Racial democracy struggles in Sunflower County: comparing 1950s-1960s and 1980s movements

Racial Democracy

Struggles for racial democracy in Sunflower County in the 1980 substantially differed in many aspects from freedom struggles that were there in the 1950's and 1960's. Civil rights movements in the 1980 were not a monolithic entity. Tensions that were witnessed at the national level were not prominent at the local level. The civil rights movements' activities in the sunflower county illuminated problems unique to one area. Sunflower County was inhabited by isolated, dependent, unskilled, unneeded, and unwanted people a clear indication that the black freedom movement involved issues of class as well as those of race. Struggle for racial democracy in the Sunflower County in 1980 was the struggle to liberate the less privileged that made up about 70% of Sunflower County (Moye, 2004).

Unlike the 1960's Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), that targeted Sunflower County as a civil rights activism because of Eastland's political prominence, the struggle for racial democracy in Sunflower County in 1980 was a struggle to liberate the isolated, dependent, unskilled, unneeded, and unwanted people (Moye, 2004). It was a racial/class struggle. The SNCC activists of the 1960s had intended to bring the public attention to deplorable living conditions in which the residents of Senator Eastland's backyard lived.

Struggle for racial democracies in the 1950s and 1960s were similar in some aspects to the struggle for racial democracy in the Sunflower County in the 1980. James O. Eastland's name is synonymous with the struggle in mid-1950s. He travelled far and wide denouncing public school desegregation decision that was handed down by the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education. His denunciation was laced with lots of rhetoric that was mean to address and arouse the people. In a Senate session he was quoted saying "The Question is asked, will the South obey this decision? Who is obligated morally or legally to obey the decision whose authorities rest not upon the law but upon the writings and teaching of procommunist agitators who are part and parcel of communist conspiracy to destroy our country?" (Moye, 2004). He replied to his question when speaking before Citizens' Council and other segregationist groups averring that the southerners would not be violating the constitution or the law when they defy the outcome of Brown v. Board of Education. Instead they would be defying those who would be trying to destroy the United States form of government. He retorted that the citizens are not required to any court which passes out such a discriminatory ruling. He averred that the citizens are obliged to disobey such rulings. The brand of politics of the activists of the 1950s just like Senator Eastland was cleverly crafted to preserve the status quo. Eastland was an elitist who suffered from a voracious appetite for entitlement. His thirty five-year stint as a senator is perceived to have destroyed Second Reconstruction (Moye, 2004). While claiming to protect the interest of Mississippians, he refused to hold any meeting in his capacity as chairman of the Civil Rights Subcommittee, despite of a requirement in law that weekly conferences are intervened. This confirmed his opposition to black freedom struggle despite having denounced public school segregation.

Freedom struggles in the 1950s and 1960s is marked with trials, tribulations, and triumphs of individuals and organizations that sought to change the existing system in the Sunflower County. These included Martin Luther King, Fannie Lou Hamer, Medgar Evers, Bob Moses, Stokely Carmichael, Diane Nash, the NAACP, SCLC, and CORE among others (Oates, 1994). There are also lesser known figures in this period who worked tirelessly to bring political democracy, educational opportunities, and economic equality to Sunflower County. They became agents in their community's destiny a mean that could not be achieved a couple of years before. There were also individuals who formed massive resistance that characterized civil rights movements' activities in the Sunflower County in the years before 1980's (Moye, 2004). One such individual was Robert Patterson who organized the Citizens' Council of Indianola which became a respectable southern institution of obstruction in the years after the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. The council's activities were a sharp contrast to the Ku Klux Klan activities, an organization whose activities were uncivilized. The Citizen's Council used economic intimidation to keep African-Americans from integrating schools, registering to vote, joining organizations like NAACP, and engaging in subversive activities. The council frustrated every effort of the African-Americans by integrating themselves in the county's political, administrative, and governmental infrastructure (Moye, 2004).