A Thousand Days

by Arthur M. Schlesinger

  The 1961 report’s chief recommendation was that the President issue the executive order forbidding discrimination in housing; and that it cover not just federally financed housing—that is, mortgages insured by the Federal Housing Administration and the Veterans Administration—but the conventional mortgage activities of federally assisted financial institutions, such as banks whose deposits were guaranteed by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. In the view of the Commission, housing was as much a key to Negro inequality in the North as voting was in the South; and, as Bernhard said in 1962, though present concern focused on the South, “the last battle for equal rights will be joined in the north” where “the forms of discrimination are often more subtle, and hence harder to combat.”

  The difficulties between the Commission and the Department of Justice were of no great importance; and they arose essentially from the fact that one was an agency of recommendation and the other of action. The Commission moved out ahead to define new areas and offer new proposals; the Department acted to solve immediate problems. Despite occasional arguments between them, it seemed to the outsider a good combination. If annoying at times, the pressure of the Commission probably enabled the Department to do a better job.

  The civil rights groups were meanwhile pressing even harder for the executive order on housing. Recalling Kennedy’s campaign assurances about “a stroke of the pen,” people began sending pens to the White House in a sarcastic effort to ease the President’s task. Kennedy had, I think, intended to put out the order when Congress adjourned in the fall of 1961. But he decided to postpone it because he needed congressional support for a Department of Urban Affairs with Robert Weaver as Secretary, because he sought southern votes for the trade expansion bill in 1962 and perhaps because he feared that the order might slow up business recovery by holding back building starts. The delay aggrieved the civil rights leadership. By declining to issue the order, Martin Luther King, Jr., said, “The President did more to undermine confidence in his intentions than could be offset by a series of smaller accomplishments.” While conceding that “the vigorous young men” of the administration had “reached out more creatively” than their predecessors and, undaunted by southern backwardness, had “conceived and launched some imaginative and bold forays,” King pronounced the broad record “essentially cautious and defensive,” directed toward “the limited goal of token integration.” He recalled Lincoln’s reluctance a century earlier to issue the Emancipation Proclamation lest he alienate slaveholders in the border states. Kennedy, King thought, “may well be tormented by a similar dilemma, and may well be compelled to make an equally fateful decision.” In similar vein Wilkins, while praising the President for “his personal role in civil rights and very plain indications of his concern that conditions be improved,” declared his “disappointment with Mr. Kennedy’s first year” as a result of the failure to issue the housing order and even more of the “basic error” of the strategy of “no legislative action on civil rights.”

  Yet, despite the discontent of the leadership, the Negro community on the whole seemed well satisfied, and Kennedy’s personal popularity was obviously increasing. The President himself, sensitive to the need of maintaining momentum, observed in his 1962 State of the Union message that there was much more to be done “by the Executive, by the courts and by the Congress.” In particular he expressed administration interest in bills to end the use of literacy tests and poll taxes as means of denying Negroes the right to vote. In August 1962 Congress obliged by passing a constitutional amendment declaring that the poll tax could not prevent voting in federal elections.* But this was a relatively non-controversial proposal, discreet in its approach and changing the situation in only five states. The bill exempting everyone with a sixth grade education from literacy tests was another matter; and a southern filibuster killed it in the spring. The civil rights forces were unable even to get a majority to vote for cloture. This experience seemed to confirm beyond question the President’s judgment about the impossibility of legislation. In the meantime, the courts were about to precipitate a new crisis of equal rights.

  5. THE BATTLE OF OXFORD

  On January 20, 1961, a veteran of nine years in the Air Force named James Meredith, his spirit quickened by Kennedy’s inaugural address, wrote to the University of Mississippi requesting an application for admission. “I am an American-Mississippi-Negro citizen,” he explained when he returned his form. “With all of the occurring events regarding changes in our educational system taking place in our country in this new age, I feel certain that this application does not come as a surprise to you. I certainly hope that this matter will be handled in a manner that will be complimentary to the University and to the State of Mississippi. Of course, I am the one that will, no doubt, suffer the greatest consequences of this event.”

  Ole Miss, as the university at Oxford was known through the state, had never (to its knowledge**) admitted a Negro, and now offered complicated academic reasons for rejecting Meredith. But Meredith, encouraged by Medgar Evers, director of the NAACP in Mississippi and represented in court by the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, filed suit on the ground that he had been turned down because of his race. When the federal district judge dismissed Meredith’s plea, he appealed, and the Fifth Circuit Court, finding in June 1962 that he had been rejected “solely because he was a Negro,” reversed the lower court’s decision. After a summer of legal maneuver Justice Hugo Black, an Alabaman, upheld the court of appeals. Governor Ross Barnett of Mississippi promptly declared, “We will not surrender to the evil and illegal forces of tyranny.”*

  Robert Kennedy thereupon phoned the Governor, pointing out that he was proposing to defy a federal court order, and suggested they try to work out a solution together. But Barnett’s neo-Confederate rhetoric, echoed by most of the legislature and most of the newspapers of the state, had already incited a wave of panic and hate among his fellow-Mississippians; and this encouraged the Governor in his course. On September 20, when James Meredith, accompanied by federal marshals, presented himself at Oxford for registration, students were marching around the campus singing “Glory, Glory, Segregation.” Barnett grandiloquently read aloud a long proclamation rejecting Meredith’s application. Concluding, he handed the document to Meredith: “Take it and abide by it.”

  This action in Oxford gave Washington a new states rights crisis—and also me a new assignment. Up to this point, though my personal concern was of very long standing, my participation in civil rights matters at the White House had been slight. After Harris Wofford left for the Peace Corps and Ethiopia in the spring of 1962, Lee White, the very capable Associate Special Counsel to the President, took over the civil rights responsibility. Louis Martin of the Democratic National Committee, an able Negro newspaperman in whose judgment the President had confidence, also served as a link between the White House and the Negro leaders. Now both the Mississippi impasse and the impending centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, set for September 22 at the Lincoln Memorial, drew me into civil rights. This was at first in my capacity as an historian; for Barnett was resting his case on nothing more nor less than the old doctrine of nullification or interposition—that is, the alleged right of state officials “to interpose the State sovereignty and themselves between the people of the State and any body politic seeking to usurp such power.” One supposed that this proposition had died with John C. Calhoun; and I was able to recall to the Attorney General that, when South Carolina had claimed the right of interposition 130 years earlier, the Mississippi Legislature of that day had rejected it as “a heresy, fatal to the existence of the Union . . . contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitution and in direct conflict with the welfare, safety and independence of every state.” Constitutional scholarship had evidently languished in Jackson since 1832.

  In the meantime, two days after Ross Barnett turned back James Meredith in Oxford, the country marked the first century of the Emancipation Proclamation. The President, in a messag
e to the gathering at the Lincoln Memorial, placed special emphasis on the Negro role in the long fight for equal rights since the abolition of slavery. “The essential effort, the sustained struggle,” he said, “was borne by the Negro alone with steadfast dignity and faith. . . . It can be said, I believe, that Abraham Lincoln emancipated the slaves, but that in this century since, our Negro citizens have emancipated themselves.” But the task was not finished: “like the proclamation we celebrate, this observance must be regarded not as an end, but a beginning.”

  Robert Kennedy had already responded to Barnett’s defiance by citing the three top officers of the University of Mississippi for contempt of court. Once in the courtroom the academic administrators readily agreed to register Meredith. But the Governor, furious at this pusillanimity and unimpressed by federal law, told the Attorney General, “I consider the Mississippi courts as high as any other court and a lot more capable. . . . I am going to obey the laws of Mississippi.” Robert Kennedy replied, “My job is to enforce the laws of the United States—I intend to fulfill it.” The next day he obtained a restraining order from the Fifth Circuit Court enjoining Barnett and other state officials not to interfere with the registration of Meredith. But when Meredith again tried to register, Barnett physically barred his way. As Meredith and the Department of Justice officials departed, the mob surrounding the building shouted, “Communists. . . . Go home, nigger.” That night Barnett told Robert Kennedy, “It’s best for him not to go to Ole Miss.” The Attorney General replied softly, “But he likes Ole Miss.”

  In the next days the Department of Justice made one more attempt to find a solution. After complicated negotiation through intermediaries, Barnett assured the Attorney General that a sufficient show of federal force—the appearance, for example, of marshals who, when the governor confronted them, would promise to draw their guns—would give him the excuse he needed for retreat. But the state was now aflame, and the excitement was bringing to Oxford country folk from miles around, many armed, all determined to keep the nigger out of Ole Miss. Recruits were on their way even from more distant points. On September 26, General Edwin A. Walker, now of Dallas, who had commanded the federal troops at Little Rock in 1957, repented in a disjointed radio exhortation: “Now is the time to be heard. Ten thousand strong from every state in the Union. Rally to the cause of freedom. The battle cry of the Republic. Barnett, yes; Castro, no. Bring your flags, your tents and your skillets. . . . The last time in such a situation I was on the wrong side. . . . This time I am out of uniform and I am on the right side and I will be there.”

  As Meredith, flanked by a group of armed marshals, prepared to make his third try, Barnett decided that the situation was too dangerous, the crowd might break out of control. The Attorney General, who had never much liked the play-acting, instructed Meredith and the marshals to pull back. The next day Barnett was found guilty of civil contempt and ordered to purge himself by the following Tuesday or face arrest and a fine of $10,000 a day. The Attorney General had hoped up to this time that civil force would suffice to get Meredith into the university. But Barnett’s continued defiance was foreclosing this hope. On Friday, September 28, Robert Kennedy met with General Maxwell Taylor to provide for the necessary troop movements.

  Later that afternoon he asked me to come over to the Department of Justice to work on a statement explaining the necessity for federal intervention. Preparations were being made with great secrecy. Edwin Guthman spirited me into the Department through a side entrance and installed me in a room behind the Attorney General’s office. In a moment Bobby came in and said he understood better now how Hitler had taken over in Germany. “Everyone in Mississippi is accepting what that fellow is doing,” he said. “There are no protests anywhere—from the bar or from professional men or from the professors. I wouldn’t have believed it.” He described with incredulity the latest proposition from Barnett: that Mississippians would raise money for Meredith to go to any university he desired outside the state if the Attorney General would persuade him to give up on Ole Miss.

  The next afternoon, Saturday, September 29, I was called over to the President’s office. The Attorney General, Burke Marshall and Kenneth O’Donnell were there. Matters were now rushing to climax. In a final effort to get a peaceful settlement and avert the sending of troops, the President himself had put in a call to Governor Bamett. Awaiting the call, the Kennedys were calm and dispassionate, talking quietly between themselves in fraternal shorthand and, as ever, lightening the tension with jokes. As the phone rang, the President, with the air of a master of ceremonies, announced, “And now—Governor Ross Barnett.” Bobby, mocking a prize-fight manager, said, “Go get him, Johnny boy.” As if rehearsing to himself, the President went on, “Governor, this is the President of the United States—not Bobby, not Teddy.” Then he picked up the receiver. His expression serious, his voice calm, his manner unemotional, he began, “I am concerned about this matter as I know you must be. . . . Here’s my problem, Governor. I don’t know Mr. Meredith, and I didn’t put him in there. But under the Constitution I have to carry out the law. I want your help in doing it.” Barnett said that Tom Watkins, the Mississippi lawyer who had served as intermediary in the show-of-force scheme, was ready to come to Washington with a new plan. “The difficulty is this,” the President said. “We have two or three problems. First, the Court’s order gives you till Tuesday to permit the entry of Mr. Meredith. What is your position on that? . . . I have my responsibility as you have yours. The Attorney General can talk to Mr. Watkins tomorrow. I want to work this out in an amicable way. I don’t want a lot of people down there to be hurt or killed.” There was a long silence while Barnett spoke. Then the President said, “The Attorney General will see Mr. Watkins. After that I will be back in touch with you.” Hanging up, he added, “You know what that fellow said? He said, ‘I want to thank you for your help on the poultry program.’”

  As the two brothers discussed the Barnett proposal, they concluded that there was no point in Watkins’s coming to Washington unless he was prepared to negotiate a change in Barnett’s position. The Attorney General then called Watkins. He had, he said crisply, two questions: “Will the Governor defy or follow the order of the Court? If he means to defy that order will we have a pitched battle down there when we arrest the Governor?” After a moment, “Is there any possibility of finding out what we need down there? Must we send an army, a division or what? This depends on what the Governor will do. We are at least entitled to know that. If the Governor is going to stand up and bar the way, that’s one situation. If he is going to tell everyone to go home, that’s an entirely different situation.” Watkins said his understanding was that Barnett would physically bar Meredith; he would also try to quiet the mob. Robert Kennedy: “He can’t do that. You can’t tell others to behave if you yourself are obstructing the order of the court.” Watkins went on to say that the situation was explosive; he was not sure the law enforcement officials could control it. The President whispered to Bobby, “Will they try?” The Attorney General asked the question and whispered back, “He doesn’t know.” Then, before concluding the conversation, he asked Watkins whether Barnett would take responsibility for maintaining law and order.

  They waited for a while to give Watkins a chance to talk to Barnett. Then the President called Barnett again. For some reason Watkins had not called the Governor; so the Attorney General, going to the phone, recapitulated his conversation with Watkins. “I said that, unless he had concrete proposals which might form a basis for agreement, he was wasting his time in coming to Washington. These proposals would have to include strong and vocal action on your part . . . at minimum an order that people could not congregate in Oxford in groups larger than three or five; that students who commit disorders are liable for expulsion; that all people carrying guns or clubs in Oxford be arrested.” Barnett then suggested that, while he himself would go with a flourish to Oxford, Meredith should be registered at Jackson, the state capital. Robert Kenned
y said, “Sneaking Meredith off to Jackson for registration doesn’t meet the problem. It doesn’t really make much sense, does it?”

  In a minute the President went on the phone. “I know your feeling about the law of Mississippi and the court order,” he said. “What we are concerned about is whether you will maintain law and order—prevent the gathering of a mob and action taken by a mob. Can you stop that? What about the Attorney General’s proposals to stop a mob?” His voice was dispassionate and stern. Barnett evidently said that he would do his best. The President: “As I understand it, you will do everything you can to maintain order. Next, Governor, can you maintain order?” Barnett then suggested a cooling-off period. The President: “Would you undertake to register him in two weeks? Unless we have your support and assurance . . .” The conversation trailed off.

  At seven that night there was a third phone call. Barnett brought up again the idea of registering Meredith secretly in Jackson, assuring the President that the state police could keep everything under control. With reluctance, the President decided to accept the subterfuge. Then three hours later Barnett phoned Robert Kennedy canceling the deal. There was now no alternative to a collision between the state of Mississippi and the national government. After midnight the President issued orders federalizing the Mississippi National Guard and sending troops of the United States Army to Memphis. He also requested national television time for Sunday evening.

  Mississippi, throbbing with righteous emotion, prepared as if for war. But Barnett, whose rhetoric constantly outran his resolution, drew back once again, calling the Attorney General on Sunday morning with a more elaborate version of the show-of-force proposal, this time a staged capitulation of Mississippi forces to the Army. Robert Kennedy coldly dismissed it as “a foolish and dangerous show.” He added that the President planned to report Barnett’s repudiation of their earlier agreement in his television speech. Alarmed at this, Barnett quickly came up with a substitute proposal: that Meredith be quietly flown into Oxford that afternoon. He told the Attorney General that the state police would keep outsiders off the campus; and that, while he would have to say that he had yielded to overwhelming force, he would condemn any talk of violence and urge that the fight be carried forward in the courts.