Guns or Butter

by Bernstein, Irving;

  On June 8 SANE held an antiwar rally at Madison Square Garden. Wayne Morse, the noted pediatrician Benjamin Spock, and Socialist leader Norman Thomas were among those who addressed 18,000 people.

  On the anniversary of Hiroshima, August 6, the Assembly of Unrepresented People, a group of radical peace groups, staged a civil disobedience rally in Washington which ended on August 9, the anniversary of Nagasaki. At the close 800 marched to the Capitol and sat in. About 350 were arrested and jailed.

  Many of the troops bound for Vietnam embarked from the Oakland Army Terminal. On three days in early August, 200 to 300 demonstrators blocked the railway tracks and were dispersed either by a slow-moving locomotive or by the police.

  On October 15–16 the International Days of Protest engaged nearly 100,000 demonstrators in 80 cities and several nations in antiwar activities. In Manhattan a young man ostentatiously burned his draft card. In a number of communities those who favored the war mounted counterdemonstrations. A few days later five men burned their cards in Union Square in New York City before a friendly crowd of 1500.

  On November 9 Roger LaPorte, 22 years old, poured gasoline over his body and struck a match in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza at the United Nations. At Bellevue Hospital he told the aides, “I’m a Catholic Worker. I’m against the war, all wars. I did this as a religious action.” A priest gave him last rites and he died.

  The radical Vietnam Day Committee on November 20 brought 8000 to a march on Oakland which had a cast of unreality. Allen Ginsberg, the poet of the absurd, wrote the scenario, which included mass calisthenics and singing “Three Blind Mice.” But there were violent acts in the streets, clashes with the police, and the vandalism of cars and buildings.

  Finally, on November 27 SANE staged a peaceful march on Washington in which 30,000 participated. Dr. Spock, Coretta King, and Norman Thomas were among the speakers at the Washington Monument.

  Robert Jay Lifton, the noted psychiatrist, observed that the perception of the Vietnam War changed radically in 1965 “from unpleasant background rumbling (1954–64) to nasty foreground obsession (1965 to 1973).” What did the emergence of protest against the war in 1965 mean? While it made Lyndon Johnson extremely angry, he refrained from saying so publicly and his power as President was only modestly diminished. Nor did the dissent affect his conduct of the war.2

  Mid-August 1965 was a popular time for high public officials to be on vacation. Edmund G. (“Pat”) Brown, the governor of California, was in the Greek Islands. On Thursday, August 12, President Johnson took a long weekend at his ranch on the Pedernales River. He did not want to be disturbed. Both McNamara and Katzenbach were on Martha’s Vineyard, an island off Cape Cod.

  About 7 p.m. on Wednesday, August 11, California Highway Patrolman Lee W. Minikus was riding his motorcycle just south of the Los Angeles city boundary, A passing black motorist told him that he had just seen a car being driven recklessly. Minikus gave chase and pulled the car over in a black neighborhood near the Watts business district. Marquette Frye, a young black man, was the driver, and his brother, Ronald, was the passenger. Minikus gave Marquette the standard Highway Patrol sobriety test, which he flunked. Minikus radioed for a car to take Marquette to jail and for a tow truck to haul off the car. Since the evening was hot, many people were on the street and a crowd of 25 to 50 gathered. Ronald Frye walked two blocks to his home to tell his mother to come over to claim the car. Another motorcycle policeman, a patrol car, and the tow truck, along with Ronald and his mother, arrived at 7:15. The crowd had swelled to 150 to 300.

  Until now Marquette had been cooperative, but his mother scolded him for drinking. He pushed her away, cursed and shouted, and told the officers that they would have to kill him to take him to jail. They tried to subdue him, but he resisted. The crowd became hostile, a patrolman radioed for help, and three more officers arrived. Now Minikus and his partner were struggling with both brothers and Mrs. Frye jumped on the back of an officer and ripped his shirt. A policeman swung at Marquette with his night stick, struck him on the forehead, inflicting a minor cut. By 7:23 other Highway Patrolmen and Los Angeles police officers had arrived. A few minutes later the patrol car left with the brothers.

  The crowd had now grown to more than 1000. As the officers were leaving, someone spat on one. They arrested a woman and a man said to be inciting the crowd to violence. All the officers drove off by 7:40. The police car was stoned.

  Rumors spread through the area that a pregnant woman had been abused by the police. From 8:15 to midnight a mob stoned autos, dragged white motorists out of their cars and beat them, and menaced a police command post. By 1 a.m. Thursday, the situation seemed under control. The police had made 29 arrests.

  On Thursday both black and white leaders preached calm. The Los Angeles Human Relations Commission held a meeting with neighborhood groups and community leaders. The press, radio, and television provided coverage. At the outset the theme was to persuade residents to remain indoors, and Mrs. Frye called for peace. A black high school boy, however, ran to a microphone to say that rioters would attack nearby white areas that evening. At the close of the meeting black leaders proposed that white officers be withdrawn and that black policemen in civilian clothes and unmarked cars replace them. The police rejected the idea. Rioting resumed and the police set up a perimeter line around the troubled area.

  At 5 p.m. Los Angeles Police Chief William H. Parker phoned General Roderic Hill, the commander of the California National Guard in Sacramento, to inform him that troops might be needed. Hill designated a liaison officer in Los Angeles and alerted the 40th Armored Division in Southern California. He also informed Lieutenant Governor Glenn Anderson. An Emergency Control Center was opened at police headquarters at 7:30.

  A large crowd at the site of the original incident turned over cars and set them afire. Firemen were stoned and shot at. The first store fire broke out nearby. Shortly before midnight rock-throwing and looting began outside the police perimeter. On Thursday night and continuing until 4 a.m. Friday 500 police officers were unable to restrain mobs that smashed windows with rocks and looted stores.

  Friday was the 13th and it was, indeed, a black day. By 8 a.m. many fires had been set and looting was rampant, particularly in the Watts business district. Ambulance drivers and firemen refused to enter the riot area without an armed escort. At 10:50 Chief Parker concluded that the situation was out of control and called the governor’s office in Sacramento to ask for 1000 National Guard troops. Lieut. Governor Anderson was reluctant to act in the absence of Governor Brown. He did meet with guard officers and they agreed that 2000 troops should be assembled at armories by 5 p.m. That afternoon the governor was reached by phone in Athens. After a briefing, he ordered the immediate calling of the guard, asked for study of a curfew, and said he would come home as soon as possible.

  By this time the Watts Riot, as it came to be called, was a news sensation. The Los Angeles Times deployed a small army of reporters and photographers and their material moved out over the wire services. The networks and local TV stations provided massive coverage on the ground and from the air by helicopter. The scenes of a huge city turned into a war zone, of immense looting, and of flames leaping into the sky went out to the nation and to much of the world.

  On Friday morning the calls began coming into the White House and Joe Califano handled them. He assumed that the President would oppose sending federal troops into the city and would want to place the responsibility for restoring order upon the state and local authorities. Califano repeatedly called the ranch, but Johnson did not return his calls, “the only time in the years I worked for Lyndon Johnson that this occurred,” he later said. The President must have sensed that the Watts Riot was poison for his Great Society and perhaps for his presidency. The white backlash was already evident in Chief Parker’s assertion that violence was inevitable “when you keep telling people they are unfairly treated and teach them disrespect for the law.”

  Early Friday afternoon rioters
set systematic fire to two blocks of 103rd Street in Watts, and snipers drove off firemen. By late afternoon gangs had spread the riot 50 or 60 blocks to the north. The first death, a black bystander caught in an exchange of gunfire, occurred between 6:00 and 7:00. Almost no one noticed when Marquette Frye pleaded guilty.

  That night the rioting rolled completely out of control, spreading to a much larger area of south central Los Angeles. Fires seemed everywhere. The first contingent of guardsmen, 1336 troops, were in the area at 10 p.m. A second wave of 1000 men joined them at midnight. At midnight Saturday the total on duty was 13,900 guardsmen, 934 Police Department officers, and 719 Sheriff’s Office patrolmen. At 11 a.m. on Saturday 100 engine companies were fighting fires, often under sniper fire. That night a fireman was killed when a sheriff’s shotgun discharged in a struggle with rioters. Major calls of looting, burning, and shooting were reported every two or three minutes.

  The rioting on Saturday morning spread to the maximum extent and continued throughout the day. But the guardsmen gradually established control. They swept the streets and rode on engine companies to stop sniping. The curfew went into effect at 8 p.m. on Saturday; anyone on the street was arrested. Except for the burning of a block of stores on Broadway between 46th and 48th streets, Saturday night was quiet.

  On Saturday morning the President had authorized Bill Moyers to put out a statement that the riot was “tragic and shocking” and warning the rioters that their violence would not be rewarded. But he still would not speak to Califano, who was under great pressure from General Creighton Abrams, the Army vice chief of staff. The California National Guard needed food, trucks, tear gas, and ammunition that the Army had available in northern California and Abrams wanted presidential permission to use Air Force planes to haul them south. Anderson called the White House repeatedly to urge bringing down the supplies. Califano talked to McNamara and Katzenbach on Martha’s Vineyard. They supported the Abrams request and agreed that regular Army troops should be deployed if the guard was unable to restore order. McNamara also wanted approval to alert forces at Ft. Lewis, Washington, and to send some to the vicinity of Los Angeles. But Califano could not reach Johnson. He got Deputy Attorney General Ramsey Clark to draft the order and proclamation and wired them to the ranch. He also sent a Jetstar to stand by at the Vineyard if McNamara or Katzenbach needed to return to Washington. When Abrams pressed on the supplies, Califano said, “You’ve got White House approval.” “Do we have presidential approval?” Abrams demanded. Califano repeated, “You’ve got White House approval.” He called Jack Valenti at the ranch to report what he had done. Valenti wrote a “cautious note” for the President, hoping to protect Califano.

  Johnson finally phoned at 9:09 p.m. Saturday. He insisted on no federal presence in Los Angeles. “Not one of our people sets foot there until you talk to me.” “His voice,” Califano wrote, “was heavy with disappointment.” Early Sunday morning Johnson called again. He had heard of the airlift and was “deeply distressed, but he sounded more sorrowful than angry.” He demanded to know who had authorized the lift. Califano said he had on the recommendations of Abrams, McNamara, Katzenbach, and Anderson. Johnson scolded, “Remember you work for your President.”

  Then he shifted gears. He wanted an assessment of the situation in Watts. Califano said it was coming under control. Johnson ordered him to issue a statement congratulating the state and city officials, acting under their local responsibility, for restoring order. He also wanted a statement from prominent black leaders condemning the violence.

  The President then expressed his real concern: “Negroes will end up pissing in the aisles of the Senate, and making fools of themselves, the way … they had after the Civil War and during Reconstruction. … Just as the government was moving to help them, the Negroes will once again take unwise actions out of frustration, impatience, and anger.” The riots would threaten the gains already made and make it difficult to pass new legislation. “I began to grasp,” Califano wrote, “how acutely Johnson feared that the reforms to which he had dedicated his presidency were in mortal danger, not only from those who opposed, but from those he was trying to help.” The President told him to get Dick Goodwin to write a White House statement. He phoned back in 30 minutes to hear the draft. Califano told him the Coast Guard was looking for Goodwin, who was sailing off Martha’s Vineyard. “We ought to blow up that goddam island!” He then told Califano to instruct Governor Brown to name John McCone the chairman of the state inquiry commission. “An ex-CIA director, conservative, if he says no communist conspiracy and describes the conditions in Watts, we’ll be able to help those Negroes out there.”

  The rioting diminished markedly on Sunday, August 15, but there were a few new fires. Governor Brown lifted the curfew on Tuesday and by the following weekend only 252 guardsmen were still in the area.

  After six days of rioting, the inventory of damage to life and property was immense. The entire south central riot area covered 46.5 square miles of Los Angeles County, most of it within the city of Los Angeles. Watts provided only 2.1 square miles. The black population of the county in 1965 was 650,000, of whom two-thirds lived in south central. No one knew how many rioted and estimates ranged from 10,000 to 80,000. A high propertion consisted of young black males, many organized in gangs. The heaviest damage was along major arteries, where stores were burned, smashed, and looted. The casualties were 34 killed and 1,032 injured. Of those who died, one was a fireman, one a deputy sheriff, and one a Long Beach policeman. Of those injured, 90 were Los Angeles policemen, 10 national guardsmen, 23 from other government agencies, and 773 were civilians. Gunshot wounds caused 118 of the injuries.

  More than 600 buildings were damaged by burning and looting, over 200 of them totally destroyed by fire. The rioters concentrated on food markets, liquor, furniture, clothing, and department stores, and pawn shops. Stores with signs reading, “A Blood Brother,” were spared. Service stations, banks, and car dealerships were hardly damaged. No homes were deliberately burned, and schools, libraries, churches, and public buildings suffered only slight damage. The losses were estimated at over $40 million.

  Louis Martin, the deputy chairman of the Democratic National Committee and a politically savvy black, investigated the riot area and held a four-hour session with elected Negro officials. He wrote,

  The most interesting revelation … was the fact that State Rep. Ferrell who lives in Watts was threatened by robbers. He reported phone threats and one attempt by rioters to get into his backyard. He and his sons stood an armed watch around the clock. Rep. Ferrell won the district on a racist appeal just four years ago. Up until then the Watts area was represented by a veteran white assemblyman. Earlier the press carried the fact that Councilman Billy Mills had been threatened by rioters. The rioters had no love for “upper class” Negroes.

  Watts was hardly the first of the ghetto riots. In 1963 there had been disorders in Chicago and Philadelphia. During 1964 there were disturbances in Chicago, Cleveland, Jacksonville, three New Jersey towns—Elizabeth, Jersey City, and Paterson—New York, Philadelphia, and Rochester. Aside from Watts, 1965 also saw a riot in Bogalusa, Louisiana. But Watts differed from the others in many ways: it was much bigger by any standard of measurement, far more broadly publicized, and more significant by an even wider margin. The others were local events, very important within the community but little noticed elsewhere. Watts was a national event which happened to occur in Los Angeles; in fact, it left its mark on the world.

  If this big explosion had occurred in Harlem or in the Chicago Black Belt or in the Philadelphia ghetto the explanation would have been obvious. But Watts? It enjoyed Southern California’s much ballyhooed climate. The streets were wide and uncrowded. “We were struck,” Martin wrote, “by the neatness of the residential area, well tended little lawns separating hundreds of small one-storey houses which were painted in bright attractive colors.” Though public transportation was inadequate, this was not unique to South Central, and Watts
was not far from downtown Los Angeles to the north and the centers of industry and employment to the east. Blacks, obviously, were free to vote and to use public accommodations. In 1964 the Urban League had made a survey of the conditions of Negro life in 68 cities and ranked Los Angeles first.

  Brown accepted LBJ’s suggestion by naming John McCone chairman of his Commission on the Los Angeles Riots, though he tempered McCone’s conservatism by appointing a prominent Democrat and distinguished Los Angeles attorney, Warren M. Christopher, as vice chairman. But Johnson proceeded to select his own investigative body chaired by Deputy Attorney General Ramsey Clark, along with Andrew F. Brimmer, a prominent black economist, and Jack T. Conway, a former UAW officer who was now a high-ranking official of the Housing and Home Finance Agency.

  The McCone Commission concluded that “there is no reliable evidence of outside leadership or pre-established plans for the rioting.” This view was shared by the attorney general, the district attorney, and the police. No radical political organization nor, for that matter, any civil rights group, had anything to do with the riot. It had been started and had grown spontaneously.

  The National Advisory Commission on Civil Disorders later studied a large number of ghetto riots and found that “40 percent involved alleged abusive or discriminatory police actions.” The triggering of the Watts Riot fit this pattern. While the McCone Commission stressed that the conduct of the police in this instance was beyond reproach and the facts support that conclusion, this was not the perception in the black community.

  In his analysis of the riot Milton Viorst found that policemen were looked upon by residents as “the occupying army of white America, a hostile power. … They often behaved as savages, as captors without mercy, and they were loathed.” The police engaged in random intimidation; they called young black men “niggers” and “boys”; and they stopped and arrested whomever they liked. The black officials Martin talked to with one exception “agreed that Police Chief Parker and the police … constituted a provocative force in the general unrest which erupted into a riot.” Parker bitterly denied these charges and insisted that his officers treated black citizens exactly as they did white citizens.