Double Victory

by Cheryl Mullenbach

  The students remained outside the restaurant and formed a picket line. When customers tried to enter the restaurant, the students explained the situation. Some white customers expressed support for the students’ actions.

  “I think it’s reasonable. Negroes are fighting to win this war for democracy just like the whites. If it had to come to a vote, it would get my vote!” one white customer said.

  Another said, “Well now, isn’t that something! I eat here regularly, and I don’t care who else eats here. All I want is to eat. I want the place to stay open. After all, we’re all human.”

  On the following Monday, the students again set up their picket line in front of the restaurant. Within two days, the restaurant owner had given in and changed his policy. No more “whites only” at this restaurant.

  A year later the Howard students decided to try to integrate the heart of Washington, DC. They went to a restaurant near the White House. On a Saturday afternoon in 1944, groups of two or three students dressed in their best clothes entered the restaurant. Every ten minutes more black students strolled into the restaurant.

  Outside a picket line of black students formed as well. They were well dressed and well behaved. Even when a group of white soldiers taunted the picketers, they refused to react. They remembered the training they’d had. They were quiet and dignified.

  Meanwhile, 55 black students had taken seats inside. The manager called the corporate office of the establishment and reported that the restaurant was filling with black customers. The manager was ordered to serve the students.

  In Chicago, Bernice Fisher, Rita Baham, Gladys Hoover, Shirley Walowitz, Sylvia Barger, Eleanor Wrights, and Priscilla Jackson, members of a student group at the University of Chicago, had also sworn themselves to the elimination of discrimination by means of nonviolent action.

  The women and some of their male classmates formed a group of about 20 students intent on integrating a South Side restaurant in May 1943. The restaurant had always discriminated against black customers. The group—consisting of black and white students—entered the restaurant and seated themselves. Five of the group were black—three men and two women.

  The three men went up to the counter. The two black women sat in a booth with some of the white students. The waitress told the three men at the counter that they could be served in the basement—where blacks had been served in the past. They declined. They preferred to sit upstairs at the counter.

  The manager tried to get the black women to move to a booth in the back of the restaurant. When they refused to move, the manager called the police. The police arrived but said no one was breaking the law.

  With all the tables occupied and the seats at the counter taken by the protestors, the manager and waiters held out. They wouldn’t serve any black people. But the protestors weren’t going anywhere. They sat and sat. Finally, after two hours, the manager gave in. Everyone was served.

  The students were surprised but happy. They had lined up enough students to take turns coming into the restaurant in groups of 20. But the first group achieved results—so the second and third groups weren’t needed.

  When Hattie Duvall participated in the movement in St. Louis she joined other black professional women and college students who had learned from the protestors in Washington and Chicago. The St. Louis group also stood up to discrimination with “stubborn and nonviolent resistance” in the form of a series of sit-ins that summer. Sometimes men joined the women. And sometimes white people joined. But it was a core group of black women who planned, organized, and led the effort. Marie Harding Pace, Thelma Grant, Modestine Crute Thornton, and others organized and participated in about a dozen sitins in department store restaurants between May and August 1944 in St. Louis. On May 15, 1944, Pearl Maddox and Birdie Beal Anderson—joined by three college students, Vora Thompson, Shermine Smith, and Ruth Mattie Wheeler—went into a popular department store and asked to be served in the store’s restaurant. The manager invited Vora Thompson to a private meeting in his office. He explained to Vora that she couldn’t be served because it would “create a disturbance” and “the American pattern would not permit the serving of Negro customers.” Vora told the manager that black men were suffering and dying in a war for democracy. Certainly, blacks should be allowed to eat where they chose in a democratic America. Vora said it was “time to begin training Americans to respect Americans. Our brothers and our sweethearts are suffering and dying all over the world to destroy Fascism, and you and I must get rid of it at home.”

  While Vora was in the meeting with the store manager, the other women were enjoying a soda and a sandwich in the restaurant. Their lunch had been purchased by a white man who had been in the protest group. The black women quietly ate their lunch at the counter and left. Vora’s visit with the store manager failed to change the store’s policy of discrimination. The manager and waiters continued to make it clear that black diners were not welcome at the lunch counter.

  In July, 55 women enjoyed ice cream at a department store restaurant in St. Louis. Forty of the women were black. Fifteen were white women. The white women had purchased the ice cream and given it to the black women. Sometimes the sit-ins by the black women of St. Louis caused a stir. At another sit-in at a drugstore counter, for instance, Shermine Smith had eaten only part of her sandwich when the manager took the sandwich from her hands, grabbed Shermine by the arm, and lifted her from her seat. Shermine remembered what she had been taught. She met the attack with nonviolent resistance. She didn’t kick, or scream, or resist the manager. She didn’t say anything as he escorted her from the store.

  Usually when these black women entered a restaurant the waiters refused to serve them. Sometimes the white customers complained and left because they didn’t want to eat with black people. When that happened, the managers sometimes closed the stores for the day—which meant the stores were losing money.

  As the summer of 1944 wore on in St. Louis, the protestors learned new tactics. They started moving their sit-ins from Mondays to Saturdays. The weekends were busier, and closing the restaurants caused more loss of money for the store owners and white workers.

  Sometimes the police were called to remove the protestors. The women began to plan sit-ins at more than one restaurant at the same time to cause delays in the police arrivals. That gave the protestors more time to sit at the counters—and more time for people to notice them.

  And like Hattie Duvall, the women used signs to call attention to their cause. As they silently walked back and forth in front of the stores where they were refused service, they carried big signs:

  WHY CAN’T I EAT HERE?

  WHAT DOES DEMOCRACY MEAN TO YOU?

  A NAZI’S BULLET KNOWS NO PREJUDICE

  MY MOTHER SERVES, MY BROTHER SERVES, MAY I BE SERVED?

  Maybe white people who saw them would think about the four freedoms that President Roosevelt had spoken about in his State of the Union address in 1941. Maybe they would think about the injustice of discrimination when they witnessed black people quietly and politely asking for basic civil rights. Maybe they would think that the contributions black Americans were making to the war effort should give them the right to eat where they wanted. However, it was long after the war ended that black customers were finally welcomed at St. Louis lunch counters. The women who led the sit-ins during the war years laid the foundation for what was to come years later.

  The VV Campaign

  At a time when everyone in the world was paying attention to the ideas of democracy and freedom, it seemed like a logical time to talk about democracy and freedom for blacks in the United States. That’s why a black newspaper called the Pittsburgh Courier started the Double V campaign in 1942. “Double V” stood for victory at the war front and victory at home—victory for democracy in Europe, Africa, and Asia, and victory for democracy in America.

  The campaign spread quickly across the country. Black citizens of all ages talked about the Double V. It was a symbol of pride. Do
uble Victory Clubs were started. People wore Double V pins and flashed the Double V sign with their fingers to show their support for the campaign. They stuck bumper stickers that read DEMOCRACY: AT HOME + ABROAD on their cars. Women were crowned Double V Girls. When Irene Hunter of Chicago was featured in the newspaper as the Double V Girl of the Week, she was swamped with letters from soldiers stationed all over the world. A teacher in Texas named Ruth Chumley won $25 when her song lyrics were chosen as the theme song for the Double V campaign.

  Some black leaders opposed the Double V campaign. They thought movements like the Double V might appear unpatriotic. They thought black activism should be “on hold” for the duration of the war. But others believed it was a perfect time to be active. Movements like the Double V campaign gave some black people the courage to act.

  The Double Victory Girls Club of Cincinnati, Ohio, conducted a demonstration in front of a federal government employment building to protest discrimination by the office staff in December 1943. They claimed the government workers at the office generally ignored black applicants for jobs. And they said that when black applicants were considered, they were only offered jobs as maids or maintenance workers regardless of their training and qualifications.

  Ethel Payne decided to act when she faced discrimination by a government employee. Ethel knew about discrimination; she had witnessed it more than once in her life. That’s why she became involved in the March on Washington in 1941. And she was encouraged when the president signed Executive Order 8802. The order had been directed at the government as well as businesses. Government agencies were reminded that discrimination in hiring for government jobs had to stop.

  In December 1942, Ethel had taken a civil service test. She passed the test, which meant she was qualified to be a librarian with the government. She applied for an opening in a government agency in Washington, DC. Ethel was ready to go to work—but over a year later she still hadn’t been offered a job. She happened to be in Washington in 1944 and decided to inquire about the status of her application. She set up an appointment to talk to an official at the agency. When Ethel arrived, she was directed to the fifth floor and was greeted by a man who introduced himself as Mr. Mc Pherson. He said, “You’ve come about the job. Well, I’m sorry to say that I can’t give it to you.” When Ethel asked why, he admitted she had scored at the top of the grade but that he couldn’t hire her because she was black. “I’m sorry,” Mr. Mc Pherson said, “but that’s just the policy.” Ethel thought it was ironic that Mr. Mc Pherson had rejected her application based on the color of her skin. The department where Mr. Mc Pherson worked and where Ethel had been discriminated against was the US Department of Justice!

  Anna Arnold Hedgeman was a black woman who was executive director of a national committee that was lobbying for a permanent FEPC—the committee that oversaw Executive Order 8802. In the fall of 1944 she had been invited by the US Senate to answer questions about the need for a permanent FEPC. Some members of Congress wanted the commission to end when the war ended. Anna and others knew that it was an important committee that must continue after the war.

  While Anna was at the Senate answering questions from the senators, she experienced discrimination, which only underscored FEPC’s importance for her. During a break for lunch, Anna joined a group of white people who were testifying at the hearing too, and they all went to a government cafeteria in the Senate Building. It was there that an employee told one of the white women in the group, “We have orders from the management not to serve Negroes.” The group went to another restaurant—in the Senate Office Building. They were again told they could not be served. Finally, the group went to the US Supreme Court building and had lunch in its cafeteria.

  One of the white women in the group wrote a letter to President Roosevelt telling him about the injustice. She reported that two restaurants in a government building had refused service to the women because Anna was black. But she added, “I am proud to report here in the building of the highest court of our land we found food and freedom.”

  The March on Annapolis

  When news about the Double V campaign reached Maryland many black residents were inspired. Black soldiers were already fighting for victory on the war front. And now black citizens were prepared to fight for victory at home—in Annapolis, Maryland. They also listened when E. Pauline Myers talked about “mass organization” that was “nonviolent in character.”

  Black citizens in Maryland were fed up. They claimed too many blacks had been killed by the Baltimore police department. The police said the killings were justified; the black citizens said they were signs of police brutality. Black leaders orchestrated a letter writing campaign to Governor Herbert R. O’Conor. But no one ever got a response from the governor. Was he ignoring the black community’s concerns?

  A black woman named Juanita Jackson Mitchell managed to finally get the attention of Governor O’Conor. She did it by bringing 2,000 black people to the state capitol in May 1942 to make their demands heard. That was impossible for the governor to ignore.

  The well-organized event was supported by the Citizens Committee for Justice, which was made up of representatives from 125 black organizations. They contributed $800 to cover transportation costs for anyone who wanted to join the march. People traveled by train, bus, and car. They gathered in front of the state capitol and made their way into the stately old building with its marble halls and crystal chandeliers. A newspaper reporter commented on the “many occupied seats that had never held a colored body before.”

  The protestors were serious, quiet, and resolute. The governor listened for two hours as individuals explained what actions they wanted. They demanded an end to police brutality. They wanted a new police commissioner and a black judge. They wanted more black police officers—in uniform—so they were visible to all in the community. Lillie M. Jackson asked for an additional black female police officer. The group also demanded at least one black person on boards that oversaw institutions in the state. Virgie Waters, the president of the Master Beauticians Association, spoke about the need for a black representative on the state board of beauty culturists and hairdressers. And she wanted an additional black state inspector of beauty shops.

  After listening to everything that was said, Governor O’Conor said he would establish a biracial committee to study conditions in the areas of concern. He said the committee would act promptly on some matters but that others would have to be dealt with “gradually.”

  Juanita Jackson Mitchell gave the final speech. She said, “This demonstration was born out of the desperation of the people and we demand immediate redress.” And Juanita explained what they meant by “immediate.” She said they expected action from the governor “not within the next year, nor the next month, but next week.” Juanita didn’t wait for the governor to take actions when it came to helping his black constituents. Later that year she directed the citywide Register and Vote campaign—getting 11,000 black citizens to register, making them eligible to vote in local and national elections. With 11,000 more black voters at the polls, the governor’s political career was more tenuous than it had been.

  A Maker of History

  As Pauli Murray, Layle Lane, and Juanita Mitchell applied their revolutionary approaches in organizing black Americans, other black women utilized their distinctive styles to bring about change through more traditional channels. Crystal Bird Fauset was one who chose a more conventional path.

  Crystal Bird Fauset started her career as a teacher, but her efforts in getting black women out to vote for Democratic presidential candidate Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 led to another career. When Roosevelt became president, he appointed Crystal to a position in the Works Progress Administration (WPA)—a federal program designed to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads. In 1938, Crystal ran for a seat in the Pennsylvania state legislature and won. This made her the first black woman elected to the Pennsylvania House of Representatives—
and the first black woman in America to be elected to a state legislature. While serving as a state representative, she worked on issues related to working women.

  When the war broke out, Crystal was appointed to a position with the Office of Civil Defense (OCD). The OCD was a federal agency that worked to protect the United States from attacks by its enemies. It also worked to keep morale high during wartime. Crystal was assigned to direct race relations within the OCD. Her duties involved working to encourage community leaders to include blacks in civil defense work in their communities.

  Crystal Fauset was known for her engaging speaking skills. She drew big crowds. When she spoke to a group of 300 at a meeting of the National Association of Negro Business and Professional Women’s Clubs in October 1942, she recommended that a study of all high schools and colleges should be undertaken to learn what white students were learning about “darkskinned peoples of America.” Crystal said students should learn about other races but that “color prejudices” should be targeted “in order to make democracy a greater reality in America.” She told the audience that it would be up to women to assume this work because the men were overseas fighting the war. She reminded the women that “this is our war and anyone who tries to shirk is a traitor to the future of the colored American.”

  Crystal believed black women should become involved in politics, and she encouraged them to vote. She said that by becoming involved in politics blacks could become “makers of history.” Crystal was so highly regarded in politics that when President Roosevelt ran for reelection in 1944, he consulted with her on how to appeal to black voters. Despite Crystal’s position in the Roosevelt administration and her friendship with Eleanor Roosevelt, her political loyalties shifted to Roosevelt’s challenger. Crystal announced in October that she was supporting Republican candidate Thomas E. Dewey for president in the November election. One southern newspaper gloated that “friends of Mrs. Roosevelt who haven’t been enthusiastic over her association with Negro leaders are now saying ‘I told you so.’” According to the newspaper, it was long believed that “despite all the advantages received under the Roosevelt administration, [blacks] would turn against the President.”