James Farmer's Reflections Part 1

This will be the first lecture of how we're going to start dealing with what was I think one of the greatest periods in the nation's history. The nation's finest hour certainly in my memory, a time when people became larger than themselves and maybe coin a phrase 'larger-than-life' because hundreds of thousands no doubt millions white and black something to believe and that was outside of themselves and bigger than the day and are thus they forgot about the pettinesses and selfishness which problems lives most of the time are willing to die for the things he believed it and they were willing to die for the things that they work for our it was America's great day and a galvanized the world because the world's fall this nation's finest nature struggling against its worst nature and they witnessed that drama they saw on TV they stalled the federal government serving as more than just a referee but as an advocate for the Constitution and advocate for justice coming to the rescue all those persons were fighting for a better nation and that was the difference between this nation and 1960s and what we're witnessing in South Africa today because the government in South Africa is the oppressor asked one of the differences many other differences and a great many distinctions 10 years ago when America was celebrating its centennial I have the opportunity to speak in Asia and Africa quite extensively visiting some 30 of 35 countries and I found people were fascinated by that drama which they had witnessed in the 60s they were fairly knowledgeable because it had been covered widely by their media they of course had some false impressions of what it taken place of probably the greatest knowledgeability was in Japan where they have plummeted very closely indeed to questions were asked most frequently in both Asia and Africa the first laws in a democracy such as the United States where decisions are made by a company moves in how can a minority into its not and make progress while avoiding what de Tocqueville called it really all the majority of the words if an issue is raised and people have to stand up and be counted then doesn't the Minardi will lose more weight in a democracy that was the first question and it came up again and again in all different languages the interpreters interpreted it was translated over and over again and again second question was alive and in the 60s why not in the fourth is the third is the 20s wind out of turn-of-the-century why not of the last century after emancipation why did the civil rights explosion in the United States occur when he did what were the unique elements were the ingredients situation walloping both questions were very simple and it will not dwell on the first one I just give the the obvious answers and will grow a bit on the second which is also simple of the first questions of course we're hardly ask for Minardi we were perhaps 12% of the population being a Minardi we had to gain allies we had to win friends we had to gain sympathizes thusly made full use of the media and as Martin Luther King but it do wanted to appeal to the conscience of the nation and he did admirably so slick and core we similarly appealed to the conference sometimes a different part of the national conference of the appeal of a conference we had to whittle down the majority which was opposed to its bring them over to our side of another quite successfully solely by the fall of 1963 shortly after the great march on Washington in 2000 August 1963 public opinion polls show that more than 75% of the American people were in favor of strong new civil rights legislation and they wanted that even if and to be enforceable and wanted to see in force in other words they want outside was white and black North and South we had won the battle to win symbolizes we will no longer a Minardi we then were the majority and possibly avoided at journey of the majority because we had become the majority worldwide then why in the 60s and why not been so early a decade there are many reasons and you know about before this series of car sessions as local will come up with your own reasons such as the existence of a television in the 60s and tried occasionally did not have television television was a post-World War II development in this country and what was happening in the 40s the early 40s was not covered by televisions of television we had Citians land but nobody knew about because it was modeled to and also persons who could've gone out to do the same thing get into the same thing because they did know what the same thing wants to know what all those were doing in other parts of the country nothing could take place all television that was one of the reasons of course but not a major reason a major reason was one major reason was a Supreme Court decision in Brown versus Topeka Board of Education in that historic landmark decision by Warren Supreme Court said this was the first time the high court had ever said that racial segregation is per se discrimination and unconstitutional it's true with said news of that was the case in public education but are pursuing public education than why all in conservation public transportation why not been public accommodation and restaurants theaters will tell us amusement centers why not install these two in public education why isn't true in every area of the nation's life while the Court had reached its decision easily had been a long evolution that they decided in the own Plessy versus Ferguson case that facility is have to be separate but must be equal that will separate but were not equal as the NAACP national Association for disaster, people that oldest and largest civil rights organizations pointed out in case after case they can before the Supreme Court will never equal in fact could not be equal as the organization argued in some of the cases especially and more school in ACP arguing that it is that quote education could not possibly be provided blackball student studying in a segregated ballscrew in the state human if we professor sat more degree is and the white progressives in the white ball screw even if the buildings were but a library locked could not possibly get an equal education why because he or she would be denied the privilege all the pain and alumnus all the same institution from which the news in that profession of the leaders of that profession had graduated couldn't talk to the judge about the old days of the campus of the alma mater and thus would be handicapped in wheeling and dealing in the judges came and thus have not received an equal education for pairing him or her to compete equally before the courts of all rolled final AAV Supreme Court decided that segregation itself provided an equal education and must come to an end well that was Shalhoub Rall throughout the black community than Salm overestimated the impact of it so amusing and said well it's almost over now world of all erroneously thinking that once this is implemented that freedom will be here and everything else will fall into place that all the other inequities will come down like the proverbial dominoes when you push the button Houston was a landmark decision and it was motivation or many blacks to begin agitating for an end to segregation a second reason for the time being while the civil rights explosion was World War II when this nation was fighting against the master race the array all involved with a Nazi is and the fact is and there were black or use of the two many of them and work with items and not fighting those were fighting were fighting in segregated units but still it would buy in the battle against Nazism and it was racism it was inevitable that they should turn around and say you wait a minute about racism back home racism is wrong in your and how all in God's name Kennedy right in America and various incidents serve further to encourage them in their struggle and for instance when the lack groups back from the prop riding on trains in the South and had to ride in that Jim Crow coach if you won't remember it a difficult for some of you were so young to believe that it existed but that was separate cultures on train they would leave from coaches on Troy and you see the idiocy of the whole day back seats of the buses up from coaches on train was not the back of the front that matter is that this is a separation will add a certainly a frockcoat shaman trying and the same time they so not see prisoners of war writing first-class on the same train well that was a bit more than they could stumble and they came out determined to do battle against racism here and their relatives and friends back home at equal determination of the other major reason closely related to that was the emergence of new nations in Africa closely related because simulations of Africa began to emerge partly because of World War II Malaysia they are fighting against racial theory of the one about the racial theory that undergirds the colonial policies in Africa all those nations which shell of a colonial power in Africa and then they stepped up their campaign to gain political independence but the black Americans then the global and so a new image of Africa popular porn black Americans are the same image of Africa white Americans at what was the Hollywood image of the Tarzan the new I'm sure you're familiar with that image or reformatted so we follow a few half naked savages dancing on the boiling pot with a missionary in time I remember when I was a post-Cold War aid going up in taxes I would go to the movie and every Saturday afternoon matinee and that was half-hour serial law of Tarzan and we would sit them supple said ballot of course of chewing the months and watching Tarzan to Sweden due to use by Levine zero out what will and and could see the missionary in the pot as he builds upon the needs and the sweat was living from his now and he was standing in the forests as we work to looking for cars and news in editable and timely arrival coming through to use they would show the Africans dancing or round-the-clock to the tom-tom beat and you can can can can can can then/a close-up of the face of one of the Africans on the screen all painted in fierce and I know my buddy at curbing to his wealth is I don't tell you whether his reaction was small and less on the room on the last one and only in Africa on America and alerting was rejecting Africa and in a sense rejecting cell that was true then 10 13 million blackberry of around the country what was the images we have Africa we knew nothing will want African past that his recent knowledge in fact it is only around the turn of the century of this century that of archaeologists began uncovering the rulings of ancient cities in central and eastern Africa I've seen the rulings by the way in a row into cities of great beauty and they compare their magnificence with the ruins of ancient Rome and Greece when they first one cover these rulings and scholars had a predictable reaction is and why clash the Romans must've come for the south and we fall what anthropologists began examining the rulings in the two wounds and examine those skeletal remains and determined that people were black they were African rooms are Africans the soldiers that were scholars libraries universities judicial system in the cities go home warfare from the north updated of a highly developed cultures and civilization that was comparatively new knowledge and I would refer you to one book of lies and English on lost cities of Africa by Bassam Davidson which brings together some of that research that has been done while black Americans became more familiar with these developments today I have asked it is not true it is alive that I don't have a pass and therefore have no future if I have a past then I may have a future and graveside began developing and lacks some to Africa after the war as in the 50s new nations began emerging the early 60s and solve our image this all Blacks leading nations speaking the eloquently on television with a published British accents or French and representative speaking in the United Nations and the baby in somebody then I come somebody to so the combination of these reasons that led blacks to struggle more to gain and equality in this country at the time they did much of longer for the Roman nonviolent movement which so became all have to worry in the 60s was not due to that decade to say in his which you are familiar from your readings did not begin February 1, 1960 with a Southern student said in movement there had indeed been sitting in for civil rights in this country in the early 1940 there had been standing in his way in you may not be aware of that in those news segregation in places of public accommodation laws not of selling phenomenon was a national phenomenon existing throughout the country restaurants theaters hotels in northern city segregated excluded blacks swimming pools and public beaches similarly excluded were segregated blacks the difference between the North and the South in those years was a that the pattern was stocky in the mall while it was consistent in the South in that essay Chicago in 1941 when we began all efforts to develop a nonviolent movement frequently one would see a black wall by a restaurant palmistry and slow news of her niece passing the restaurant and movie and continue walking and maybe at the end of the glass window turn around and walked back looking again at the long looking obviously for no blockers see them a black student in their if there were then this might go in order for me over the uncertainty the indecision will not bring in the northern cities and a cocoa and could not go in the south there was no question no doubt could go in place except in the black own restaurant in the back of the city the other side so that was the difference about our some people young people people your age college students quite in black and largely point who want to change this with nonviolent method I was one of those I was a pacifist then refusing to participate in war first I'd read war to be immoral as it was killing and I did want to kill I'm no longer passes by the way I think that some wars are justified because I believe that known till he was justified the second reason for not wanting to participate in wall for refusing to speak more was that I didn't think that I could fight against whose racial feeling in a segregated army and thus side was a pacifist my draft board chose to do for me on theological grounds inside a study for the Ministry while it was not enough for me and for my conscience just to refuse to fight in the onboard I wanted to find nonviolent alternatives to violence in the resolution also shall conflict situation especially racial conflict of that was my beginners that had been my life having grown up in the deep South that was not motivated any more than anything else this lecture will continue in the next program James