of local laws and state constitutional
provisions that enforce du jure (by law) segregation and various other discriminatory
acts.15 Though not an official term, by the end of the nineteenth century, the label “Jim
Crow” was so commonplace and so closely associated to racism that virtually all methods
of racial discrimination were recognized as Jim Crow laws or practices.16
Jim Crow laws are perhaps the most prominent barriers that civil rights activists
face in the fight for equality. The expanse of area covered by the laws is as large as from
Delaware to California and North Dakota to Texas, proving to be a vast array of states
(most especially the Southern) that have made the act of different races being near one
another in public places a punishable offense.17 Segregation is in fact the one facet of Jim
Crow laws that has persisted in its original intent almost unchanged; in postReconstruction Alabama, for example, transportation, along with billiards rooms,
(accessed 12 January 2009)
13
Davis, Ronald L.F. “Creating Jim Crow: An In-Depth Essay,” Jim Crow History, 2003,
http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/history/creating2.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
14
Ibid.
15
Davis, Ronald L.F. “From Terror to Triumph: Historical Overview,” Jim Crow History, 2003,
http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/history/overview.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
16
Davis, Ronald L.F. “Creating Jim Crow: An In-Depth Essay.”(accessed 12 January 2009)
17
"Examples of Jim Crow Laws," The Jackson Sun, http://www.ferris.edu/JIMCROW/links/misclink/examples/
(accessed 12 January 2009)
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restaurants, and toilet facilities were expected to be kept separate for white and blacks.
White female nurses, too, were not to be expected to treat or even be in the same ward as
a black man.
Conditions in Alabama remain restrictive and discriminatory, voting
registration falling sharply among blacks and poor whites because of stringent voting
registration laws being written as the new face of Jim Crow as well as a clear and
unchanging segregation among the populace.18
From the very beginning of the Jim Crow laws, the gamut has run far in terms of
what sort of racial discrimination they can enforce or allow. Between 1865 and 1960,
more than two hundred ordinances, state laws, and state constitutional amendments have
been passed and commonly understood as falling under the Jim Crow moniker.
19
All
aspects of daily life have been regulated, from education to transportation, health care to
housing, the use of public facilities and the interaction between two private citizens. Even
death has been touched upon by Jim Crows, where several states have regulations
dictating that blacks and whites must be buried in separate cemeteries and indeed, even
conveyed there by different services of hearses.20 The discriminations perpetuated by Jim
Crow laws have similarly stripped basic human rights away by dictating breeding
(miscegenation laws, which as of 1956 had seen one hundred twenty statutes proposed to
limit blacks and whites populating together), education (the enforcement of Brown v.
Board has been lacking in many Southern States since its passing), public
accommodations and public services (even companies for adoption have stringent rules
keeping the races separate) and voting.21
Though there has been some progress in overturning certain Jim Crow laws
18
“Alabama and the Civil Rights in 1960,” Scholastic.com,
http://teacher.scholastic.com/researchtools/researchstarters/civilrights/ (accessed 12 January
2009)
19
“Jim Crow Legislation Overview,” The History of Jim Crow Online,
http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/resources/lessonplans/hs_es_jim_crow_laws.htm (accessed 12
January 2009)
20
Ibid.
21
Ibid.
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(segregation on interstate transportation was outlawed by the Supreme Court in Irene
Morgan v. Virginia, citing the Commerce Clause as a reason)22 the prejudice that persists
in public and private domains is still enforced and allowed by many Jim Crow laws—
especially those that might not specifically reference race but instead outline
qualifications that those of a certain race are unable to fulfill. Such Jim Crow laws are the
chief cause of disfranchisement among blacks, demanding levels of literacy, property,
and income that blacks in poor regions cannot afford to procure. This is why Jim Crow
laws are the necessary focus of SNCC in particular; one task on the organization’s agenda
is the task of overturning prejudicial legislation with legislation that ensures civil rights.
Without overturning these laws, it is impossible to imagine more minorities voting for
those in public office or having a say in changing the practices that dictate how they live
everyday life. It is for this reason, seeing the current manifestation of historical Black
Codes and Jim Crow laws, that social change cannot be truly affected unless legal change
is pursued as well.
1910-1940 - First and Second “Great Migration”
As a result of the violence and prejudicial attitudes that dictated the actions and
lives of blacks in the South, there was a “Great Migration” from 1910-1940; historians
content that a second “Great Migration” took place after 1940, but the first wave of
African-Americans to move in mass numbers took place for the first two decades
following 1910. In this “Great Migration,” African-Americans left the South in
substantial numbers to settle in regions in the North and West so as to enjoy physical
safety, economic prosperity, and better quality of education for their children.23
In search of more opportunities and above all, greater racial tolerance, between
thirty thousand and one hundred thousand African-Americans moved North and West
22
"Morgan v. Virginia," PBS.org, http://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_morgan.html (accessed 12
January 2009)
23
Shultz, Stanley K. “American History: Civil War to the Present.”
http://us.history.wisc.edu/hist102/lectures/lecture09.html (accessed 12 January 2009)
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(“the Promised Land” of racial freedom) primarily to easy-to-reach places by rail.
Environmental factor like floods and cotton infestations meant that black farmers were
displaced, while others moved because of the opportunity for alternative work created by
a shortage of workers in factories; positions were available as laborers and sharecroppers
as well.24 Excepting the Great Depression, black migration to these regions remained
strong after the 1920s into present-day; there are more than six million Southern blacks
who have migrated to the North as of 1960.
Still, the utopia of racial equality and thriving economically did not exactly
happen for blacks that made the move. No government assistance for the families that
would move together meant that blacks and white European immigrants were often in
competition for jobs and housing. Though not as legally restrictive in the North and West
(black adult men could vote in the North, and education was much more readily
available) racial discrimination was still a pervasive presence in these areas. White
Northerners especially became afraid as African-Americans began to assert themselves,
becoming self-made men and crossing economic lines. As such, whites were sure to
reiterate racist rhetoric, commenting on the scientifically proven inferiority of the black
race (an offshoot of the ethnology, psychology, and anthropology studies that became
popular at this time) in order to put blacks in their place. “In-breeding” in the North, just
as in the South, was subsequently feared.25
In 1941, the Second Great Migration began, a move that many say is continuing
today. Those who migrate under this time period do so for different reasons and under
different conditions than the previous Migration, which is why there is a distinction
between the two. The African-Americans of the previous Migration had been primarily
agricultural workers with roots in the rural South, moving because necessity—whether
economic or social—prompted them. In the Second Migration, blacks were moving into
social and cultural centers where there was an established center of population to
24
Ibid.
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accommodate them; black communities by the 1950s were some of the most urbanized
areas in the country, especially cities like Memphis and Birmingham. 26 Urban blacks left
the overcrowded cities of the South for the overcrowded cities if the North, relying on a
network of information to inform them of new jobs and wage-earning opportunities, and
benefiting from an overall better education and world-savvy than many of their rural
predecessors.27 Following the Second World War, black women and men found
themselves employed in the defense industries that had developed, as well as being
recruited by other industrial jobs. A sharp fall in domestic labor for black women at this
time is evidence of more women entering the labor force. 28
The rise of urban blacks flooding the already cluttered cities in the North and West
meant that expansion of suburbia and “white flight” ran rampant during this time, as well.
Black families looking for houses were often charged double by the realtor and the white
family selling the house, and tenement camps of preexisting poor conditions became even
worse with more people and no funding from the government. The Second Migration
continues today because of a perceived increase of opportunities in the North, yet racism
and economic exploitation continues to exist even there, shaping the lives of blacks all
over the United States.
9 April 1947 - Journey of Reconciliation
The Journey of Reconciliation was one of the first truly prominent non-violent
examples of direct action in the civil rights movement of this century. Led by the
Congress for Racial Equality (CORE), a group heavily influenced by the non-violent
25
Ibid.
Holt, Thomas C. "The Second Great Migration, 1940-70," University of Chicago,
http://www.inmotionaame.org/texts/viewer.cfm?id=9_000T&page=1 (accessed 12 January 2009)
27
“Diversity in the Life of Migrants,” The Second Great Migrations,
http://www.inmotionaame.org/migrations/topic.cfm?migration=9&topic=6&tab=image
(accessed 12 January 2009)
28
Phillips, Kimberely. “The Plight of the Negro Workers,”
http://www.inmotionaame.org/texts/viewer.cfm?id=9_013T&page=226 (accessed 12 January
2009)
26
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rhetoric of Mahatma Ghandi, sixteen men—eight black, eight white—attempted to
challenge the segregation laws of interstate buses in the South. Targeted states included
Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky and though the Supreme Court case
Morgan v. Virginia had, in 1946, removed the requirement of segregation on interstate
transportation, the riders suffered several arrests.29 In North Carolina, Judge Henry
Whitfield made it a point to condemn the white men involved more harshly than the
black men in order to demonstrate his disgust.
Though the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
(NAACP) did not approve of the direct action approach even with non-violent action,
anticipating resistance and violence against the riders anyway, the organization did offer
legal help to those who were arrested. Later, the Journey of Reconciliation was credited
for ushering in the 1954 Brown v. Board decision, as well as providing the basis for some
present-day desires to repeat the defiant action on segregated buses today.30
1954 - Brown v. Board of Education Heard
A landmark case to the cause of desegregation, the Supreme Court hearing on
Brown v. Board in 1954 struck down segregation in public schools. The case completely
took apart and rendered useless the legal basis of reasoning for segregation in schools and
other public facilities. A combination of five like cases under one heading, the Supreme
Court addressed the wide array of concerns regarding the inadequacies of educational
resources reserved solely for black students, as well as the disparities in everything from
transportation, education, teacher pay, and facilities.31 More than two hundred plaintiffs
expressed their grievances in suits brought by the NAACP previously, but in Brown,
29
“Journey of Reconciliation,” Spartacus Educational,
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAjor.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
30
“The History Behind You Don’t Have to Ride Jim Crow!” You Don’t Have to Ride Jim
Crow Official Website, http://www.robinwashington.com/jimcrow/journey.html (accessed 12
January 2009)
31
“Brown v. Board: About the Case,” Brown V. Board,
http://www.brownvboard.org/summary/ (accessed 12 January 2009)
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tacking Oliver Brown’s name as the plaintiff was a strategy to have a male name heading
the case. Though this was not the first case to challenge segregation in schools, it was the
first time the Supreme Court overturned such a practice on grounds of a violation of the
Fourteenth Amendment.32 By acknowledging, “separate educational facilities [as]
unequal” the Supreme Court effectively eliminated any legal basis for du jure
segregation, making it clear that under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment, segregation was unconstitutional.33
Despite the revolutionary nature of the ruling, change did not sweep the country.
For one thing, the ruling was heavily ignored in the South and rarely enforced in some
states. Such was the backlash that scientific racism (the justification of racism based on
scientific evidence of black inferiority) emerged as well as individuals such as Virginia
Senator Harry S.F Byrd, who attempted to close down schools rather than integrate them.
Today, Virginia continues to feel the effects of Byrd’s ideas, though most of his attempts
were negated in state and federal court earlier this year.34 Most notably, in 1957, President
Dwight E. Eisenhower sent U.S. troops to Little Rock, Arkansas, in order to protect the
nine black students entering the white school. This action demonstrated the seriousness
with which the President took the Supreme Court ruling, setting the precedent for the
Executive Branch to enforce those rulings.
Above all, Brown demonstrates the recognition by the country’s highest court that
segregation is not morally or legally justified by the Constitution and therefore, cannot in
good faith be upheld by the lawmakers in the United States.
1955 - Montgomery Bus Boycott Begins
The Montgomery Bus Boycotts were the events that first ignited the flames of the
32
Ibid.
“Brown Versus Board Decision,” Civil Rights Movement Veterans,
http://www.crmvet.org/tim/timhis54.htm#1954bvbe (accessed 12 January 2009)
34
Glarud, Bruce. “The Journal of Southern History,” 1977, http://www.jstor.org/sici?sici=00224642(197705)43%3A2%3C324%3ATCOCVT%3E2.0.CO%3B2-F&cookieSet=1 (accessed 12
January 2009)
33
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13
modern civil rights movement. They demonstrated the ways in which direct, non-violent
action when taken on by a mass of people invested in a cause can make people sit up and
take notice. Though not the first time that attempts to desegregate buses, the boycotts
went further and mobilized more people than the isolated incidents of individual
experiences in years prior—Rosa Park’s infamous fight being one.
In 1955, the community of activists, including the Women’s Political Council and
the NAACP, were waiting for the right person to pin a mass movement behind. Already
gearing up for boycotts, they anticipated the unjust arrest of someone who could serve as
a representative figure for the protests. Fifteen-year-old Claudette Colvin, arrested for
refusing to give up her seat, was initially one such figure but later, it was discovered she
was pregnant. E.D Nixon of the NAACP stated, “I had to be sure I had someone I could
win with.”35 On 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her
seat—the seat in the back, designated for blacks—to a white man. This was just the push
the movement needed, and Nixon put into motion the boycotts that would characterize
the uncompromising nature of civil rights demonstrations today.
Galvanized by the idea of boycotting the bus system, prominent ministers in the
area met and decided to spread the word through their sermons; if the one-day protest
succeeded, they would continue. Martin Luther King, Jr., then a minister at Dexter
Avenue Baptist Church, was one of these initial activists and the elected president of the
group that sprung from the protest, the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA). 36
MIA was faced with the logistics of maintaining the boycott even in the face of stringent
denial to acquiesce to desegregation plans. A ban on cab discounts, a concentrated effort
to divide the black community with false information, and an end resort to violence did
nothing to stop the boycott. Even looking to the law, stopping the “private taxi” service
35
Williams, Juan. Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965 (New York:
Viking Penguin Inc., 1987) 62
36
“Montgomery Bus Boycott,” Black History,
http://www.watson.org/~lisa/blackhistory/civilrights-55-65/montbus.html (accessed 12 January
2009)
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
14
(set up by MIA) with minor traffic offenses and major charges, did nothing to end the
boycott. Blacks were staying off the buses—and criticizing the ones who did not—and
business was suffering. White business owners began to speak up to try and end the
boycott, but black leaders would hear none of it; emboldened by their success, they
would settle for no less than full integration.37 Looking to the two year old Brown v.
Board, they bought their case to federal court, which used similar reasoning to rule in
their favor.
On 21 December 1956, more than a year after it began, the bus boycott ended and
blacks returned to the buses. The move inspired waves of violence against blacks,
including sniper shots at buses, bombings at the homes of prominent black leaders, and
KKK scare-tactics. Yet the violence died down after several well-known white voices in
the community spoke out against it, and integration was eventually successful. It was
through these protests that King rose to prominence, eventually leading the Southern
Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and becoming a revered voice in the movement
as it stands today, even extending his leadership over the first SNCC meeting at Shaw
University in early 1960.
1957 - Civil Rights Act of 1957
By 1957, only twenty per cent of the country’s African-American population was
registered to vote. A result of Jim Crow laws by state that made it difficult for individuals
in certain economic and social conditions to register to vote, as well as intimidation from
people who did not want blacks to register, ensured that the voting population was kept
white and privileged. In 1957, however, the first Civil Rights Act in eighty-two years
went through Congress, aiming to improve the number of registered black voters. The
original Bill was tough on those who obstructed any individual’s right to vote, as well as
proposing several initiatives meant to uphold civil rights. After much opposition from
other Congressmen, however, the Bill was rewritten as a water-down version much
37
Ibid.
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
15
different than its original. The end product barely punished those who sought to
jeopardize voting registration, and Eisenhower later admitted he did not even understand
parts of it.38 Though publicly derided as a sham, ultimately, activists looked at the Bill
with hope, calling it progressive as the first piece of civil rights legislation in more than
eight decades. Statistics show that voting registration now, however, is even lower than it
was three years ago.
1960 - Greensboro Sit-Ins
The Greensboro sit-ins brought together the first group of student activists who
would eventually form SNCC, and proved to be as important to the desegregation of
public places as the Montgomery Boycotts were to the desegregation of buses. Though
many were shocked by the strength and suddenness of the sit-ins, the students involved
had been part of underground discussions and rising discontent that had been racing
through college campuses and meeting halls for several months already. On 1 February
1960, four black college students from North Carolina Agricultural and Technical
College, sit down at a whites-only Woolworth’s lunch-counter in Greensboro, N.C.39
Under segregation laws as they currently stand, blacks and whites are not permitted to eat
with one another—not only could the black customers be fined if they ignored the
segregation ordinance, but so could the server who served them. Though the boys asked
for food, they were ignored. Undeterred but not arrested—in the wake of Brown v.
Board, southern legislators were careful to charge black defiance of segregation with
“disturbing the peace” or something similarly unrelated to race—they stayed until
closing.40 The next day, the boys brought their friends and again sat at the counter,
refusing to move even as they were refused service. Media coverage of the sit-in began,
and the movement gained momentum. By 3 February, more than sixty students from the
38
“Civil Rights Act of 1957,” History Learning Site,
http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/1957_civil_rights_act.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
39
“First Southern Sit-In, Greensboro NC,” Civil Rights Movement Veterans,
http://www.crmvet.org/tim/timhis60.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
16
region were occupying Woolworth’s counters in rotating shifts.41 Though they received
threats, the sit-ns persisted, as did picket lines and boycotts from supporters. Soon, other
lunch counters and Greensboro restaurants were faced with the sit-ins, too. In July, as the
movement begins spreading to the upper South, Woolworth’s makes a concession and
agrees to serve all “properly-dressed and well-behaved” customers, regardless of race.
The sit-ins were the first inkling to civil rights activists that there was a new but
powerful section of the movement emerging with the will, the creativity, and the patience
to forge new roads for freedom: the youth. The sit-ins represented the first cohesive and
comprehensive mass movement of youth in the civil rights battle, displaying a united
front of black and white activists alike, as well as incorporating women into the
movement. Others sat up and took notice of the way the sit-ins capitalized on and used
the Gandhian non-violent, direct action approach, and they wondered if perhaps the
students were a new front of innovative thought within the movement. For the students’
parts, they were gearing up for an expansion of their actions and thought.
15-17 April 1960 - SNCC Founded
SNCC was first organized during a conference held at Shaw University in Raleigh,
North Carolina from 15-17 April 1960. The aim of the conference, as expressed by Ella
Baker in a letter sent as invitation to prospective attendees, was to “share experiences
gained in recent protest demonstrations and to help chart goals for effective action.” The
conference brought together more than two hundred freedom fighters from varied
backgrounds and organizations; though prominent adults in the civil rights movement
attended, youth presence was especially heavy. Student representatives from fifty-eight
sit-in centers across twelve different states were present, as well as student delegates from
nineteen northern colleges. Members of several student action groups of the time were
also in attendance, bringing a variety of opinions, experiences, and suggestions to the
40
41
Ibid.
Ibid.
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
17
table.42
The turnout and ideas generated at this conference gave way to the official
formation of SNCC, populated with some of the most trailblazing voices of the civil
rights movement today. Known as the “shock troops” of the movement, SNCC
coordinates and plans many of the most dangerous grassroots campaigns in the South
today. As 1960 ends, however, it becomes abundantly clear that many of the original
initiatives discussed at the conference have yet to be expanded upon or implemented.
Other youth-oriented organizations look to SNCC rather than older (and seen as
ineffectual) groups for guidance, and as such, the members of the organization choose
now—the end of 1960 and on the brink of more violence—to meet and discuss the
organization’s future.
Members of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee
Ella Baker
Born 13 December 1903, Ella Baker is the oldest prominent voice within SNCC's
inner-circle. A graduate of Shaw University in 1927, Baker has a long and storied history
as a civil rights activist. At a young age, she began her journey into the realm of social
justice from a home base in Harlem, taking a position with the Young Negroes
Cooperative League during the Depression, developing consumer cooperatives to combat
the economic downturn. During this time, she also partook in several women’s
organizations. 43 In 1941, Baker turned her attention to the civil rights movement, joining
the NAACP. Over the years, however, it became clear that Baker did not care for the
central focus of the movement, preferring grassroots organizing to the alteration of laws
through legal venues. After meeting activists Bayard Rustin and A. Phillip Randolph
following the Montgomery Bus Boycotts, Baker joined the SCLC in 1957 and eventually
42
“SNCC,” Civil Rights Movement Veterans, http://www.crmvet.org/tim/timhis60.htm#1960sncc (accessed 12
January 2009)
43
“Who Was Ella Baker?” Ella Baker Center,
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
18
took over leadership temporarily from Martin Luther King, Jr.44
Baker’s extensive and varied experience in the civil rights movement is especially
important in light of her feelings today. Preferring to work with the youth in the
movement, she has left the NAACP and serves as a mentor, advisor, and executive
advisor for SNCC. Her experiences in fundraising to combat Jim Crow laws, community
organizing, and increasing voting registration should prove invaluable for the guidance of
many SNCC members in the years to come.
John Lewis
One of the founding members of SNCC, John Lewis is a young but rising presence
in the civil rights movement. The son of sharecroppers in Alabama, Lewis grew up
committed to ending the segregation and humility he was routinely subjected to as a
child; after the Montgomery bus boycotts, Lewis corresponded with Martin Luther King,
Jr., inspired by his efforts.45 A graduate of Religion and Philosophy studies at Fisk
University, Lewis is a particular student of non-violent policies, acting as in integral force
in the lunch-counter sit-ins and now, SNCC.
As a student volunteer, Lewis has proposed several revolutionary and daring
tactics of direct non-violent action in the South; one of these ideas is an offshoot of the
bus boycotts, a program some have termed “freedom rides.” Slated for later this year, the
movement serves to illustrate the dynamic place Lewis holds within SNCC, as well as the
significance of his leadership. It is to be recognized, however, that though Lewis is a
student of non-violence. He also does not support and indeed criticizes the lack of
federal action concerning civil rights today.46
http://www.ellabakercenter.org/page.php?pageid=19&contentid=9 (accessed 12 January 2009)
44
Ibid.
45
“On the March for Peace and Justice,” John Lewis Biography,
http://www.achievement.org/autodoc/page/lew0bio-1 (accessed 12 January 2009)
46
Ibid.
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
19
James Forman
Born 4 October 1928, James Forman is a relatively new but valued member of
SNCC. After a childhood spent in Chicago and summers in Mississippi (the hotbed of
racism in the South) Forman experienced life among both urban and rural blacks,
witnessing in horror the degree of discrimination suffered by his fellow AfricanAmericans. After a stint in the Air Force after graduating high school, Forman enrolled in
the University of Southern California. It was there that an incident of police brutality
prompted Forman to suffer from an emotional breakdown and withdraw from the college.
Ultimately, his educated was completed in Chicago and in 1957, Forman graduated from
Roosevelt University, traveling south to work as a teacher, journalist, and graduate
student until his recent joining of SNCC.47
As executive secretary of SNCC, Forman is a particular asset to the group, taking
an active role in creating and steering new initiatives in the dangerous Deep South. At
least a decade older than the average trend of SNCC members, Forman gives
organization and focus to the organization, looking after the logistics and administrative
duties of the group as well as expanding operations and coordinating much of the voterregistration drives just now taking hold in states such as Alabama and Georgia.48 It is
important to note that though he acts in accordance with the strict non-violent directive of
SNCC, his past experience at the hands of violent whites has led Forman to express
sentiments more in tune with the increasing philosophy of radicalism that is seeping
through the movement.
Diane Nash
Born 15 May 1938, Diane Nash is one of the founding student members of SNCC
and a guiding force within youth participation in the civil rights movement. Raised in
Chicago but a student of Nashville, Tennessee’s Fisk University, Nash has studied under
47
Holley, Joe. “James Foreman: Civil Rights Leader James Foreman Dies,” The Washington Post, 11 Tuesday
2005, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A1621-2005Jan11.html (accessed 12 January 2009)
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
20
James Lawson in civil disobedience seminars, using what she learned to help prepare
fellow students on how to conduct themselves during the Nashville wave of the sit-ins
that were so popular in 1960.49 Confronted with racism and degradation in the South that
she was rarely confronted with in the North--including mob violence that often singled
her out along with jail time and fines as a result of the sit-ins--Nash overcame her
skepticism of non-violent action to become a field worker with SNCC. Though a
proponent of SNCC’s policy, Nash has expressed doubts on the effect of the youth
movement and the strategies as they stand, citing the violence and legal repercussions
suffered from activists as evidence of possible dangers to be anticipated. Nevertheless,
Nash has willingly taken part in the movement to continue the “freedom ride” initiative,
as well as expressing a desire to move deeper South and work with the voting registration
programs currently being set up.50
James Lawson
Like only a few other SNCC members, James Lawson has always been a stringent
supporter of the non-violent rhetoric. Lawson is a particular proponent of SNCC’s
mission. Born in 1928, Lawson was, as a college student, a member of two other
organizations that pushed non-violent action, Fellow of Reconciliation (FOR) and CORE.
As a member of these organizations, Lawson took part in sit-ins and freedom rides long
before the popularization of such actions today. After refusing the draft in 1951, stating
himself a conscientious objector, Lawson was sent to prison for fourteen months. Upon
his release, he traveled with a Methodist mission to India, learning more from those in the
Gandhi camp the concept of satyagraha, or non-violent action.51
48
49
Holley, Joe. (accessed 12 January 2009)
“Nash Recounts Civil Rights Movement, Promotes Peace,” Daily Collegian, 2003,
http://www.collegian.psu.edu/archive/2003/01/01-21-03tdc/01-21-03dnews-09.asp (accessed 12
January 2009)
50
Ibid.
51
“James Lawson,” King Encyclopedia, Stanford University,
http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/about_king/encyclopedia/lawson_james.htm (accessed 12
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
21
He returned to the United States in 1955, meeting with Martin Luther King, Jr. and
exerting such an influence that King urged Lawson to come South and help the
movement. Lawson then moved to Nashville, Tennessee and began running workshops to
train the burgeoning youth movement; it was here that Lawson first met Diane Nash.
Soon, Nashville students began to sit-in at lunch-counters and department stores, the
conduct of the students a model for other students involved in the movement.52 Following
these movements, Lawson was instrumental in the coming-together of SNCC, helping to
organize and galvanize the students who attended the conference at Shaw University.
Lawson helped to write the statement of purpose for SNCC, shaping it around many of
the non-violent and Christian ideals that lead the movement. Currently, Lawson helps
prepare SNCC field workers by teaching workshops.53
James Bevel
Born in 1963, James Bevel is most notable for being a vocal proponent for voting
rights, as well as participating and helping to organize the Nashville sit-in movement.
After being called to the ministry and enrolling in the American Baptist Theology
Seminar in Nashville, Bevel joined the SCLC.54 Bevel is a dynamic speaker and an
imaginative tactician, constructing several unorthodox and innovative plans to combat the
segregation and voting registration worries in the South. Though passionate, he is
described by many of his peers as a “loose cannon” with “reckless courage” ideal for the
dangers of working in the Deep South.55 His guiding philosophy, rather than simple nonviolence, is that religion is fundamental to the human rights struggle and that the church
fills an essential role as an institute for social change. The SNCC field secretary in
January 2009)
52
Ibid.
53
Ibid.
54
“Rev. James Bevel,” History Makers,
http://www.thehistorymakers.com/biography/biography.asp?bioindex=359&category=Civicmak
ers (accessed 12 January 2009)
55
Ibid.
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
22
Mississippi, Bevel has released many pamphlets and literature on civil rights since his
year in the state.56 Ultimately, Bevel’s impassioned activism and managerial efficiency
make him a person of particular interest on the SNCC roster.
Marion Barry
Born in Itta Bena, Mississippi, Marion Barry is well-acquainted with the racism so
deeply entrenched in the South. One of the founding members of SNCC, Barry attended
LeMoyne University and Fisk University, where fellow SNCC activists were engaged in
the sit-in movement. A passionate supporter of civil rights, Barry was elected as the first
Chairman of SNCC, devoting much of his focus to the desegregation of buses in the
United States. Though he desires to further his education, hoping to earn a doctoral
degree, white parents have expressed their disapproval of an African American teaching
their children. As such, currently, Barry is a full-time SNCC member, leading protests
and demonstrations for the group.57
Bernard Lafayette
Acting as program director in Central Alabama, Bernard Lafayette was involved in
the Nashville movements along with his fellow SNCC members, contributing to the
creation of SNCC as one of the founding members. Particularly interested in voting
registration initiatives in Alabama, as well as building mounting excitement for the
freedom ride movement, Lafayette uses the non-violent principles in conjunction with his
foundation of faith. Currently, he has also turned his attention to more urbanized areas in
the North, seeking to coordinate movements in Chicago in particular.58
56
Ibid.
“Marion Barry,” Spartacus Educational,
http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAbarryM.htm (accessed 12 January 2009)
58
“Bernard LaFayette, Jr.” Ethiopian Institute for Nonviolence and Peace Education Studies,
http://www.eineps.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=91&Itemid=72 (accessed
12 January 2009)
57
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23
Julian Bond
Born in 1940, Julian Bond is one of the youngest activists and original founders of
SNCC. A student at the Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia, Bond is currently the
communications chair of SNCC. He also leads student protests in Georgia, speaking out
against segregation in public facilities. Bond is married to a fellow student at Spelman
College; he devotes much of his time, however, to the civil rights movement,
disseminating literature such as the SNCC newsletter, The Student Voice, and forming
important connections between SNCC and other groups as part of his role as
communications chair. 59
Stokely Carmichael
A Trinidadian-American, Stokely Carmichael was born in 1941 and moved to
Harlem at the age of eleven. In high school, Carmichael made acquaintances in the
Communist party, befriending several black radicals and joining a Marxist discussion
group, eventually demonstrating against the House Committee on Un-American
Activities.60 He went on to attend Harvard on an SCLC scholarship for students arrested
during protests, and joined the Non-Violent Action Group (NAG). As a student
representative of NAG, Carmichael brings a wide spectrum of concerns to SNCC
meetings; rather than just focus on desegregation, Carmichael is passionate about
eliminating the social and economic exploitation of blacks, stressing unity as a race in
demanding basic human rights. To Carmichael, the non-violent work in voting
registration drives, freedom rides, and other protests is only honorable if it is recognized
and things are thusly changed; he has demonstrated hostility against the government,
59
“Julian Bond, Center President,” SPLC, http://www.splcenter.org/center/history/bond.jsp
(accessed 12 January 2009)
60
“Stokely Carmichael,” King Encyclopedia, Stanford University,
http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/about_king/encyclopedia/carmichael_stokely.html
(accessed 12 January 2009)
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
24
stating the inability of legislators to regulate civil rights.61
Robert Parris Moses
Harlem-born and Harvard-educated, Robert Parris Moses is a field secretary for
SNCC, coordinating voter registration projects in Mississippi and other areas of the
South. Dedicated to increasing literacy and defeating the discriminatory requirements
written into state constitutions in order to disenable blacks from voting, Moses is a
knowledgeable and passionate source from which SNCC derives its support for the
voting drives currently developing in the South.62
Fannie Lou Hamer
Fannie Lou Hamer was born in 1917 and in many ways, represents the success of
SNCC’s recruitment efforts in its early years. Lacking formal education, Hamer was a
devout student at her church in Mississippi, and her religious training and beliefs remain
a guiding force for her ideals today. For much of her life, Hamer existed as simply a rural
agricultural worker who had to submit to the indignities and racism that even now run so
rampant in her state. Sabotaged by jealous white neighbors, her life as a sharecropper
never bore economic prosperity, and as such--even despite her literacy--she was never
afforded much opportunity to transcend her low-class and low-economic status. Currently
making their own liquor and operating a small saloon, Hamer has come to SNCC’s
attention as a possible volunteer for voting registration drives. As a literate black woman
who is symbolic of the status suffered by many blacks unable to vote, Hamer has the
potential to change the complacency and helplessness that blacks face.63
Cleveland Sellers, Jr.
Born in 1944, Cleveland Sellers, Jr. is another person of interest to SNCC.
61
62
Ibid.
“Robert Parris Moses,” Stanford University, http://www.stanford.edu/~ccarson/articles/left_3.htm (accessed 12
January 2009)
63
“Fannie Lou Hamer,” Africa Within, http://www.africawithin.com/bios/fannie_hamer.htm
(accessed 12 January 2009)
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
25
Inflamed by the murder of activist Emmett Tillet in 1955, Sellers enthusiasm for the
movement spread so that he eventually became inspired by the Greensboro, N.C. sit-ins.
Organizing his own sit-in in his hometown of Denmark, N.C., Sellers put himself on the
map of civil rights activists. The biggest obstacle preventing Sellers from joining SNCC,
however, is his father’s adamant opposition of Sellers’s participation in the movement.
As such, Sellers is currently pursuing his education in lieu of serving as an active member
of SNCC. His presence at meetings, however, denotes his mounting interest and
dedication to the movement.64
Goals of the SNCC as of 1960
Desegregation
One of the biggest challenges facing SNCC is finding a way to have a wider
impact on the efforts to eliminate segregation. The sit-in movements across Nashville and
Greensboro proved successful in making lunch-counters and public facilities to change
their policies, but a legal statute prohibiting segregation has yet to reach many state
constitutions, let alone entering any federal laws. Segregation not only contradicts the
idea that African-Americans deserve the same human rights as everyone else, but it also
places whites in a superior role at the expense of blacks who suffer humiliation and
degradation in the process of being denied their rights. After the desegregation of many
schools in the South, it has been seen that integration is indeed possible, and SNCC’s
mission is to expediently and non-violently demand this process. In an effort to do away
with race hate, increase the economic and social opportunities of blacks, and dispel the
waves of violence continually sweeping the country, SNCC aims to see institutionalized
segregation completely erased from federal and state laws. Currently, SNCC has a wave
of freedom rides planned across the South, an initiative that needs intense focus and
planning as the year progresses.
64
“Sellers, Cleveland,” BlackPast.org, http://www.blackpast.org/?q=aah/sellers-cleveland-1944
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
26
An End to Disfranchisement
An obstacle to eradicating much of the power imbalance in state and federal
legislatures, the lack of blacks and other minorities who are registered to vote ensure that
those who would protect civil rights interests are not in office. The last of the Jim Crow
laws provide the biggest basis of reason for the deficiency in voting registration in the
South. With restrictions such as literacy test laws and poll taxes, even literate blacks can
be denied voting registration if the administrator of the test decides to discriminate
against him. Poor blacks are also doubly impacted by both common restrictions, as they
do not have the money to pay the poll tax as well as the means to become educated.
Oftentimes, the lack of numbers at the polls are also due to the intimidation tactics of
whites in their region, as well as a general feeling of malaise as a result of the overriding
sentiment that change is impossible. It is SNCC’s goal to increase voting registration,
especially in the Deep South, using support workshops and voting registration drives in
as many regions as possible in order to get the word out.
Direct Action with Focus on a Non-Violent Approach
What sets SNCC apart from other youth movements in the freedom fight is its
formative beginnings, a credo that is shaped around Christian ideals of love and
community as well as the non-violent rhetoric popularized by Gandhi in the Indians’ fight
for freedom from British colonialism during the preceding decade. Fighting for the end of
racial discrimination in housing, education, employment, and voting, SNCC seeks to
deviate from the approach of older civil rights groups such as the NAACP, turning to
methods of civil disobedience rather than using litigation as a means for their ends. James
Forman has articulated the goals of SNCC as such: “[W]orking full-time against the
whole value system of this country and by working towards revolution.” It is important to
note, however, that according to SNCC’s mission statement, this revolution should be
fostered in the spirit of non-violent action. SNCC seeks direct action, meaning a stop to
(accessed 12 January 2009)
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
27
relying simply on legislative maneuvers to encourage the completion of their aims, while
taking care not to increase violence and tension in regions where it is currently rife. This
goal, the frame of philosophy that guides the initiatives and programs that SNCC
members seek to implement in the South, is one of the most difficult ones for SNCC due
to the resistance anticipated for this idea, within SNCC ranks and from outsiders alike.
Challenges Faced by the Committee
The federal government’s inability to adjudicate civil rights violations is one of the
first and foremost challenges faced by SNCC. It is also the reason why SNCC and other
youth in the movement have taken it upon themselves to campaign for change through
action rather than appeals in state and federal courts. Both in the preceding Eisenhower
administration and the current Kennedy administration, attempts at civil rights legislation
has been blocked by delaying tactics and overt racism by Southern Senators; most
concessions have been minor, and anything significantly attempting to alter the state of
things in the country is swiftly gutted by those in power, rendering bills useless to the
cause. Not only is this inaction harmful to the progression of Congressional thought and
philosophy on racial equality, but under the new tactics of civil disobedience, protection
of peaceful protesters is entrusted to local government, an oversight by the federal
government that has caused escalation in violence.
In a related challenge, resistance from states and a resurgence of white power
rhetoric has made it even more dangerous for civil rights activists to venture into regions
that need SNCC presence. The Klu Klux Klan (KKK), a white supremacist group that is
most recognizable in many Southern states by setting fire to giant crosses on the lawns of
those they wish to scare, has become more prominent in opposition. Unaffiliated white
people, and especially those in authority figures, have taken up the same racist and
violent mantle. During the first wave of sit-ins, many activists were beaten, spit on, and
humiliated by those watching the demonstrators. Lynching has also seen a disturbing
resurgence in the South as a method of dealing against civil rights movements. Even the
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
28
North is not untouched; the atmosphere in many urbanized cities is unsettled as a result of
the blind eye police forces turn to the crimes committed against blacks. Non-violence
rhetoric is especially difficult to reconcile with the violence that many SNCC field
workers experience.
Another challenge relation to this question of reconciliation of ideals is the
disjunction of guiding philosophies within the movement. Perhaps the biggest challenge
facing SNCC today, the disparity between the fervor with which members of SNCC
subscribe to non-violent action makes it difficult for the organization to strengthen its
effectiveness, both operationally and in ideals. The rhetoric of non-violence, both
philosophically and strategically, is currently one of the main tenets of the organization.
Direct action in the form of public protest is another tenet, and as expected, sometimes
both ideals do not intersect with intended results. As more SNCC members rally events
and attempt to drum up support for voter registration in the South, using a more
prominent display of non-violence as a tactic, white-initiated violence is increasing. With
the increase of violence, many SNCC workers are uncertain that the non-violence credo
under which SNCC was founded is particularly sound in current times. Those who wish
to comply with the non-violent mission have taken a very decision course of action,
suffering the consequences of their protests however harsh they may be. Those who are
increasingly unhappy with the course of planning SNCC has taken, however, have begun
subscribing to a more radical ideology. In the impassioned words of many SNCC
members, it is obvious that a serious reexamination of SNCC’s mission and aims is
needed. The challenge of reconciling disjunctive philosophies must be addressed in order
to present a unified front.
Summation of Key Points
In the coming months, the tasks that SNCC faces will include: remaining in line
with its core mission, developing a concrete policy that is all-encompassing as well as
feasibly (and prudently) carried-out, and finally, making sure to account for the resistance
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
29
it has and continues to encounter from American lawmakers and society as a whole.
Examining the complex history of racial discrimination in the United States, it is obvious
that the fight will not be easy; racism is an institutionalized construct in the country and
aside from the laws of the United States, the minds of men must be changed as well. With
a roster of prominent and influential civil rights activists who are all invested in various
but not necessarily divergent causes, SNCC has the potential to dramatically change the
landscape of the movement. Before that can be done, however, the organization must
reassess its goals, address the challenges before them, and come back together as a group
with similar purposes and comprehensive plans on how to achieve those purposes.
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
30
Discussion Questions
• What role can SNCC play in achieving racial equality in the United States?
• How can SNCC get the Federal and State governments to enforce anti
discrimination laws and pass new civil rights legislation?
• How will your character’s background and views affect the way that you act in
committee?
• What do the Federal, State, and Local governments have to do to achieve racial
equality?
• How can SNCC overcome over a century of discrimination that has been
indoctrinated into American society?
Rutg ers M od el Congr es s
31
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