The Petal paper. [volume], October 30, 1958, Page 3, Image 3

About The Petal paper. [volume] (Petal, Miss.) 1953-19??

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East Side...
prevent the execution of the laws, the Federal government had to
use sotne.^ortn of force — if necessary, troops — to insure the pas
sage of the laws. The main trouble is that the South is still thinking
in terms of ^he Constitutional Federation of Madison and the found
ers of thupcoturtfy. The South has never accepted the fact that we
fought the Civil War and lost it, and that the Fourteenth Amendment
was written. I am a citizen not only of South Carolina but of the
United States.' "
WALLACE — How do you account for that? You said to me before
we went on the air: “The South has really never been willing to face
up to the fact that it lost the Civil War.”
DABBS -t, I don’t know how to account for it, but I do think it’s a
fact — one of the deepest facts in Southern psychology. We lost a war
and we admitted that slavery was wrong, but we didn’t admit that
discrimination was wrong. We didn’t admit that any Negro could be
come a citizen. We simply dropped our lines back a little bit further
and reinstated segregation in place of slavery. Whether we’d have
done differently if more force had been used I don't know, but I do
feel sure of this: that we not only failed in the Civil War but failed to
understand what the Civil War meant. A great defeat like the Civil
Wr.r is one of the greatest assets one could have.
WALLACE — How so?
DABBS Well, consider the edge Fve got on you, if you’re a North
erner. You’re living in the same history you began in. Your life
started here three or four hundred years ago and what you started to
do then you're still doing and succeeding in. The South started on
another track.and went a long way. It built up some kind of a civili
zation — I think a great one in many ways. And then it failed ab
solutely anid we had to start over again. I can become conscious of
rry history because a large part of it is different. I can look back
anr< cpp thot ihnrn tirac thnf onrl thorn ic thic and if T non nnf tho turo
together, and if I can understand what happened and relate the pre
sent to the pife-Civil War period, there is a richness possible to my
outlook on life that simply is not possible to yours. But until I do
it — and the jSouth usually hasn’t done it — there is a trauma cutt
ing right straight across the life of the South, and we don’t know
what to do with it.
WAL1.ACE — Let’s move to something that happened this week at
President Eisenhower’s press conference. He said, I believe, that tye
felt that school integration in the South should go slovyer than it has
been going. Do you think that integration has been going too fast?
DABBS — I don’t think integration is going too fast. There is no in
tegration at all in the so-called hard-core states of the South. But I
don’t care particularly how fast or slow it goes, provided we-'re going
somewhere. My basic criticism of the South is when she says she
wtnts time. What does she want time for? The indications are that
she wants timp to build up the defenses so that she won’t have to do
anything at all. If she indicated any real desire to piake a change, I
should say, certainly, she should have time. But if she’s going to put
otf Little Roek for two and a half years, just getting Faubus out is
not going to solve the problem. The people are stili-there smd roidre
going to figb£ the same thing over again.
WALLACE — Do you believe that there are sincere, well-intention
ed, intelligent people in the South who believe that they can actually
stop the coming of integration and really feel they can reverse the
Supreme Court decision?
DABBS — I think they're sincere. From my point of view I can’t
think they’re intelligent. Too many world forces are moving. The
South may looking back to 1876. The Federal troops withdrew
liuiii uic o'juui in loiuM < anu leu me ouum iu iicuiuie me icttmi
problem as it saw fit, and we know what happened. The South may
still hold that the union — the nation — will back down and leave
the South to do what it wishes. But the nation cannot back down.
What difference did the racial issue make to the world, to the posi
tion of America in the world, in 1876? None. What difference does it
make now? It's the key issue. Our relation to the colored peoples of
the world is more fundamental than communism and democracy. It
is a b’gger issue and it will be distrubing the world longer than the
democratic vs. Communist issue. The nation cannot withdraw today
and lot the South do what it wishes.
WALLACE ■*— President Eisenhower has said that he will enforce the
Supreme Court’s decision with troops if necessary, but he has con
sistently refused to commit himself about integration. He has con
sistently refused to say whether he approves of a law which per
mits Negro children to sit ,nexjt to white children in classrooms. What
is your reaction to the President’s refusal to take a public stand on
an issue of tips importance?
DABBS — I’m very grateful that the President made it clear that the
power of th^ nation was behind the Federal Courts. I’m very glad
of that. I do regret the fact that he doesn’t see fit to take a moral
lead in this matter. We have had Presidents who would have1 taken
the lead on one side or the other. Franklin Roosevelt would h^ve
done it. Woodrow Wilson would have done it. Both of them had the
theory that the President coaid make the office about what he pleas
ed. He was elected, it’s true,, by one. party, but he becomes the leader
of the natiod. Who else is the leader except the President? The Presi
dent has trelmendous moral influence, which it sems to me should
be used. Thi^s is a democratic issue — I don’t see how he can see it
otherwise —1 this is a movement of democracy, and I wish the Presi
dent would take a stand on the moral issue.
WALLACE j— Mr ’ Dabbs, you’ve expressed yourself rather wryly
about certain Scnjthern politicians up to now. Who are tha leaders
in the South whopv.ypu respect and who can lead the Southed a
better understanding Of our racial problem? „•* • .. .
DABBS — the men I think of are the men I am more or less as
sociated with in the Soutiwm itegatnal Council. I think of both Nag
roes and wAiitesOChere’s President Clement of Atlanta .1 Ini versify
and Beniamin Mava of Morehouse College. There’s Hodriine Carter
«nd Aakmpee — both noth*™*, of coarse, ia 'Ctrtmm parts ot the
South cow There*s John Wheeler, a banker, of Worth Carolina, Paid
Greea of North Carolina, o nationally known dramatist.
«• . -
WALLACE — Martin Luther King?
DABBS — Martin Luther King, of course — one of the outstanding
figures of the South. The Montgomery episode is absolutely unprece
dented.
WALLACE — Let me ask you one final question. What do you think
about Orvai Faubus?
DABBS — Well, 1 said in September, 1957, when this mess was de
veloping for the first time: “I think Faubus is ploying by oar ond
he hasn't a very good ear.” I know, of course, that he figured out
Arkansas correctly but I still think ha hasn’t too good an ear for the
whole business.
WALLACE — Time will tell. James McBride Dabbs, I surely thank
you for coming here from Sumter, South Carolina, to spend this half
hour with us. I think it may be fitting to quote here from James
Dabbs’ book, The Southern Heritage, in which he, a Southerner,
hurls a challenge to his fellows. He writes: “If Southerners could rise
to the level of loving passionately not only their hills and valleys, but
also the rich and varied configuration of people, black and white,
who dwell there in, we should not only solve our greatest problem,
but our age would become a challenge to generations as yet unborn.”
Book Review...
portant a role in the Montgom
ery protest, Dr. King devotes
many pages to discussing its va
rious aspects and the ways in
which it was applied in moments
of chisis. Acknowledging an
early indebtedness to Thoreau’s
ESSAY ON CIVIL DISOBEDI
ENCE, Dr. King guides the read
er through successive stages in
his own intellectual and spiritual
growth. This “pilgrimage' to non
violence” culminates in the hap
py discovery (cjtd subsequent
study) of the philosophy of Ma
hatma Gandhi. “Gandhi was
. probably the first person in his
tory,” the author tells us, “to lift
the love ethic of Jesus above
mere interaction between indi
viduals to a powerful and'effec
tive social force on a large scale.
Love for Gandhi was a potent
instrument for social and collec
tive transformation. It was in
this Gandhian emphasis on love
and nonviolence that I discover
ed the method for social reform
that I had been seeking for so
many months.”
Like Gandhi, Martin Luther
King is a man dedicated to his
convictions, with an unshakable
faith in the idea that right prin
ciples can be made operative in
the everyday lives of men for the
benefit bf all. Like his late In
dian predecessor, Dr. King has
demonstrated that religious
idealism need not be confined to
the monk’s cell, but may readily
guide the attitudes an dconduct
of Everyman towards productive
ends.
Month after month, at meet
ing after meeting, Dr King
stressed the tenets of nonviolent
resistance to his people.
“Nonviolence does not seek to I
defeat or humiliate the oppon
ent, but to win hts friendship.” I
he tcrid them; and they listened
“We must be willing to eecept
suffering without retaliation, to
accept blows from Hie opponwrt
without striking hack**; and be
stilled the grumblings of crowds
that had gathered before bomb
ed homes. “At Hie center of non
violence is love,” he argued —
and however idealistic, fanciful
and remote from experience
these prepositions may sound to
Americans who live in an at
mosphere already overwhelmed
by material concerns, the Mont
gomery movement is evidence of
the force and efficacy of these
same principles in action.
Dr. King records the climactic
events of the night of victory,
when a sympathetic white iwm
ister addressed a gathering of
Negroes who had participated in
the Montgomery protest,
“Though I have all faith, so thal
I could remove mountains, and
have not love, I am nothing . .
tiho urhito nactnr nnntpH “Wh^n
I was a child, I spoke as a child,
I understood as a child, I thought
as a child; but when I became a
man, I put away childish things.**
With this, Dr. King reports, “the
congregation burst into applause.
Soon they were shouting and
cheering and waving their hand
kerchiefs, as if to say that they
knew they had come of age, had
won new dignity. When Bob
Graetz (the white minister) con -
cluded: ‘And now abideth faith,
hope and love, but the greatest
of these is love,” there was an
other spontaneous outburst.” No
gahering of men in recent times
has deserved more richly the
right to greet those words with
joyous approval. Again, the
Montgomery bus boycott is in •
spiring not so much for the
achievement of its immediate
aims as for the spirit in which it
was conducted and the principles
which it took to heart. STRIDE
TOWARD FREEDOM documents
(Continued on Page 4)
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