WEBVTT 00:09.567 --> 00:13.097 What I'd like to do today is go back very briefly so 00:13.100 --> 00:17.500 we're all on the same page, moving from events in 1964 00:17.500 --> 00:20.870 through 1966 actually.  I'm trying to compress some 00:20.867 --> 00:24.167 information so we can really be ready to catch next week 00:24.167 --> 00:27.967 right where we should be.  Remember in the last 00:27.967 --> 00:31.797 lecture, I talked about the events leading up to this 00:31.800 --> 00:35.000 pivotal summer of 1964, John F. 00:35.000 --> 00:37.300 Kennedy's assassination, Lyndon Baines Johnson taking 00:37.300 --> 00:38.900 up the mantle of Kennedy's civil rights 00:38.900 --> 00:42.470 legis--legislation, the battles over the civil 00:42.467 --> 00:46.467 rights bill, a bill being essentially stuck in 00:46.467 --> 00:49.997 Congress, especially the Senate filibuster, 00:50.000 --> 00:53.900 student leaders from SNCC conceptualizing the idea for 00:53.900 --> 00:57.300 a Freedom Summer, freedom vote to train people how to 00:57.300 --> 01:00.500 become--how to fully embrace their rights as citizens in 01:00.500 --> 01:03.500 the state of Mississippi, setting up freedom schools.  01:03.500 --> 01:05.000 These things all come together in the summer of 01:05.000 --> 01:11.000 1964.  Students from all around the country, 01:13.200 --> 01:16.270 Yale included, travel down to various points in 01:16.267 --> 01:18.197 Mississippi to begin Mississippi Freedom 01:18.200 --> 01:20.800 Democratic--Mississippi, Mississippi Freedom Summer, 01:20.800 --> 01:23.100 set up freedom schools, help organize votes to create a, 01:29.200 --> 01:30.200 a separate delegation to the Mississippi Democratic--to 01:30.200 --> 01:32.200 represent the Mississippi, Mississippi Democratic Party 01:32.200 --> 01:36.570 at the Democratic National Convention in August.  And 01:36.567 --> 01:40.497 the day after Mississippi Freedom Summer begins, 01:40.500 --> 01:41.700 three of the workers, Schwerner, 01:41.700 --> 01:46.270 Goodman and Chaney, disappear and are very 01:46.267 --> 01:51.997 quickly presumed to have been murdered.  During the 01:52.000 --> 01:54.170 course of the summer, the Civil Rights Act of '60--the 01:54.167 --> 01:56.997 Civil Rights Act is passed, signed into law, 01:57.000 --> 01:59.900 the most comprehensive law in support of racial 01:59.900 --> 02:03.400 equality in the nation's history.  There was an 02:03.400 --> 02:10.000 immediate white backlash.  George Wallace declares, 02:10.000 --> 02:13.970 the governor of Alabama, declares his candidacy.  02:13.967 --> 02:16.397 Ultimately has strong showings in Wisconsin, 02:16.400 --> 02:21.300 Indiana, and Maryland.  Public places in the South 02:21.300 --> 02:25.400 go private in order to prevent integration.  Civil 02:25.400 --> 02:29.270 Rights Act had not addressed the private institutions.  02:29.267 --> 02:34.467 It's a long summer of riots in 1964.  Riots aren't just 02:34.467 --> 02:37.697 in southern U.S.  In fact, they're largely urban and 02:37.700 --> 02:39.600 northern: New York City; Rochester; 02:39.600 --> 02:41.570 Paterson, New Jersey; Elizabeth, 02:41.567 --> 02:48.697 New Jersey; Philadelphia; Chicago.  It's a time of 02:48.700 --> 02:55.900 trial.  And as you'll recall from my lecture on Monday as 02:55.900 --> 02:59.000 I was wrapping it up, weeks before the Democratic 02:59.000 --> 03:02.570 National Convention convenes, 03:02.567 --> 03:04.197 the bodies of Schwerner, Goodman and Chaney are 03:04.200 --> 03:10.300 found, August 4th.  And they become martyrs of the 03:10.300 --> 03:12.900 movement, there's no doubt about it.  It's really 03:12.900 --> 03:14.800 important that you know that they were found in 03:14.800 --> 03:17.100 Philadelphia, Mississippi, for reasons that become very 03:17.100 --> 03:19.970 important later on in this course.  The bodies are 03:19.967 --> 03:21.297 found in an earthen dam in Philadelphia, 03:21.300 --> 03:24.900 Mississippi.  There was an aspiration to have them 03:24.900 --> 03:27.800 buried together, but Mississippi state law said 03:27.800 --> 03:32.900 the races had to be buried in separate spaces.  David 03:32.900 --> 03:38.900 Dennis, the head of CORE in Mississippi, 03:38.900 --> 03:41.070 agrees to give a eulogy in honor of James Chaney, 03:41.067 --> 03:42.767 the sole African American of these, 03:42.767 --> 03:48.567 of these three people who were murdered.  And he 03:48.567 --> 03:51.497 agrees to do it and then he sits down to do it and 03:51.500 --> 03:53.070 something happens. 03:53.067 --> 03:57.997 I want to play for you a clip.  It's a 03:58.000 --> 03:59.500 three-minute-long clip.  It's a little bit longer 03:59.500 --> 04:01.000 than I normally like to play, 04:01.000 --> 04:04.100 but you'll actually see the transformation happen during 04:04.100 --> 04:05.100 the course of the eulogy. 04:05.100 --> 04:09.400 August 7th, 1964.  The funeral of James Chaney in 04:09.400 --> 04:10.400 Meridien, Mississippi. 04:10.400 --> 04:15.100 I feel that he's got his freedom and we're still 04:15.100 --> 04:16.500 fighting for it. 04:16.500 --> 04:21.700 But what I want to talk about right now is the 04:21.700 --> 04:26.000 living dead that we have right among our midst, 04:26.000 --> 04:29.300 not only in the state of Mississippi, 04:29.300 --> 04:31.270 but throughout the nation. 04:31.267 --> 04:34.567 Those are the people who don't care, 04:34.567 --> 04:40.267 those who do care but don't have the guts enough to sign 04:40.267 --> 04:45.497 up for it, and those people who are busy up in 04:45.500 --> 04:50.270 Washington and other places using my freedom and my life 04:50.267 --> 04:52.167 to play politics with. 04:52.167 --> 04:56.897 That includes the President on down to the governor of 04:56.900 --> 04:58.800 the state of Mississippi. 04:58.800 --> 05:02.100 In my opinion, as I stand here, 05:02.100 --> 05:07.370 I not only blame the people who pulled the trigger or 05:07.367 --> 05:12.097 did the beating or dug the hole with the shovel, 05:12.100 --> 05:16.870 I bury the people--not bury, I'm sorry--but I blame the 05:16.867 --> 05:22.097 people in Washington, D.C., and on down in the state of 05:22.100 --> 05:26.370 Mississippi for what happened just as much as I 05:26.367 --> 05:29.197 blame those who pulled the trigger. 05:29.200 --> 05:33.000 You see, I know what's going to happen. 05:33.000 --> 05:38.270 I feel that even if they find the people who killed 05:38.267 --> 05:40.597 those guys in the summertime, 05:40.600 --> 05:45.870 you got to come back to the state of Mississippi and 05:45.867 --> 05:49.197 have a jury, of all their cousins, 05:49.200 --> 05:51.100 their aunts, their uncles. 05:51.100 --> 05:54.900 And I know what they're going to say, 05:54.900 --> 05:59.600 'not guilty' because no one saw them pull the trigger. 05:59.600 --> 06:01.500 I'm tired of that. 06:01.500 --> 06:05.300 See, another thing that makes me even tireder, 06:05.300 --> 06:10.570 though, that is the fact that we as people here in 06:10.567 --> 06:14.797 the state and the country are allowing this to 06:14.800 --> 06:18.600 continue to happen, even us as black folk. 06:18.600 --> 06:22.470 So I look at the young kids here, 06:22.467 --> 06:25.767 that's something else that I grieve about. 06:25.767 --> 06:30.997 And little Ben Chaney here and the other ones like him 06:31.000 --> 06:32.900 around in this audience. 06:32.900 --> 06:37.670 Well if you want someone to babysit for your kids, 06:37.667 --> 06:41.467 hire a black mammy to hold your baby. 06:41.467 --> 06:45.267 And as long as he can do that, 06:45.267 --> 06:51.397 he can sit down beside me, he can watch me go up there 06:51.400 --> 06:57.100 and register to vote, and he can watch me take some type 06:57.100 --> 07:03.300 of power in this state and he can sit down as I rule 07:03.300 --> 07:08.070 over him just as he's ruled over me for years. 07:08.067 --> 07:10.397 This is our country, too. 07:10.400 --> 07:17.600 We didn't ask to come here; they brought us over here. 07:17.600 --> 07:18.900 It's cut off at the last bit there, 07:18.900 --> 07:21.900 but he simply reiterates, "this is our country too."  07:21.900 --> 07:24.300 Asked about this eulogy afterwards, 07:24.300 --> 07:26.600 Dave Dennis said he looked down--he was planning to 07:26.600 --> 07:29.000 abide by the rules and give sort of a calming and 07:29.000 --> 07:32.100 reassuring, mournful and certainly angry, 07:32.100 --> 07:35.170 but in a polite sort of way, mournful eulogy.  And he 07:35.167 --> 07:37.597 looked down at Ben Chaney and he just snapped, 07:37.600 --> 07:40.700 "because I can't do this any longer."  What you see 07:40.700 --> 07:44.500 happening in '64 and you'll see more in '65 as well, 07:44.500 --> 07:47.700 is a fundamental shift in the tone of the movement.  07:47.700 --> 07:49.700 This is really one of the most important things to 07:49.700 --> 07:54.370 understand about this moment in the movement's history.  07:54.367 --> 07:58.397 You also see in the wake of great triumphs of the 07:58.400 --> 07:59.900 movement, like the Civil Rights Act being 07:59.900 --> 08:04.400 signed--there's no mistaking it's a triumph--you also see 08:04.400 --> 08:08.600 a very clear tactical shift in the movement, 08:08.600 --> 08:10.370 and that's what this lecture really is about, 08:10.367 --> 08:13.397 the fundamental tone and tactical changes in the 08:13.400 --> 08:14.500 movement that happened in the, 08:14.500 --> 08:18.500 in the '64, '65 moment.  From the standpoint of 08:18.500 --> 08:24.800 tactics, it's clear to Johnson and to 08:24.800 --> 08:28.200 others--Lyndon Johnson and to others--that by signing 08:28.200 --> 08:31.800 in the Civil Rights Act, he was kissing away the 08:31.800 --> 08:33.800 Democratic Party in the South.  This is the, 08:33.800 --> 08:37.100 this is the real fear.  And the only Democrats who were 08:37.100 --> 08:40.370 going to vote for him were African American Democrats.  08:43.100 --> 08:47.470 From the highest levels of political government, 08:47.467 --> 08:48.997 organized government, the notion is, 08:49.000 --> 08:52.170 "you've got to get these black folks registered."  08:52.167 --> 08:54.197 Well, as it happened--at least for the Democratic 08:54.200 --> 08:57.900 Party.  On the ground, that's the agenda as well 08:57.900 --> 09:00.400 for people in Mississippi, people who were working on 09:00.400 --> 09:02.600 Mississippi Freedom Summer and the Mississippi Freedom 09:02.600 --> 09:07.600 Democratic Party.  So the Freedom--MFDP, 09:07.600 --> 09:09.100 Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, 09:09.100 --> 09:12.200 an attempt by white and black activists in 09:12.200 --> 09:14.770 Mississippi, with support from other places, 09:14.767 --> 09:17.597 to set up a slate of candidates to run as the 09:17.600 --> 09:19.800 alternate to the Mississippi Democratic delegation, 09:19.800 --> 09:22.400 that would ultimately be seated at the, 09:22.400 --> 09:26.500 at the Democratic National Convention.  The vice chair 09:26.500 --> 09:29.670 of the MFDP, a very famous activist named Fannie Lou 09:29.667 --> 09:33.897 Hamer.  Fannie Lou Hamer was the youngest of twenty 09:33.900 --> 09:38.400 children, sharecropper all of her life, 09:38.400 --> 09:42.200 no education after the third grade, 09:42.200 --> 09:48.200 but had powerful presence, incredibly eloquent, 09:50.700 --> 09:52.700 captivating speaker.  And sadly, 09:52.700 --> 09:54.800 part of what made her so captivating is the story she 09:54.800 --> 09:59.500 had to tell was nightmarish.  When I say 09:59.500 --> 10:01.100 that, you know, she was in school to the third grade, 10:01.100 --> 10:04.000 the schools were only open for three or four months, 10:04.000 --> 10:07.300 because the rest of the time you were working in the 10:07.300 --> 10:10.400 fields.  Well, as other SNCC activists and SCLC activists 10:10.400 --> 10:14.070 come to, to Mississippi, they meet this person 10:14.067 --> 10:18.867 they've been hearing about, Ms. Hamer, 10:18.867 --> 10:20.767 and she begins to be inspired by them and starts 10:20.767 --> 10:26.767 to try to organize voters on her own.  She's harassed by 10:29.000 --> 10:32.770 the police.  People would call all day and night on 10:32.767 --> 10:35.967 her home telephone number to the point she had to just 10:35.967 --> 10:38.697 take the phone off the receiver.  Threats with her 10:38.700 --> 10:41.400 losing her job, threats against her life, 10:44.200 --> 10:48.000 but she's unfazed.  The Mississippi Freedom 10:48.000 --> 10:52.600 Democratic Party is more than just her, 10:52.600 --> 10:57.770 but she embodies so much of it.  As they're marching to 10:57.767 --> 11:00.297 the Democratic National Convention, 11:02.900 --> 11:07.100 the debate is which Democratic delegation will 11:07.100 --> 11:13.100 the national Democratic leadership accept?  MFDP 11:19.000 --> 11:20.600 insists that they're going to be the party to be 11:20.600 --> 11:23.700 recognized.  Democratic established leadership said, 11:23.700 --> 11:26.570 "That's just not going to happen."  Southern 11:26.567 --> 11:31.967 delegations in other states threaten to walk if Lyndon 11:31.967 --> 11:36.167 Johnson, Democratic National Committee admit or--yeah, 11:36.167 --> 11:41.567 admit--MFDP to the floor of the convention.  Johnson's 11:41.567 --> 11:43.297 already afraid of losing the South and now this is 11:43.300 --> 11:46.100 confirmation.  And these were states that are already 11:46.100 --> 11:48.070 leaning towards Barry Goldwater anyway, 11:48.067 --> 11:53.897 the Republican candidate.  Anyway, 11:53.900 --> 11:57.700 the convention arrives and Fannie Lou Hamer goes to the 11:57.700 --> 12:00.600 credentials committee, representing the MFDP, 12:00.600 --> 12:04.000 and starts to talk with them about why the MFDP needs to 12:04.000 --> 12:07.600 be recognized as the proper delegation.  This is the 12:07.600 --> 12:11.300 committee that's setting the rules for the conference, 12:11.300 --> 12:14.800 for the convention.  And her statement is captured on 12:14.800 --> 12:18.500 live TV.  This is when you'd have what, 12:18.500 --> 12:19.670 what is it called?  Gavel-to-gavel 12:19.667 --> 12:23.297 cover--coverage of conventions and such.  And 12:23.300 --> 12:26.400 she starts telling a story about her efforts to 12:26.400 --> 12:29.700 organize people to exercise their full civil rights just 12:29.700 --> 12:32.570 to vote, get them to register to vote, 12:32.567 --> 12:35.267 and being arrested by the police, 12:35.267 --> 12:39.567 being taken to jail.  And while she's in jail for 12:39.567 --> 12:43.497 breaking no law, they put--the jailors stand by 12:43.500 --> 12:48.200 and get two black inmates, bring them over and threaten 12:48.200 --> 12:50.770 them with further punishment if they did not beat Fannie 12:50.767 --> 12:56.297 Lou Hamer, and they beat her senseless.  She survives the 12:56.300 --> 13:01.470 beating, she survives it, but is physically, 13:01.467 --> 13:09.267 permanently damaged from the beating.  This is what being 13:09.267 --> 13:15.297 a citizen meant if you're an African American activist in 13:15.300 --> 13:18.200 Mississippi.  You could end up like James Chaney, 13:18.200 --> 13:21.600 could be beaten to an inch of your life like Fannie Lou 13:21.600 --> 13:26.800 Hamer, certainly sending signals to the rest of black 13:26.800 --> 13:31.470 Mississippians.  Well, while Hamer is giving this 13:31.467 --> 13:33.697 testimony to the credentials committee, 13:33.700 --> 13:34.870 Lyndon Johnson, still in Washington, 13:34.867 --> 13:38.867 D.C., at the White House, hears about it, 13:38.867 --> 13:41.197 knows it's going out live and is furious, 13:41.200 --> 13:43.700 and immediately calls a press conference 13:43.700 --> 13:46.400 trying--[student sneezes] Bless you--trying to simply 13:46.400 --> 13:49.800 distract the media from what's now airing over the 13:49.800 --> 13:54.000 country.  Just a trumped-up news conference.  He had 13:54.000 --> 13:56.700 nothing to actually talk about.  A lot of the cameras 13:56.700 --> 14:00.970 stay with Hamer, but Johnson recognizes that he's losing 14:00.967 --> 14:05.097 grip of retaining any, any hope of keeping the white 14:05.100 --> 14:09.400 South.  He asks his vice president, 14:09.400 --> 14:11.900 Hubert Humphrey, to get Walter Mondale to coordinate 14:11.900 --> 14:15.500 this, a resolution to a dispute, 14:15.500 --> 14:18.970 and the resolution says that the Mississippi--Mississippi 14:18.967 --> 14:21.097 delegation, the Democratic delegation, 14:21.100 --> 14:23.500 Democratic Party would be seated if they swore 14:23.500 --> 14:26.200 allegiance to Johnson's civil rights platform.  14:31.700 --> 14:33.970 But--And in addition to that, 14:33.967 --> 14:35.397 two delegates from the Mississippi Freedom 14:35.400 --> 14:37.900 Democratic Party would also join the Mississippi 14:37.900 --> 14:43.500 Democratic delegation.  All but three of the Mississippi 14:43.500 --> 14:46.500 Democratic Party delegates, the "formally" elected 14:46.500 --> 14:48.200 delegates--this is an all-white, 14:48.200 --> 14:49.500 all-white party in Mississippi, 14:49.500 --> 14:52.200 I should have said in the beginning--all but three of 14:52.200 --> 14:54.200 the Mississippi delegates bolt, 14:56.200 --> 14:58.900 and the MFDP refuses to compromise.  "You either 14:58.900 --> 15:03.500 seat all of us or none of us."  The Democratic Party 15:03.500 --> 15:05.870 National Convention ultimately recognizes just 15:05.867 --> 15:07.397 three of the delegates from Mississippi who didn't 15:07.400 --> 15:10.100 leave.  The rest of the Mississippi delegation votes 15:10.100 --> 15:14.200 for Barry Goldwater.  The MF--the, 15:14.200 --> 15:17.200 the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party delegates 15:17.200 --> 15:18.800 ultimately vote for LBJ. 15:18.800 --> 15:20.500 There's no logical choice, frankly, 15:20.500 --> 15:23.000 between LBJ or Goldwater, as far as their actions were 15:23.000 --> 15:28.300 concerned.  Johnson, of course, 15:28.300 --> 15:30.570 goes ahead and gets re-elected, 15:30.567 --> 15:32.397 or gets elected, I guess, for the first time in a 15:32.400 --> 15:38.170 landslide, but he loses five states in his native South.  15:38.167 --> 15:40.767 The states that were threatening to bolt if he 15:40.767 --> 15:45.867 caved in to the MFDP came through.  He might have lost 15:45.867 --> 15:48.697 them anyway, but it becomes very, 15:48.700 --> 15:50.200 very clear to Johnson at this point, 15:50.200 --> 15:54.370 to any Democratic activist, that the black vote is now 15:54.367 --> 15:56.667 critical in the South, if there's any hope to hang 15:56.667 --> 16:02.667 onto a Democratic presence.  So this is the end of the 16:06.500 --> 16:11.700 summer in 1964.  Civil Rights Act is there, 16:11.700 --> 16:14.800 but the question of the vote is unresolved.  Civil Rights 16:14.800 --> 16:18.870 Act does not address voting.  Right away, 16:18.867 --> 16:21.297 activists on the ground and those at the highest reaches 16:21.300 --> 16:25.000 of the federal government, Democratic Party at least, 16:25.000 --> 16:27.970 hone in on voting.  This is the next, 16:27.967 --> 16:31.197 this is the next challenge.  Meanwhile, 16:31.200 --> 16:34.400 Martin Luther King is awarded the Nobel Peace 16:34.400 --> 16:36.570 Prize.  He goes to Oslo to receive it, 16:36.567 --> 16:42.167 and he returns in January of '65 to participate in this 16:42.167 --> 16:47.097 next wave of challenges, the vote.  He goes--In January 16:47.100 --> 16:49.900 of '65 he goes to Selma, Alabama, 16:49.900 --> 16:52.900 Dallas County, Selma, Alabama, 16:52.900 --> 16:55.800 and he announces a new SCLC initiative to register 16:55.800 --> 16:59.500 people to vote.  The sheriff in the county, 16:59.500 --> 17:04.400 a guy named James Clark, was much like--oh my 17:04.400 --> 17:11.200 goodness--our favorite punch--punching bag from 17:11.200 --> 17:12.200 Birmingham. 17:12.200 --> 17:14.000 Bull Connor. 17:14.000 --> 17:15.200 Ah, you guys were paying attention.  Thank you, 17:15.200 --> 17:17.970 Bull Connor--much like Bull Connor.  So he's, 17:17.967 --> 17:20.097 he's pulling out cattle prods, 17:20.100 --> 17:24.770 clubs and tear gas to break up crowds.  I mean he is 17:24.767 --> 17:28.667 ripe for becoming a target of national media coverage.  17:28.667 --> 17:32.197 The situation in Selma is really quite 17:32.200 --> 17:36.200 astonishing--in, in Dallas County, 17:36.200 --> 17:40.800 I should say, not Selma.  The larger district. 17:40.800 --> 17:44.070 In Dallas County, out of fifteen thousand people who 17:44.067 --> 17:47.697 are registered to vote, only three hundred and 17:47.700 --> 17:49.600 thirty-five of them are black.  Now if you don't 17:49.600 --> 17:52.400 know Alabama, it's important to understand, 17:52.400 --> 17:54.400 it is a state with, in many places, 17:54.400 --> 17:56.000 a majority black population, and in all places, 17:56.000 --> 17:59.000 a significant black population.  So in Dallas 17:59.000 --> 18:02.470 County, there is no black voting presence. 18:02.467 --> 18:04.467 In Alabama in general, seventy-seven percent, 18:04.467 --> 18:06.067 over three quarters of eligible blacks, 18:06.067 --> 18:10.297 are still off the voting rolls.  It's a much higher 18:10.300 --> 18:12.700 percentage than what you see in other places, 18:12.700 --> 18:17.770 other southern--throughout the South in general.  So 18:17.767 --> 18:19.867 King goes down there to announce a new voter 18:19.867 --> 18:24.097 registration drive, knowing that the sheriff would be 18:24.100 --> 18:28.070 one he could bait pretty easily.  Rallies are 18:28.067 --> 18:32.197 organized, marches are planned.  Middle of 18:32.200 --> 18:35.370 February, peaceful SCLC rally in a neighboring, 18:38.900 --> 18:43.200 neighboring area was attacked by the police.  The 18:43.200 --> 18:46.300 city police, the county police and the state police. 18:46.300 --> 18:51.700 And during the melee, one of the people involved in the 18:51.700 --> 18:55.900 rally, a twenty-six-year-old named Jimmie Lee Jackson, 18:55.900 --> 19:01.100 according to witnesses, shields his mother who's in 19:01.100 --> 19:03.100 the process of getting beaten by a state trooper, 19:05.067 --> 19:08.567 and he's shot in the stomach and dies.  Now the police 19:08.567 --> 19:09.897 account of what happened is different, 19:09.900 --> 19:12.500 as one would expect, but the fact of the matter is, 19:12.500 --> 19:14.600 he's shot in the stomach, and he dies.  19:17.567 --> 19:21.197 Guaranteeing--I mean this would be horrible enough as 19:21.200 --> 19:24.970 it is, and one would hope gather attention, 19:24.967 --> 19:27.397 but what guaranteed gathering the attention to 19:27.400 --> 19:31.670 this fact is that news cameras were there. 19:31.667 --> 19:35.097 And in the, in the confusion of the rally being broken up 19:35.100 --> 19:38.200 by the police, several reporters from NBC are 19:38.200 --> 19:40.370 injured.  Essentially attacked, 19:40.367 --> 19:42.767 hit--they get beaten up by the police as well.  19:45.067 --> 19:50.697 Guarantees national coverage.  A plan evolves 19:50.700 --> 19:54.200 immediately to march from Selma, 19:57.600 --> 19:59.100 where Jimmie Lee Jackson was murdered, 19:59.100 --> 20:00.970 from Selma to Montgomery, the state capital, 20:00.967 --> 20:05.097 fifty miles away.  The original plan was to take 20:05.100 --> 20:11.700 Jimmie Lee's body along this path and leave him at the 20:11.700 --> 20:14.200 state house stairs.  And, very quickly, 20:14.200 --> 20:16.570 saner heads prevail.  This is disrespectful to the 20:16.567 --> 20:21.997 body, of course.  But the fact is the plan for a march 20:22.000 --> 20:29.100 from Selma to Montgomery is hatched.  On March 7th, 20:29.100 --> 20:36.900 the chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating 20:36.900 --> 20:41.770 Committee, John Lewis, begins a march 20:41.767 --> 20:45.997 across--begins the march from Selma to Montgomery.  20:46.000 --> 20:47.900 He's leading in single file order, 20:47.900 --> 20:52.300 maybe two or three across, six hundred protesters over 20:52.300 --> 20:55.500 the Edmund Pettus Bridge.  It's very important to know 20:55.500 --> 20:58.170 that Martin Luther King was not there, 20:58.167 --> 21:04.167 even though he knows about the plans.  This is the 21:06.400 --> 21:07.400 march. 21:07.400 --> 21:13.400 Waiting on the other side were Alabama state troopers, 21:19.167 --> 21:25.167 under orders from Governor Wallace to stop the 21:30.067 --> 21:31.397 marchers. 21:31.400 --> 21:37.400 Oh, I hit it a second too late.  You can see right 21:43.467 --> 21:45.767 here in the fading out, that's John Lewis, 21:45.767 --> 21:47.497 now Representative John Lewis, 21:47.500 --> 21:48.700 in the tan trench coat. 21:48.700 --> 21:54.700 Clark's posse was on the sideline. 22:01.000 --> 22:07.000 It will be detrimental to your safety to continue this 22:21.500 --> 22:27.500 march and I'm saying that this is an unlawful 22:40.000 --> 22:46.000 assembly.  You are to disperse.  You are ordered 22:56.467 --> 23:02.467 to disperse.  Go home or go to your church.  This march 23:19.000 --> 23:25.000 will not continue.  Is that clear to you? 23:35.467 --> 23:41.467 I've got nothing further to say to you... 23:51.900 --> 23:59.370 Tear gas canisters. 23:59.367 --> 24:00.997 The march, the disruption of the march, 24:01.000 --> 24:02.970 is captured on live TV, of course, 24:02.967 --> 24:06.397 and shown across the nation, leading people to ask the 24:06.400 --> 24:08.870 same question that Fannie Lou Hamer asked when she was 24:08.867 --> 24:11.697 giving her testimony to the credentials committee: "is 24:11.700 --> 24:19.100 this America?"  Thousands flocked to Selma as a 24:19.100 --> 24:23.100 protest was announced, "We will march again" from 24:23.100 --> 24:24.770 across the country, black, white, 24:24.767 --> 24:28.297 doesn't matter.  They all come to Selma to right this 24:28.300 --> 24:32.800 injustice.  This day becomes known as "Bloody Sunday."  24:35.167 --> 24:36.597 Two days later, King is there, 24:36.600 --> 24:41.400 and they're going to march a second time.  And this is a 24:41.400 --> 24:45.000 pattern that has grown to become quite irritating to a 24:45.000 --> 24:47.170 lot of activists on the ground, 24:47.167 --> 24:49.267 is that King, for all of his incredible charisma and 24:49.267 --> 24:52.797 power, is never right--really quite there at 24:52.800 --> 24:55.970 the moment of crisis.  His presence creates a new 24:55.967 --> 24:59.397 moment of crisis, no doubt about it, 24:59.400 --> 25:01.400 but he wasn't there getting beaten on Bloody Sunday.  25:01.400 --> 25:06.500 And this is a tension that has been there in the 25:06.500 --> 25:09.700 movement for years already, that when King arrives, 25:09.700 --> 25:11.070 the cameras show up; when he leaves, 25:11.067 --> 25:12.697 the cameras leave.  In this case, 25:12.700 --> 25:16.570 the cameras were already there.  There's a federal 25:16.567 --> 25:20.797 order banning the march, wanting a cool-down period.  25:20.800 --> 25:24.070 King goes, "We're going to have a march anyway."  A 25:24.067 --> 25:27.167 bold statement.  So on Tuesday, 25:27.167 --> 25:34.667 March 9th, King leads a much larger group of activists 25:34.667 --> 25:39.367 across the Edmund Pettus Bridge and starts the march 25:39.367 --> 25:44.197 to Montgomery.  This is not the famous march though.  25:44.200 --> 25:47.700 Crosses the bridge, the police are there like they 25:47.700 --> 25:51.700 were the last time.  They tell him to turn around, 25:51.700 --> 25:56.470 the same script.  "Go back to your churches" and 25:56.467 --> 26:01.297 whatnot.  King asks, asks his followers to kneel and 26:01.300 --> 26:05.000 pray along with him and then, 26:05.000 --> 26:09.900 in a complete shock to those SNCC leaders who are still 26:09.900 --> 26:12.670 beaten and bloody from two days earlier, 26:12.667 --> 26:16.597 King tells them to go back to their churches.  This is 26:16.600 --> 26:18.070 not what they had bargained for.  They were going to 26:18.067 --> 26:21.897 press forward and do this all over again.  More 26:21.900 --> 26:25.900 horrified to discover that King had negotiated--to keep 26:25.900 --> 26:28.770 the peace and respect the federal order, 26:28.767 --> 26:33.597 King had quietly negotiated this whole performance, 26:33.600 --> 26:36.800 so the police knew that if King stuck to his script, 26:36.800 --> 26:39.900 he would kneel and tell his flock to pray, 26:39.900 --> 26:42.000 you know, create the visual moment, 26:42.000 --> 26:45.500 and then disperse peacefully.  SNCC leaders 26:45.500 --> 26:47.770 had no idea about this.  They--so King came in and 26:47.767 --> 26:50.267 took their march, hijacked it, 26:50.267 --> 26:52.667 turned it into his circus, and then they didn't even 26:52.667 --> 26:55.597 get to press forward to honor Jimmie Lee Jackson's 26:55.600 --> 26:59.370 life.  This is a very important moment in the 26:59.367 --> 27:03.197 movement.  Not one that is--it's not triumphed as 27:03.200 --> 27:05.200 the march, the eventual march to Montgomery that 27:05.200 --> 27:10.000 happens two weeks later, under incredible federal 27:10.000 --> 27:17.900 protection by the way.  The slight cracks and fractures 27:17.900 --> 27:19.870 and fissures that were there between SNCC and 27:19.867 --> 27:23.097 SCLC--remember SNCC being organized under SCLC's 27:23.100 --> 27:29.000 umbrella just five years ago at that point--the, 27:29.000 --> 27:33.070 the cracks are now wide open.  And SNCC would no 27:33.067 --> 27:38.167 longer see itself as being part of SCLC's organizing 27:38.167 --> 27:42.597 logic.  And SNCC would no longer kowtow to King's 27:42.600 --> 27:46.600 declarations.  They are truly--it is truly its own 27:46.600 --> 27:49.100 organization, and as we'll soon see, 27:49.100 --> 27:54.000 takes off on its own path.  So the march does proceed 27:54.000 --> 28:00.800 in--on the 21st.  What's that, 28:00.800 --> 28:06.000 forty-five years ago and a, and a few days.  But the 28:06.000 --> 28:08.600 real drama in many ways, for the movement's sake, 28:08.600 --> 28:10.700 is the drama that happens in the two attempts prior to 28:10.700 --> 28:16.700 that.  So the issue is voting registration.  This 28:20.200 --> 28:22.100 is what these rallies were about that where Jimmie Lee 28:22.100 --> 28:24.700 Jackson had been murdered.  This is what the vote to 28:24.700 --> 28:27.800 Montgomery is, is all about recognizing the fact that 28:27.800 --> 28:29.670 African Americans still don't have access to the 28:29.667 --> 28:37.597 ballot box.  Meanwhile, a voting rights bill is 28:37.600 --> 28:43.670 bouncing around Congress, and Lyndon Johnson keeps 28:43.667 --> 28:48.797 upping the stakes, and, and in many ways throwing his 28:48.800 --> 28:54.700 presidency in harm's way.  He declares between the 28:54.700 --> 29:01.470 Tuesday turnaround march and the eventual march, 29:01.467 --> 29:04.197 he goes to joint session of Congress and astonishes 29:04.200 --> 29:08.400 Congress by quoting one of the famous lines of the 29:08.400 --> 29:10.000 movement.  He says, you know, 29:10.000 --> 29:11.900 he's basically saying, "As a nation, 29:11.900 --> 29:16.100 we cannot abide by treating our own citizens this way.  29:16.100 --> 29:20.100 Their struggle is our struggle and we shall 29:20.100 --> 29:23.200 overcome."  It's an astonishing moment, 29:23.200 --> 29:25.700 presidential rhetoric, Lyndon Johnson saying it. 29:27.900 --> 29:30.800  In June of the same year, '65, 29:30.800 --> 29:32.800 at Howard University's graduate--graduation 29:32.800 --> 29:37.800 ceremony, Howard being the most important, 29:37.800 --> 29:41.600 largest historically black college and university, 29:41.600 --> 29:46.100 essentially mostly funded by the federal government, 29:46.100 --> 29:48.400 Johnson at the graduation ceremony says the following: 29:48.400 --> 29:53.400 "You do not--[coughs] excuse me--You do not wipe away the 29:53.400 --> 29:55.800 scars of centuries by saying, 29:55.800 --> 29:57.800 'Now you are free to go where you want, 29:57.800 --> 30:02.000 do as you desire, and choose the leaders you please.' You 30:02.000 --> 30:03.570 do not take a man who, for years, 30:03.567 --> 30:07.297 has been hobbled by chains, liberate him, 30:07.300 --> 30:09.500 bring him up to the starting line of a race saying, 30:09.500 --> 30:12.100 'You are free to compete with all the others, 30:12.100 --> 30:15.600 and still believe that you have been completely fair. 30:15.600 --> 30:18.370 This is the next and the more profound stage of the 30:18.367 --> 30:19.967 battle for civil rights. 30:19.967 --> 30:23.397 We seek not just freedom, but opportunity; 30:23.400 --> 30:27.700 not just legal equity, but human ability; 30:27.700 --> 30:30.770 not just equality as a right and a theory, 30:30.767 --> 30:34.267 but equality as a fact and as a result." 30:34.267 --> 30:37.597 This is part of LBJ rolling out affirmative action, 30:37.600 --> 30:43.600 sort of testing the waters essentially.  But very 30:46.000 --> 30:48.570 quickly, affirmative action policies now become woven 30:48.567 --> 30:54.497 into federal policies as well.  In fact, 30:54.500 --> 30:56.400 women who have been the greatest beneficiaries of 30:56.400 --> 30:58.800 affirmative action, something I'll probably say 30:58.800 --> 31:00.900 again in about three or four weeks, 31:00.900 --> 31:03.270 were not covered under the original umbrella of 31:03.267 --> 31:05.197 affirmative action.  It was actually only added two 31:05.200 --> 31:07.270 years later and added by someone who was hostile to 31:07.267 --> 31:09.097 the whole idea.  He thought, "My god, 31:09.100 --> 31:10.170 if we just add women to this thing, 31:10.167 --> 31:11.697 we'll sink the whole program, 31:11.700 --> 31:14.400 and people went along with it.  He's like, 31:14.400 --> 31:17.900 "Oh, I misjudged that one." Anyway, 31:17.900 --> 31:20.300 back to the summer of '65, Johnson is going out on a 31:20.300 --> 31:23.570 limb, essentially, making clear he is going to be the 31:23.567 --> 31:25.697 civil rights presidency; now he's a president, 31:25.700 --> 31:27.100 president, and many other things as well, 31:27.100 --> 31:31.170 but he's definitely the civil rights president.  On 31:31.167 --> 31:35.397 August 6th of 1965, he signs the Voting Rights Act, 31:35.400 --> 31:39.470 an incredible effort to get it through.  And the Voting 31:39.467 --> 31:42.497 Rights Act prohibited states from imposing literacy 31:42.500 --> 31:47.000 requirements as obstacles for accessing the ballot 31:47.000 --> 31:49.000 box.  It's the most successful way of cutting 31:49.000 --> 31:52.000 out the vote.  And, most importantly, 31:52.000 --> 31:53.870 and this is the most important element, 31:53.867 --> 31:56.797 it allowed the attorney general to send federal 31:56.800 --> 32:00.700 examiners in, into any election where they thought 32:00.700 --> 32:05.300 voting rights might be curtailed. The Voting Rights 32:05.300 --> 32:08.600 Act, just to make clear--and some of you may get--I mean 32:08.600 --> 32:12.000 I get, I get this email about once a year, 32:12.000 --> 32:14.700 or once every other year, that the Voting Rights Act 32:14.700 --> 32:17.200 is coming up before Congress and it's going--they might 32:17.200 --> 32:20.200 not approve it, and they'll end the right to vote for 32:20.200 --> 32:22.800 African Americans.  My father sent it to me once, 32:22.800 --> 32:23.800 which drove me crazy.  I'm like, 32:23.800 --> 32:25.800 "Dad, you know better than this."  The fact is, 32:25.800 --> 32:27.800 the Voting Rights Act does not give anybody the right 32:27.800 --> 32:30.700 to vote.  It gives the federal government the 32:30.700 --> 32:36.900 authority to protect the right to vote.  It brings 32:36.900 --> 32:41.300 into bold relief the federal government's ability and 32:41.300 --> 32:44.100 right to supersede in local affairs, 32:44.100 --> 32:45.900 which has been the, the nut of the, 32:45.900 --> 32:49.200 the bone of contention since the Voting Rights Act was 32:49.200 --> 32:54.900 passed.  The Voting Rights Act has, 32:54.900 --> 32:57.670 if you look forward from the moment of its passage in 32:57.667 --> 33:02.867 August '65, makes a clear change.  Within four years 33:02.867 --> 33:07.297 of its passage, three-fifths of adult blacks are 33:07.300 --> 33:13.200 registered to vote.  It's an astonishing shift.  Between 33:13.200 --> 33:15.670 1964 and '69, roughly the same period we're talking 33:15.667 --> 33:18.267 about here, the number of registered black voters goes 33:18.267 --> 33:21.297 from, in Alabama, less than twenty percent of the 33:21.300 --> 33:25.300 population to over sixty percent of the population. 33:25.300 --> 33:27.700 In Mississippi, it goes to less than seven percent of 33:27.700 --> 33:30.800 the population to over two-thirds of the 33:30.800 --> 33:35.200 population, within five years.  It's a seismic 33:35.200 --> 33:37.500 shift, especially when you consider the number--the 33:37.500 --> 33:39.200 numbers we're talking about in terms of the African 33:39.200 --> 33:42.000 American population.  So there's no disputing the 33:42.000 --> 33:43.570 fact the Voting Rights Act has a, 33:43.567 --> 33:47.997 a, a significant effect, as you look forward, 33:48.000 --> 33:49.300 the crystal ball, three or four, 33:49.300 --> 33:51.370 five years from the moment of its signing.  It's also 33:51.367 --> 33:58.967 clear the Voting Rights Act had astonishingly no effect 33:58.967 --> 34:02.697 in the immediate moment, in those places where blacks 34:02.700 --> 34:04.100 already had the right to vote. 34:04.100 --> 34:05.970 And this was made very clear, 34:05.967 --> 34:09.667 five days later, when the Watts community in Los 34:09.667 --> 34:15.667 Angeles goes up in flames.  A few words about Watts.  34:20.700 --> 34:23.900 It's a riot in the, if you know Los Angeles demography, 34:23.900 --> 34:27.400 in a portion of the city that is due south of central 34:27.400 --> 34:30.770 Los Angeles, a place that had been the home for the 34:30.767 --> 34:33.297 longest, for, for a couple of decades in the wake of 34:33.300 --> 34:36.100 the Second Great Migration, World War II, 34:36.100 --> 34:40.400 where black Los Angeles was overwhelmingly found.  It 34:40.400 --> 34:43.800 was not a wealthy part of the city, 34:43.800 --> 34:49.470 not by any stretch.  But people had the kinds of 34:49.467 --> 34:51.667 civil rights, citizenship rights they wouldn't have 34:51.667 --> 34:53.797 had, African Americans, they wouldn't have had in 34:53.800 --> 35:01.000 Mississippi or Alabama or Georgia.  They also had, 35:01.000 --> 35:03.570 visually, a better quality of life than those people 35:03.567 --> 35:06.667 who are stuck in high-rise slums in Chicago and New 35:06.667 --> 35:11.997 York City.  There's green spaces.  There's, 35:12.000 --> 35:14.500 well maybe they're not homeowners, 35:14.500 --> 35:17.370 but their homes, were living in homes.  They aren't in 35:17.367 --> 35:19.797 high-rises, certainly.  There's sunshine, 35:19.800 --> 35:22.200 for goodness' sakes, there's palm trees. 35:22.200 --> 35:24.200 But the fact is, there is incredible economic 35:24.200 --> 35:28.400 degradation, powerful sense of hopelessness, 35:28.400 --> 35:30.500 and a real feeling that you were not a citizen, 35:30.500 --> 35:32.000 even though you could, could vote.  But it really had no 35:32.000 --> 35:38.800 great benefit to you.  So in Watts, 35:38.800 --> 35:42.400 the flashpoint revolves around an arrest that goes 35:42.400 --> 35:46.600 bad.  Marquette Frye, an African American man living 35:46.600 --> 35:49.100 in that neighborhood, is stopped by the California 35:49.100 --> 35:52.100 Highway Patrol at night.  He'd been drinking with his 35:52.100 --> 35:55.200 older brother.  Cops pulled him over and they're about 35:55.200 --> 35:59.300 to let him go, when another--this is Marquette 35:59.300 --> 36:02.000 Frye's version--when another more belligerent crew of 36:02.000 --> 36:06.170 California Highway Patrol officers arrive.  Frye's 36:06.167 --> 36:09.097 mother arrives, wanting to know what's going on, 36:09.100 --> 36:13.800 trying to get her son.  And these new belligerent cops 36:13.800 --> 36:18.170 assault the mother.  Frye is hit by a police officer as 36:18.167 --> 36:19.697 he is trying to protect his mother, 36:19.700 --> 36:24.600 thrown into a police car, sent off.  The police 36:24.600 --> 36:27.600 version is rather different.  Drunken driver, 36:27.600 --> 36:32.600 they pull Frye over, radio for assistance. 36:32.600 --> 36:34.400 Other police arrive. 36:34.400 --> 36:39.370 Meanwhile, a crowd arrives of citizens and residents of 36:39.367 --> 36:44.297 the area.  Marquette Frye makes a play for one of the 36:44.300 --> 36:48.800 police officers' guns, and they start wrestling with 36:48.800 --> 36:50.570 him, throw him in a car.  And, 36:50.567 --> 36:52.697 immediately, the crowd that's gathered around, 36:52.700 --> 36:56.300 a crowd that had been worn out by police brutality, 36:56.300 --> 36:58.400 historic police brutality in that area, 36:58.400 --> 37:04.400 city, the crowd starts to explode.  What happens, 37:06.900 --> 37:12.300 ultimately, is that thirty-four people die the 37:12.300 --> 37:15.100 next handful of days.  Over a thousand people are 37:15.100 --> 37:17.700 injured; four thousand are arrested; 37:20.067 --> 37:21.897 property damage in excess of two hundred million, 37:21.900 --> 37:25.800 which was a ton of money in 1965 if you think about it; 37:25.800 --> 37:28.200 damage ranging across a forty-six mile, 37:28.200 --> 37:31.570 square mile area, larger than Manhattan or San 37:31.567 --> 37:35.797 Francisco.  Thirty-five thousand adults are deemed, 37:35.800 --> 37:40.800 quote, active rioters.  Seventy-two thousand are 37:40.800 --> 37:44.000 deemed close spectators.  And what, 37:44.000 --> 37:46.600 why this is important in the reports that follow is that 37:46.600 --> 37:49.000 the police are going in intermittently.  It's just 37:49.000 --> 37:52.070 one big logistics mess.  Police are going in now and 37:52.067 --> 37:54.897 again to try to calm things down.  The riot would be 37:54.900 --> 37:57.000 sporadic.  There'd be a hot point over here, 37:57.000 --> 37:58.400 a fire would be started over there, 37:58.400 --> 37:59.800 or a fake fire alarm would be called, 37:59.800 --> 38:01.900 and police would go over there.  The fire department 38:01.900 --> 38:04.900 would be called to a scene and then, 38:04.900 --> 38:07.700 and then they'd be showered with bottles and bricks and 38:07.700 --> 38:13.700 then snipers.  It was an urban battle zone.  So a lot 38:16.900 --> 38:18.770 of people were active as rioters who never, 38:18.767 --> 38:20.997 you know, see justice, according to the police, 38:21.000 --> 38:23.170 because they're the ones shooting from windows the 38:23.167 --> 38:26.367 police can never get to, for instance.  Ultimately, 38:26.367 --> 38:28.597 sixteen thousand National Guard, 38:28.600 --> 38:31.900 LAPD, and California Highway Patrol officers are brought 38:31.900 --> 38:35.470 in.  They militarize the zone in order to 38:35.467 --> 38:39.497 re-establish the peace.  It's a massive property 38:39.500 --> 38:41.900 riot.  Food, stores that sell food, 38:41.900 --> 38:43.400 liquor stores, furniture stores, 38:43.400 --> 38:45.400 clothing stores are destroyed, 38:46.800 --> 38:48.800 especially those owned by middle- and upper-class 38:48.800 --> 38:54.200 whites.  Churches, homes and libraries are relatively 38:54.200 --> 38:55.200 untouched. 38:55.200 --> 39:01.270 And I say this just to--you know some people will talk 39:01.267 --> 39:05.067 about whites--Watts as a mindless insurrection.  I'm 39:05.067 --> 39:08.767 not defending the riot at any--to any extent, 39:08.767 --> 39:12.397 but it wasn't mindless.  Certainly something tactical 39:12.400 --> 39:16.200 by going after those institutions that the 39:16.200 --> 39:21.100 residents thought were keeping them down.  Store 39:21.100 --> 39:22.970 owners who were black would write up, 39:22.967 --> 39:25.067 you know, "soul brother" in their window to prevent 39:25.067 --> 39:26.567 their store from being attacked.  Now some of them 39:26.567 --> 39:29.197 got attacked anyway, because there's certainly going to 39:29.200 --> 39:32.900 be some level of chaos in any kind of riot.  But often 39:32.900 --> 39:38.300 they were passed over.  For white America, 39:38.300 --> 39:40.870 all of this happens completely out of the blue.  39:42.967 --> 39:45.497 After all, Lyndon Baines Johnson has just signed in 39:45.500 --> 39:47.600 the Voting Rights Act.  "What else do you people 39:47.600 --> 39:48.600 want?" 39:48.600 --> 39:52.000 is essentially the mentality.  "What else could 39:52.000 --> 39:55.000 you want?"  And what L.A. 39:55.000 --> 40:01.200 shows is that there are deep and fundamental problems, 40:01.200 --> 40:02.300 that the civil rights movement, 40:02.300 --> 40:04.170 as far as its most famous rhetoric, 40:04.167 --> 40:06.997 you know, the right to vote, you know, 40:07.000 --> 40:09.900 the right to go, go into the front door of a bus--a 40:09.900 --> 40:12.870 restaurant, ride in a bus where you want to--L.A. 40:12.867 --> 40:15.597 had all those things already.  It didn't point to 40:15.600 --> 40:20.400 more fundamental economic problems.  That's what Watts 40:20.400 --> 40:27.200 was about.  Now Watts, now whether the riot--I'm not 40:27.200 --> 40:30.000 going to play counterfactual history: would the riot have 40:30.000 --> 40:31.000 happened if this or that hadn't happened?  I, 40:31.000 --> 40:33.800 I don't know.  But what is clear is that just as people 40:33.800 --> 40:36.470 are struggling with this new tactical change in the 40:36.467 --> 40:37.897 movement, got to pursue the black vote, 40:37.900 --> 40:41.300 people are clearly struggling with a shift in 40:41.300 --> 40:44.600 tone.  The kind of militancy and armed militancy that you 40:44.600 --> 40:50.300 see happening in Watts is becoming more recognizable 40:50.300 --> 40:52.800 and more frequent.  Part of it grows out of the 40:52.800 --> 40:55.900 rhetoric, no doubt, of Malcolm X, 40:55.900 --> 40:58.670 even after he disavowed a lot of the rhetoric.  This 40:58.667 --> 41:02.597 becomes very clear in next week's reading.  And part of 41:02.600 --> 41:05.670 it is--part of it's growing out of an increasing U.S. 41:05.667 --> 41:08.597 military occupation in this strange place they haven't 41:08.600 --> 41:10.070 quite figured out yet called Vietnam, 41:10.067 --> 41:15.567 and people coming home from Vietnam with a different 41:15.567 --> 41:19.597 sense of how to pursue justice.  There's a 41:19.600 --> 41:22.500 fundamental shift in tone and you see it embodied in 41:22.500 --> 41:30.000 Watts, profound impatience.  Now impatience is not just 41:30.000 --> 41:33.870 an urban or western and northern phenomenon.  It's 41:33.867 --> 41:36.267 an impatience that's in the, in the heart of, 41:36.267 --> 41:37.497 quote, "the movement" as well, 41:37.500 --> 41:42.600 in the southeastern United States.  Blacks are 41:42.600 --> 41:46.000 increasingly unhappy about, or impatient and frustrated 41:46.000 --> 41:49.170 with, the client-patron relationship in the South, 41:49.167 --> 41:53.297 and throughout the country really.  And we'll see, 41:53.300 --> 41:56.200 we'll see next week, when we start talking about the 41:56.200 --> 41:57.400 Black Panther Party, how it becomes articulated in 41:57.400 --> 42:00.270 Oakland, California.  It's most famously the Black 42:00.267 --> 42:02.967 Panther Party.  But it's important to take a moment 42:02.967 --> 42:05.997 to talk about the first Black Panther Party in the 42:06.000 --> 42:08.500 context of shift and tones.  [computer beeps] Oh, 42:08.500 --> 42:10.300 that's my--I have something happening soon, 42:10.300 --> 42:13.400 I guess, my computer telling me I have to go.  So let's 42:13.400 --> 42:19.400 look at the first Black Panther Party. 42:22.500 --> 42:24.500 You have the march from Selma to Montgomery, 42:24.500 --> 42:29.300 the, the famous march.  So much of the political 42:29.300 --> 42:31.200 rhetoric talks about how--or historical rhetoric, 42:31.200 --> 42:34.070 it goes off without a hitch, incredible federal 42:34.067 --> 42:37.567 protection.  But a hallmark to how great we are as a 42:37.567 --> 42:40.497 country because of how peaceful it was.  It wasn't 42:40.500 --> 42:43.870 so peaceful to everybody.   One of the activists who 42:43.867 --> 42:45.067 came down to Selma to help out, 42:45.067 --> 42:49.067 a woman named Vi--Viola Liuzzo from Michigan, 42:51.200 --> 42:54.100 her job was working support for the march.  And her job 42:54.100 --> 42:57.100 was to, in her car, ferry people back from Montgomery, 42:57.100 --> 43:01.470 from Montgomery back to Selma.  She happens to be 43:01.467 --> 43:04.197 driving her car with some of the marchers in it, 43:04.200 --> 43:05.400 driving through Lowndes County, 43:05.400 --> 43:09.300 Alabama.  A car pulls up next to her, 43:09.300 --> 43:11.400 rolls down the window, pulls out a shotgun, 43:11.400 --> 43:12.400 blows her away.  A young man named Stokely Carmichael, 43:12.400 --> 43:18.400 northerner raised in the, in New York City, 43:26.167 --> 43:27.797 graduated from Howard University, 43:27.800 --> 43:31.100 goes down to participate in the Freedom Summer, 43:31.100 --> 43:35.070 rises to the leadership circle in the Student 43:35.067 --> 43:36.067 Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, 43:36.067 --> 43:37.297 he's sent--Stokely Carmichael is sent to 43:37.300 --> 43:41.570 Lowndes County to figure out what the heck is going on in 43:41.567 --> 43:46.397 this place.  Trying to organize the black vote, 43:46.400 --> 43:51.470 partly in honor of Liuzzo's assassination.  What he 43:51.467 --> 43:55.997 finds in Lowndes is a population that is a 43:56.000 --> 43:57.470 predominantly black population, 43:57.467 --> 44:01.797 eighty-one percent black.  It's a black county.  Black 44:01.800 --> 44:07.900 citizens of Lowndes were poor, 44:07.900 --> 44:12.300 they were landless, and economically dependent on a 44:12.300 --> 44:16.970 small, white, elite planter society.  It's apartheid.  44:19.600 --> 44:22.000 Blacks outnumbered whites overwhelmingly, 44:22.000 --> 44:28.100 eighty-one percent, but they were not registered to vote, 44:28.100 --> 44:30.270 and they actually feared civil rights agitation.  44:30.267 --> 44:32.397 It's like, "What are you doing coming in here?  Our 44:32.400 --> 44:38.900 life is horrible, but you're going to get us killed."  As 44:38.900 --> 44:40.400 Carmichael digs a little deeper in Lowndes, 44:40.400 --> 44:43.670 he finds, finds a different current though, 44:43.667 --> 44:51.397 and he just discovers that trying to register black 44:51.400 --> 44:56.200 Lowndes County citizens to vote in the Democratic Party 44:56.200 --> 44:58.100 is something he's really not going to have much success 44:58.100 --> 45:00.370 doing.  There's such hostility and such 45:00.367 --> 45:04.697 hopelessness.  But he also discovers a level of 45:04.700 --> 45:10.600 militancy there as well.  So they form their own party, 45:10.600 --> 45:14.600 the Lowndes County Freedom Organization, 45:14.600 --> 45:17.100 the LCFO.  The Lowndes County Freedom 45:17.100 --> 45:22.370 Organization.  And it has as its goal running candidates, 45:22.367 --> 45:25.697 developing a platform, becoming a recognized party, 45:25.700 --> 45:27.700 an alternative to the Democratic Party, 45:27.700 --> 45:31.670 which had no relevance to black Mississippians living 45:31.667 --> 45:36.697 in Lowndes County.  And the LCFO chooses as its mascot 45:36.700 --> 45:41.100 the black panther.  And the logic was, 45:41.100 --> 45:43.200 LCFO leaders talked about the black panther as an 45:43.200 --> 45:46.900 animal that retreats when it's pursued, 45:46.900 --> 45:49.270 until it's backed into a corner, 45:49.267 --> 45:51.567 and then it springs forth with a life or death battle 45:51.567 --> 45:56.197 on its mind.  And that's how the Lowndes County farmers, 45:56.200 --> 45:59.800 they're all farmers, felt.  And importantly, 46:01.800 --> 46:04.200 they were armed.  I mean, and this is no big deal.  I 46:04.200 --> 46:09.300 mean, farmers in the South, everybody was armed.  You 46:09.300 --> 46:11.300 shot your meals often. 46:13.000 --> 46:17.470 The party was armed, and it was uninterested in working 46:17.467 --> 46:20.897 with whites.  Whites who sympathized, 46:20.900 --> 46:21.900 who wanted to help them, it's like, 46:21.900 --> 46:24.600 "No, forget it."  And this group, 46:24.600 --> 46:26.600 as we'll see next week, becomes the inspiration for 46:26.600 --> 46:32.500 the famous Black Panther Party.  Now very quickly, 46:32.500 --> 46:36.600 by this point, '65, SNCC had, 46:36.600 --> 46:38.570 you know, is breaking apart from SCLC. 46:38.567 --> 46:40.997 It becomes affiliated with the, 46:41.000 --> 46:43.200 sort of the rising New Left, the radical student 46:43.200 --> 46:46.970 organizations.  It's exploring other ideological 46:46.967 --> 46:50.297 options, instead its, its of what was then certainly 46:50.300 --> 46:53.670 radical in 1960, you know, integrating lunch counters, 46:53.667 --> 46:58.767 integrating places of, of, of commerce.  SNCC links up 46:58.767 --> 47:01.297 with the Students for Democratic Society, 47:01.300 --> 47:03.700 SDS, for a while, but the racial politics become too 47:03.700 --> 47:06.900 complex, because SNCC leaders felt the whites were 47:06.900 --> 47:09.600 trying to take control of SDS, 47:09.600 --> 47:10.900 black leaders in SNCC. 47:10.900 --> 47:15.700 In January of 1966, Samuel Younge, 47:15.700 --> 47:19.270 a twenty-year-old Navy vet, African American, 47:19.267 --> 47:21.597 recruited by SNCC to be an organizer in Tuskegee, 47:24.767 --> 47:29.497 he's killed for using a white bathroom.  At that 47:29.500 --> 47:33.070 point, SNCC comes out against the war in Vietnam 47:33.067 --> 47:36.897 and, in doing so, isolates itself from mainstream civil 47:36.900 --> 47:40.100 rights organizations.  Another major break in the 47:40.100 --> 47:42.100 fabric, rip in the fabric. 47:43.600 --> 47:45.700 In the wake of this, the Atlanta cell within SNCC, 47:45.700 --> 47:46.900 which is increase--increasingly 47:46.900 --> 47:51.370 radical, starts getting racially restless.  In the 47:51.367 --> 47:54.467 spring of '66, Stokely Carmichael, 47:54.467 --> 47:56.467 essentially now the leader of SNCC, 47:56.467 --> 47:58.797 produces a position paper that says: "White 47:58.800 --> 48:01.370 participation, as practiced in the past, 48:01.367 --> 48:04.597 is now obsolete.  If we are to proceed toward true 48:04.600 --> 48:07.070 liberation, we must cut ourselves off from white 48:07.067 --> 48:10.167 people.  We must form our own institutions, 48:10.167 --> 48:13.197 write our own histories." 48:13.200 --> 48:14.970 "White participation, as practiced in the past, 48:14.967 --> 48:18.597 is now obsolete."  Stokely Carmichael is now the chair 48:18.600 --> 48:23.600 of SNCC.  Whites are now kicked out of the movement.  48:23.600 --> 48:27.870 I'm going to stop right there, 48:27.867 --> 48:29.097 but we are literally, quite literally, 48:29.100 --> 48:32.100 at the cusp of the famous articulation of Black 48:32.100 --> 48:34.770 Power.  Certainly all the pieces are now in place, 48:34.767 --> 48:37.597 and the movement, the famous movement that we've all been 48:37.600 --> 48:40.900 taught about in our little grade books and stuff, 48:40.900 --> 48:43.770 begins its very quick descent into completely 48:43.767 --> 48:46.567 splintering apart.  Those are the events from '64 to 48:46.567 --> 48:48.167 '66.  We'll pick up from there, 48:48.167 --> 48:50.167 at there on Monday.