Although the Fifteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states
that the right to vote may not be denied anyone because of race or color,
in the early 1960s civil rights activists in Mississippi were struggling
against great odds to make it possible for African Americans to vote.
Mississippi’s record on voting rights was not good. In 1960, blacks made
up about 45 percent of the state’s population, but only about 6 percent
were registered to vote. White supremacists (people who believe that
whites should rule over people of other races) had devised many methods to ensure that blacks did not vote. In some cases, literacy (the ability to read and write) or “interpretation” tests were required of blacks. Whites graded the tests. In other cases, high poll taxes (money required
in order to vote) were charged. Some blacks who tried to vote were
beaten; some were even murdered. White employers often fired black
employees who voted. Some counties published the names of every
African American who tried to register to vote. The Ku Klux Klan, a secret, white-supremacist terrorist organization in the South, targeted
black voters in their violent raids. Due to intimidation and unfair registration practices, there were entire counties in Mississippi where not one
African American was registered to vote.
In 1962, several Mississippi civil rights groups joined together in one
organization, the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO), to secure voting rights for African Americans. Organized mainly by civil
rights leader Bob Moses (1935–), COFO was made up of the Mississippi
chapters of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC; pronounced “Snick”),
and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
(NAACP). The COFO faced powerful, and often violent, resistance
from white segregationists (people who wanted to maintain the enforced
separation of blacks and whites).
In 1963 the COFO invited northern white college students to come
to Mississippi for the summer of 1964 to help with a massive black-voter
registration drive and education campaign. They hoped that bringing in
white volunteers would focus the nation’s attention on the injustices and
brutality African Americans faced in Mississippi and force the federal government to protect African Americans who were trying to exercise their
voting rights. The 1964 campaign became known as Freedom Summer.
The program
In the early summer of 1964, thousands of white college students went
south to join the COFO’s work. Most took part in the ongoing voterregistration drive, working to persuade African Americans to register to
vote despite the intimidation tactics of the white supremacists. Under
the direction of SNCC veterans, some volunteers created community
centers that provided basic services such as health care to the black community. Others initiated voter-education activities and literacy classes
aimed at encouraging black Mississippians to register to vote. COFO
volunteers also established “freedom schools” that provided normal academic subjects but concentrated on discussions about current events,
black history, the philosophy behind the civil rights movement, and
other cultural activities. Over three thousand African American students
attended the freedom schools.
Mississippi Free Democratic Party
Freedom Summer activists also sought to get black Mississippians into
elected office. The summer before, the COFO had sponsored the
“Freedom Vote,” during which nearly ninety thousand African
Americans voted in a mock (imitation or pretend) election. The
Mississippi Democratic Party was all white and had strong segregationist policies, so the activists formed a new party called the Mississippi Free
Democratic Party (MFDP). In the summer of 1964, African Americans
in Mississippi voted for sixty-eight MFDP delegates to attend the national Democratic Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey. When the MFDP delegates arrived at the convention and demanded
that they be seated instead of the regular (white) Democrats, the
Democratic Party was taken aback. Many white southern delegates
threatened to walk out. A televised hearing was held to determine
whether the MFDP delegates could be seated. The cofounder of the
MFDP, Fannie Lou Hamer (1917–1977), presented a passionate appeal
to include Mississippi’s black community in the voting process. Fearing
that the Democratic Party would lose the support of its white southern
members, President Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973; served 1963–69)
stopped the hearing. The Democratic Party offered the MFDP two nonvoting seats next to the regular Mississippi delegates, which the MFDP
rejected. But Hamer’s dramatic speech had gotten the nation’s attention.
Violence
Michael Schwerner (1939–1964), a white volunteer, joined CORE in
1963 and opened a community center in Meridian, Mississippi. James
Chaney (1943–1964), an African American Meridian native, and white
volunteer Andrew Goodman (1943–1964) agreed to work with Schwerner during Freedom Summer. On June 21, 1964, these three civil
rights workers were arrested, jailed, and held without being allowed a
telephone call. The deputy sheriff who arrested them contacted members
of the local Ku Klux Klan before releasing them that night. As the three
drove home, Ku Klux Klan members stopped their car and took them to
a deserted road. Schwerner and Goodman were both shot once through
the heart; and Chaney was severely beaten and shot three times.
The disappearance of the three civil rights workers received considerable news coverage, and the publicity forced President Johnson to
order the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to begin a massive
search and investigation. On August 4, an informant’s tip led the FBI to
the bodies of the missing men. In October 1967, after years of delay,
seven men were convicted—not of murder, but of depriving Chaney,
Goodman, and Schwerner of their civil rights. They were sentenced to
three to ten years in jail. In 2006, Edgar Ray Killen (1925–), an eightyyear-old former Ku Klux Klansman, was convicted of manslaughter in
the killings, forty-two years after the crime.
The media continued to focus on the murder of the three civil rights
workers, though by the end of Freedom Summer thirty-seven black
churches and more than thirty homes and businesses belonging to
African Americans had been burned or bombed. The murder of several
other African Americans that summer went unnoticed by the press.
Impact
The impact and legacy of Freedom Summer stretched far beyond the
borders of Mississippi and long after the summer ended. Freedom
Summer community centers provided a model for federally funded clinics and programs. Freedom schools served as models for alternative
schooling nationwide. Freedom Summer publicized the tremendous obstacles whites had placed in front of black voters. This convinced the nation of the need for the Voting Rights Act of 1965. After years of
struggle, large numbers of African Americans were finally able to vote.
Freedom Summer brought a new political awareness to many white
volunteers. At least one-third of the volunteers stayed in Mississippi to
continue the struggle for black civil rights. Many volunteers who returned to the North became activists for other causes, particularly the
women’s rights movement and the antiwar movement protesting U.S.
involvement in the Vietnam War (1954–75). Freedom Summer had a very different effect on black civil rights
workers. From the start, many black activists had not wanted to invite
white volunteers to participate. Many felt that the presence of white volunteers—who too often assumed leadership roles and interacted with
black people in a condescending manner—would undermine their goal
of empowering Mississippi blacks. Many of these activists came out of
Freedom Summer ready to move on to a new type of militant (aggressive) activism called the Black Power movement.
Freedom Summer’s most enduring legacy was the new consciousness
it created among black Mississippians. It succeeded in initiating thousands of African Americans into political action, providing black children with an antiracist education, and creating black-led institutions
such as the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party.