So we’re going to start this BTN – Civil Rights segment by talking about the state of Missouri. Missouri is also known by the nickname, “The Show Me State.” So yeah, show me a black man and I’ll show you a rope and a tall tree. Missouri has a long history of racism dating back from the time of the Missouri Compromise when it entered the union as a slave state, all the way up to when Michael Brown was shot in Fergurson six times in the chest with his hands up while surrendering to police. Of course, after that, they burned Fergurson to the ground and now they know how to ask somebody. One of the most mysterious cases of racism in Missouri occurred in 1936 when a black man named Lloyd Gaines was denied admission to the University Of Missouri Law School. The sole reason was because of a clause in the Missouri Constitution that mandated separate education of the races. He was smart enough, dotted all the “i’s,”, and crossed all the “t’s”. The only thing that stopped him was because he was black. Gaines: “What!!? Hell No!” He took that shat all the way up to the Supremes! It was one of the first cases to be brought before the Supreme Court challenging the separate but equal doctrine. Now it seems Gaines had a pretty good case because the university offered to pay his full tuition at an out-of-state university. However, Gaines refused and told them, “I ain’t going nowhere!! Ima sits right in the front row of yo law school wearing the biggest Afro and bell bottoms you dudes have ever seen, plus Ima eat okra and chitlins in the lunch room!!” Okay, he didn’t say that… besides bell bottoms and afro’s were a couple of generations away at the time. As far as Afro’s go, I’m afraid a lot of black men were still conking our hair back then. Conking means putting lye in it to make it straight like white hair, and bell bottoms wouldn’t arrive in the States until around the early ’60s when they were made popular by British bands like the Beatles and the Rolling Stones. Those were the days… I had some bell bottoms you could hide a volkswagon under they were so wide… Okay let me stop… but they were big. Anywho, to the surprise and delight of black folks everywhere… GAINE’S WON THE CASE!! In fact, the State of Missouri v. ex-rel Gaines v. Canada was a key foundation in the landmark case, Brown V. Board of Education, which basically outlawed separate but equal. Now here is the mysterious part I was talking about… Although the US Supreme Court ruled that Gaines had to be admitted to the all-white school, he never stepped not now a black toe into not now a hallway there. In one of the great mysteries of the 20th century, Lloyd Gaines simply disappeared. After winning the case, he was never heard from again. He just vanished… Now it might be a mystery to them, but it ain’t no mystery to us. You and I know what happened and it has something to do with him and the upper room. FBI: “Sir, we are looking for that nigra who won that Supreme Court case so he can sit next to white women… have you seen him?” Racist: “Naw, I ain’t seen him…” Anywho, as I said, Missouri has a rich history of racism and bigotry, even in the 21 century. In 2014 the NAACP issued a warning to African Americans not to go to the state because of its attitude towards minorities.
So this brings us to our first president in the series BTN – Civil Rights, Harry S. Truman. Truman was born and raised in Missouri. Our criteria:
10 – You can sit next to the table and watch while we play a couple of hands of bid whisk.
9 – You are able to use the word “Bro” in front of us.”
8 – You can bring something to the barbecue and we’ll put it on the table with the other food.
7 – We will wave at you if we see you on the street.
6 – We won’t side-eye or sass if you bring a watermelon to our family dinner.
5 – You can leave with a little bit of your dignity after saying “My Nigga.”
4 – If we hear you calling for help, we will call the police after we have charged our phone.
3 – We will count to three before we let the dogs out if you come to our house.
2 – We won’t pee on your statue during daylight hours.
1 – Faque Off!!
Harry S. Truman – 9
Elected 1945 -1953
You are able to use the word “Bro” in front of us.”
So Truman was born in May of 1884 in Lamar, Jackson County, Missouri. The county is named after Andrew (“Trail Of Tears“,) Jackson. Jackson was the reason thousands of Native Americans perished on relocation marches. We are not going to get into that right now but here is a link on the subject. So Truman was born in Lamar, Missouri and later on, his family moved to Independence, Missouri, where he grew up. From 1884, the year he was born, to 1945, the year he became president, some of the most heinous racial crimes in American history occurred. Jim Crow, The Red Summer, Rosewood, the Scottsboro Boys, Houston riot of 1917, (19 black men were hanged after a court martial), the burning of Black Wall Street in Oklahoma, the Johnson-Jeffries Riots, (Jack Johnson was the first black man to take away the world heavyweight title from a white man in front of a white audience that was estimated to be around 20,000 bloodthirsty, rope carrying, tree climbing, hard rock racist,) the blinding of Issac Woods... and many, many more that are too numerous to detail here. So earlier we talked about the “show me” state and its general attitudes toward black people. It’s surprising how some men born under those circumstances, being taught from childhood that black people are inferior in every way, would one day strike a blow that would open the doors to the black civil rights movement… And no they are not sitting on my car outside, telling me to come out here darky, we want to talk to you… nor is there a cross burning in my front yard, or my phone ringing with somebody on the other end saying, “Die nagger!!” It’s none of that. Harry Truman was down with us. Now I know some of you are probably saying… “You talking about the Harry Truman that dropped the bomb on those folks and then dropped another one on them because they ain’t say “massa please” quick enough? You talking about that Harry Truman?” Yep, that’s the one. That’s the reason I only gave him a nine. But do you know what Harry Truman did do? He signed Executive Order 9981… ending segregation in the military. That was on July 26, 1948. The last all-black company disbanded in 1954. In 1946 after learning that black soldiers coming back from WWII were being dumped from trucks in Mississippi and beaten, he established “The President’s Committee on Civil Rights.” The committee released its report in 1947 and Truman took it before Congress. The report revealed what everyone already knew… “This is a white man’s world and ya’ll just live in it!” The report split Congress and Truman barely won re-election. Remember Truman assumed office after FDR died and ran in 1948 on the platform of finishing what Roosevelt started. Anywho, after the speech, he was never able to get any civil rights legislation signed into law during his next administration. However, he did sign a whole bunch of executive orders pertaining to civil rights. He also was the first president to speak at the NAACP National Convention in Washington DC, in June of 1947. Do you know how many folks were hanging from trees down south in June of 1947… and here he is addressing 10,000 angry, serious ass black folks, wearing a white suit and Panama hat talking about civil rights… without now a bodyguard… okay… he had bodyguards… but still that’s saying something.
Blackman: “You down here in a white suit and a Panama hat looking like Colonel Sanders!!! WHY YOU… I OUGHT TO…”
Blackman 2: “Put em down Monster… and take that KFC bucket off his head.. he’s on our side…”
Truman died at the age of 88 on December 26, 1972.
“I believe in the brotherhood of man, not merely the brotherhood of white men, but the brotherhood of all men before the law. I believe in the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. In giving the Negroes the rights which are theirs, we are only acting in accord with our own ideals of a true democracy.” – Harry S. Truman
Where In The World Is Arthur…
Enslavia: Aunt Yap, have you seen Arthur? His bed doesn’t look like it’s been slept in…
Aunt Yap: Naw, I haven’t seen him since he went into the bathroom last night.
Enslavia: ( Knock ! Knock! Knock!) Arthur? Arthur, are you in there? Arthur? I got you some city breakfast from McDoodles! (Enslavia opens the door and Arthur is gone!) He’s gone, Aunt Yap! Must have went out the bathroom window!!
Aunt Yap: You did tell him, didn’t you?
Enslavia: I didn’t think he was going to leave! I was going to tell him this morning!
Aunt Yap: Yip!! Go get the dogs.. that city fella left last night… went out the window like the other ones…
Yip: should I bring a ladder?
Aunt Yap: Naw… he’s only been gone a couple of hours… ain’t got far…
Dwight D. Eisenhower -10
Elected 1953 -1961
You can sit next to the table and watch while we play a couple of hands of bid whisk.
Dwight D. Eisenhower was the supreme commander of Allied forces during WWII. He knew from first-hand experience the contributions African American soldiers had demonstrated through their selfless acts of courage, sacrifice, and bravery. When he got into office, it was payback time. So we have mentioned that Brown v. Board of Education effectively ended the separate but equal doctrine codified in the Plessy v. Ferguson case. but it was the Eisenhower appointments that got Brown v. Board of Education across the finish line.
Now before we move on, let’s recap how Plessy v. Ferguson tore us a new one. So the Constitution states in the 14 Amendment that we shall all be treated… that’s black and whites… as equal under the law. It doesn’t say we are “all equal,”… just equal under the law… and that’s where Plessy faqued up at. So when he got on the train and wanted to sit in the all-white section because he thought they would view him as equal… the exact opposite happened, and that brother just barely got out of there without one in the dome. Pissed off, he took that shat up to the Supreme Court. They told him that just because you are separated, it doesn’t mean you are not equal. You are still an American citizen whether you sit in the back of the train or in the front of the train. Those are my words. I think they were like “Ni*ga please…” Anyway, the decision to separate minorities from whites would last almost 60 years until it was overturned by Brown v. Board Of Education. You might have noticed I used the word minorities instead of blacks. So the history books might have you think it was solely directed at black folks, but it wasn’t. “Whites Only,” meant just that… not whites and Asians or whites and Latinos or Whites and Eskimos… but whites only!
Wish we had more time but Plessy is a whole “nother” story. Luckily I wrote about it and if you like to know more, you can click this link. So I told you that without Eisenhower, Brown v. Board of Education might have been voted down. Well, it was because Eisenhower appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to the court. To use a metaphor… that white man could jump! It was the Warren court that unanimously voted to strike down Plessy. Our first black justice, Thurgood Marshall was also on the Warren court… but not at the time of Brown v. Board of Education. That’s because Marshall was the one representing Brown!
So back to Ike… short for Eisenhower. Now don’t ask me how the white folks got “Ike” out of Eisenhower because I can’t tell ya. Anywho, it was Ike that signed into law the 1957 Civil Rights Act, the first civil rights legislation to be signed into law since Reconstruction. Among other things, the law created the Civil Rights division in the Justice Department. It was the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department that prosecuted the Chaney, Goodman, and Schwerner case. It was one of their first cases. They also prosecuted the murderers of the four children at the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, Addie Mae Collins (14), Cynthia Wesley (14), Carole Robertson (14), and Carol Denise McNair (11). I’m not sure why they didn’t prosecute the killer of Medgar Evers, but he was eventually prosecuted by the state of Mississippi and died in jail. Now although they have been instrumental in fighting against racism, they haven’t always been successful. Most recently an “alleged” accomplice to the murder of Emmitt Till, charges were dropped due to everybody who was involved in it having croaked. James Byrd’s murderers also were not prosecuted under federal law or civil rights violations. Byrd was dragged behind a pick-up truck for over a mile on asphalt until he disintegrated. Fortunately, the two murderers got theirs, when Texas convicted them of first-degree murder and stuck a large dirty needle in their ass and emptied it. It was the first time in Texas history that white men were executed for killing a black man. A third man who was an accomplice was given a life sentence. He is being held under protective custody at the Texas Harlem Prison for Stong Young Black Men With Big Muscles And Long Beards Who Don’t Give A Fu*k… okay no he is not, but he is in protective custody and will not be eligible for parole until 2038 when he will be 63 years old. He has been in jail since 1998.
Ever hear of the Central High in Arkansas? Well after Brown v. Board of Education constitutionally ended segregation in public schools, those good folks down in Arkansas weren’t about to have black boys sitting next to white girls in dey school and yeah, that’s what it was about… On September 23, 1957, nine black kids were supposed to attend Little Rock Central High as a result of the Brown case integrating the schools. They were denied entrance and the police had to be called in so that they could escort them into the school. Well, on the first day, they made it in but had to leave early because over a thousand angry white racists chewing Rigley Spearmint Gum and listening to Elvis were waiting outside the school up to no good. The next day Ike let them know, “you bedda ask somebody,” when he sent in the 1,200-man 327th Airborne Battle Group of the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division to escort the young black children into Central High. The next thing he did was take control of the ten-thousand-manned Arkansas National Guard by putting it under federal control. So now Governor “Catch A Nig*a By The Toe”, Faubus, wouldn’t be able to order the National Guard to remove the Army’s 101st Airborne Division. Afterwards, members of the Arkansas National Guard’s 153rd Infantry assumed control for the rest of the school year. The first day the black children tried to attend school was broadcast on television over the entire country and Ima tell you right now, the good ole folks down there in Little Rock, Arkansas, pulled their pants and dresses all the way to the #@@! ground and were showing the whole country every last inch of it. They were using the “n-word ” like they were in a 21st-century rap video. They were talking about killing those children’s mothers and fathers, they were talking about killing those children’s friends and they were talking about killing them, if they stepped one nigra toe in that school. They were ugly with it!! Still, Eisenhower prevailed and Central High became one of the first schools integrated under Brown v. Board of Education. Although Brown had been decided in 1954, the law gave a timetable for when all schools should be integrated. Central High in Arkansas was in 1957. The last school to be integrated under Brown v.Board of Education was the University of Alabama in 1963. Governor George Wallace stood on the steps vowing not one chicken-licking black sambo would ever see the inside of UOA unless they were sweeping or mopping the floor. He famously stood on the steps of UOA and said, ” In the name of the greatest people that have ever trod this earth, I draw the line in the dust and toss the gauntlet before the feet of tyranny, and I say segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” President Kennedy then sent troops to Alabama and they had to kick a little bit of it. On June 11, 1963, Vivien Malone and James Hood walked into the University of Alabama, the first black students in its 143-year history. A few years later in Laurel Maryland, somebody shot Wallace in the ass talking that racist shat and he repented before he died in 1998.
So it was Ike who set the precedent of sending federal troops to ensure black children were being allowed the chance for a better education. He also chose a Supreme Court Chief Justice who he knew would get Brown v Board of Education across the finish line to make segregation in the United States based on color illegal. Finally, he walked through Congress the 1957 Civil Rights Act and signed it into law. When the Klan and other racists were at their most vicious, Dwight D. Eisenhower stood with us. He died on March 28, 1969, at the age of 78.
Meanwhile…
We Got You Now…
Longrope: Boy my name is Cedar Longrope III… and we got you. We got you for jumping out dat nigras bathroom and onto white man’s land… Now this is only gonna end in one of two ways… 1. You gonna tell us you just came from Africa visiting your cousin Tarzan and got yoself a sun tan or 2. there are gonna be ten toes hanging in front of the courthouse and a bunch of nigras singing we shall overcome…
Meanwhile back at Aunt Yap’s…
Enslavia: Aunt Yap how is it that you don’t own the land right behind the bathroom window? I mean you own the rest of the yard… all except that little piece. What happened?
Aunt Yap: Well chile, it all started with yo great uncle, Leroy Tofeet. After the war, he and yo granddad came to these parts from Naw Nigra, Alabama to start a business. They bought up this here land we live on and wanted to open up a saloon called Whitey’s. Now folks in this part ain’t take to kindly to a bar name Whitey’s that was owned by darkies, so they passed a law that said all nigras opening up a business in Blackity had to get a nigra license besides a business license! Uncle Leroy and Granddad were madder than if someone had served them a chicken and sauerkraut biscuit. So they went into town to talk to the judge. I was only seven years old at the time, but I will never forget that judge’s name… Cedar Longrope!
Longrope: Sheriff… I see two nigras just walked in here… remove them varmints…
Sheriff: Your honor the war is over… that fellow President Linkom freed the nigras and they have the right to walk into a gawd-fearing white men’s court now…
Longrope: I see… What be your business nigras?
Leroy: Your honor…
Longrope: Wait a damn minute!!… I ain’t tolerating no disrespectful nigra.. ain’t you forgetting something?
Leroy: Your honor… “Suh!”
Longrope: That’s better boy… well now that you’ve had your day in court nigra… Sheriff remove them…
Leroy: NOW WAIT A MINUTE SUH!! I AIN’T LEAVING UNTIL MY BUSINESS IS TAKEN CARE OF… I’M HERE ABOUT WHITEY’S!!
Longrope: HOT DIGGITY DOG ON A ALABAMA POSSUM BACK!! WHAT DID YOU SAY BOY?!! SHERIFF!! GO GIT A ROPE RIGHT NOW!! THAT NIGRA DONE SAID SUMPIN RIGHT IN MY EYEBALL!!
Sheriff: Your honor… I think he is talking about a business named Whitey’s…
Longrope: Boy you bedda change the name of that gin joint afore you find Jesus!!… Now what this be about?
Leroy: Well suh… the city wants me to get a nigra license afore they let me hang my sign up cause they don’t like the name…
Longrope: What sign?
Leroy: Let me hang Whitey’s in the front of my business…
Longrope: SHERIFF I DON’T CARE WHAT LINKOM SAID!!! I WANNA SEE A HURST OUTSIDE AND TWO NIGRA’S WITH SHOVELS!!
Leroy: Yo honor suh, please… If you let me open my gin joint, I’d be willing to do you one…
Longrope: Do tell…
Leroy: Well I’d give you a piece of the action and throw in some land too…!!
Longrope: I’d like to take you up on that boy… but I can’t have no nigra running a place called “Whitey’s!”
Leroy: Well I would put the sign in the back… right next to yo property so everybody thinks we marking it…
Longrope: Boy, I was gitting ready to string you up from the highest tree I could find… but now I see you got yo mind right… It’s a deal!!
Later on…
Sheriff: That boy forgot to sign that land over to you… what do you want me to do? I got the paperwork… I guess I could sign the nigra’s name on it… who’s to know… but I forgot his name…
Longrope: I’ll never forget that boy… and one day me and him gonna meet at that old elm tree deep in the woods and Ima gives him another sign… the boy’s name is “Leroy..!”
Sheriff: Sorry judge… the boys must be chasing them nigra’s outta town… I hear a lot of shooting and hollering!! You said the boy’s name is Leroy!!?… and how much land are you gonna get!!??
Longrope: WHAT??!! I can’t hardly hear with all that racket… It’s Tofeet!! … TOFEET!!
Aunt Yap: … and that’s how Longrope got to own that 2ft piece of land… he never forgave Uncle Leroy for putting that sign over the window outside the bathroom and he forbade any black people from ever stepping on his property again… when he died, he passed down that piece of land to his kinfolks and they be watching… and if any black folks step on they land… well… that’s why we have to hurry… and get down to the old elm tree… Yip… turn down this road right here…
John F Kennedy – 10
Elected 1961 -1963
You can sit next to the table and watch while we play a couple of hands of bid whisk.
I was a little boy when JFK was assassinated. I remember playing outside in the front yard with my brothers when Mom asked us to come in. She walked us upstairs to the TV room. We lived in a three-bedroom house on an Army base. My mom and Dad had their room, my brothers and I shared another room and the third bedroom was like a sitting room, where Momma would sit by the window and watch us play outside. The room had a 25-inch black-and-white television which Mamma would watch while watching us. There was a couch in the room and Mamma told us to sit down and then she turned on the TV. I didn’t quite understand what was going on, but I was scared because Mamma was crying. I watched as Walter Cronkite reported that John Fitzgerald Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States had been assassinated on a street in Dallas. It was on a Friday and I can’t figure out for the life of me why I wasn’t in school that day. My other two brothers were too young for school, so I know why they were there… but… anywho… Three days later, we watch his funeral being broadcast worldwide. I saw his son salute as the president’s body went by. I’ll never forget it, because the boy and I seem to be around the same age. For the next few weeks in school, the president’s assassination was a weekly topic. We studied it in our Weekly Readers and we discussed it in class.
Now there were only about three African Americans in my class of about thirty kids and I can’t remember us talking about civil rights. As far as I can remember we only talked about him being the youngest president, being a Catholic, and the duties of the presidency.
The base I lived on was in Virginia and at the time segregation was still legal… outside the base. However, I never knew anything about it as my parents kept those types of things away from us. It would be years before I knew the legacy of JFK and what his contribution to our civil rights movement meant. Now I started to give him an eight because after all was said and done, JFK was reluctant to pass civil rights legislation in his first year. He supported us, but it was his brother Robert Kennedy who was doing all the heavy lifting. I guess that’s why he appointed Robert to be Attorney General because he knew as president those Southern racists didn’t care who was caught hanging in a tree… him or us.
So anywho… man, as a child I was dumb as a rock when it came to being black or knowing my color made people treat me differently from other people. After leaving the base we moved back to Washington DC and I started attending public schools here. Now to show how well a job my parents had done in concealing the racism and bigotry in America from us, when I was in the fourth grade a little hood rat called me a “nigg*r.” Folks, I was so dumb, I didn’t know what it meant. I went home and told my Dad that a kid had called me a “nigg*r.” I said, “Dad what is that?” He said, “Son, whoever called you that… they are the nigg*r.” Well, it really didn’t answer my question, but still, I was glad I wasn’t a “nigg*r…” at least not yet. By the time I got into junior high school, I was fully versed on what a “nigg*r was and I didn’t like it one bit. It was during these years that I found out about JFK and how his partnership with Dr. Martin Luther King would propel our people into the Civil Rights Era. JFK first jumped into the fray when MLK was put in jail in Georgia protesting segregation down there. They charged him with violating his probation and sentenced him to six months in a cell next to the members of the local klavern. Deputy Fife was getting ready to integrate the jail when “Senator” JFK called the Governor and asked for King’s release. In the meantime, Robert Kennedy called the judge who sentenced King and was able to secure his release. After word got out about how the Kennedys had helped get MLK’s release, he won 70 percent of the black vote in the presidential election. Now once he got into office, it was another story. He was reluctant to mess with civil rights because he needed the Southern Democrat’s support to move his economic, and domestic agenda. He also need their support if he was going to make a move for another shot in 1965. So during his first term, a young man named John Lewis was an activist and a Freedom Rider. They called them Freedom Riders because they set out to test the 1957 civil rights act which made segregation on interstate transportation illegal. When the bus pulled into Alabama, it hit the fan. They were surrounded by hundreds of racists throwing tubes of Brylcreen and combs at them… no they didn’t, I only wish. Their bus was firebombed, forcing them to flee the burning wreckage. When they got off the bus they were beaten with clubs and tire irons. After that, Attorney General Robert Kennedy deployed 400 federal marshals to Alabama to protect the Freedom Riders when they went down there.
So anybody with just a passing interest in civil rights has seen the video of Bull “Storm Trooper” Conner and the attacks on African Americans in Birmingham in 1963. They used fire hoses, police dogs, and clubs to suppress a peaceful protest. The spectacle was shown worldwide! JFK was shocked and sent his brother Robert down to meditate. It ended with the desegregation of Birmingham lunch counters and other places of business. From that day on JFK looked at civil rights in a whole new light. After the Birmingham agreement, the racist started feeling some kinda way and acted out violently, including bombing a hotel where King stayed. JFK was fed up and sent 3000 troops down to Birmingham to kick a little bit. Luckily for the racist, they didn’t try them. They talk a good game, but in the end, they went to the same old lunch counters and businesses they had been going to before… this time with black folks in there and didn’t say a word… just like we told them to at first. When James Meredith tried to attend the University of Mississippi, and when Vivian Malone and James Hood arrived at the University of Alabama campus to integrate the university, Kennedy sent troops to protect them. The last straw was when Gov. George Wallace stood on the steps of the University of Alabama barring the way of Vivian and James. That same day Kennedy went on national television to propose the Civil Rights Act of 1963, which would provide protection for every American’s right to vote under the United States Constitution, end segregation in public facilities, and require public schools to be integrated. That August of 1963, after JFK’s speech, Dr. Martin Luther King gathered tens of thousands of protestors to march on Washington DC for the cause of civil rights and where he delivered his famous, “I Have A Dream” speech… despite the massive display, the beatings in Birmingham, and the firebombings in Alabama, the bill stalled in Congress. Three months later, John F. Kennedy was killed in Dallas on November 22, 1963. His bill never passed, but later an unexpected ally from the South would join the fight and pass the most sweeping Civil Rights legislation of the last 100 years. His name was Lyndon Johnson.
Join us next week for “By the Numbers – It’s Getting Real Now”
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