“Civil Rights opened the windows. When you open the windows it does not mean that everybody will get through. We must create our own opportunities.”
Mary Frances Berry
American writer b.1938
During the summer of 1964 many men and woman, both black and white, tried to get
through their own windows to find their opportunities. They fought together for a right that is
often taken for granted: the right to vote. They fought to get African Americans that same right
that was guaranteed to all American citizens. Voting rights were a powerful tool, a stepping
stone for African Americans to become equal at last in a place where nobody wanted to grant
them that gift. Voting granted the power of change, the power to do something that could help
even the situations of African American’s. Many fought for this right in a cut-throat time where
nobody was safe from hatred, not blacks nor whites. Often in an exchange for the right to vote
innocent African American’s found they were knocking on death’s door before they ever saw the
outcome of their vote.
Many blacks in America did try to vote. In Webster Parish, La, Joe Kirk was a black
man who tried to register to vote four times in 1960. All four times he was unsuccessful and
finally because of his attempts a voting rights law was passed five moths later. It stated that all
parents of illegitimate children were not allowed to vote. Joe Kirk did not have any children, or
illegitimate children, but because he was black he was told he did and he lost his rights to vote.
In East Carroll Parish, La., Joseph Atlas argued that he was not allowed to register to vote.
The next day he found that all the whites who bought from his farm stopped purchasing from
him. In some places like Haywood County Tenn., from 1960-1962, blacks who registered had
their insurance policies cancelled, lost their jobs, and were refused credit at local banks. In the
end only one black man was brave enough to vote in McCormick County SC, 1961, and for his
bravery he was “removed from the country.” In McCormick County there was a population of
62.2% blacks. Only forty eight blacks were registered to vote. Intimidation as well as poll taxes,
grandfather clauses, and literacy test halted voted by blacks in South Carolina. In Mississippi,
Freedom Summer, held in the summer of 1964, worked to remove these impediments and allow
blacks to vote.
The reason Freedom Summer was held in Mississippi was due to the fact that it was one
of the most black populated states, yet only 6.5% of the blacks were registered to vote. The
Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and the National Association for the Advancement of
Colored People (NAACP) joined the Mississippi Council of Federation Organizations to create a
voter registration campaign. As a result the Mississippi Party was born and 80,000+ people of
Mississippi joined.
Michael Schwerener was the first of the three civil rights workers to cause the KKK to
take notice. He was born in New York. When he was twenty four years old he and his wife Rita
moved to Mississippi where he became a CORE field worker. While there working he earned the
hatred of the KKK because of his organization of a black boycott against a white owned business
and his many attempts to help African American’s register to vote. In May of 1964 Sam Bowers,
the imperial wizard of the white knights, called out to his fellow KKK members to activate “Plan
4”. Plan 4 called for the elimination of Michael Schwerener.
The Klan first tried to kill Schwerener on June 16, 1964 in Nebbish County. Schwerener
was visiting Longdale on Memorial Day to ask the congregation at the Church of Mount Zion if
he could use the church as a Freedom School. At 10:00 PM the meeting at Mount Zion ended
and ten of the black members went outside to see 30 KKK members lined up, military style, with
rifles. They had been waiting for Schwerener to come out in order to kill him. When they could
not find him they grew angry and took ten gallons of oil from one of the cars and doused the
church with it all. They then lit the church on fire and let it burn.
Days later Schwerener received the news that the church had been destroyed while he
was in Oxford, Ohio. He shared this news with his black aid James Chaney. Chaney was twenty
one years old, a high school dropout, and a black native from Meridian. The two of them were in
Ohio to attend a three day campaign sponsored by the National Council of Churches to help
recruit students for the Mississippi Summer project. Among the students was a Queens College
student named Andrew Goodman. He met Schwerener and was convinced by the man to come to
Meridian. The three got into a blue CORE owned Ford station wagon with five other unknown
civil rights workers and started heading back to Meridian. Along the way a man leaned out of his
car window and saw a young woman sitting next to Chaney in the back seat of the car and called
her a “Nigger Lover.” The two unknown workers did not continue with them after a quick stay in
Meridian and the three men went on their way towards Longdale alone.
While in Longdale the three men went to the burnt remains of Mount Zion and then
visited the homes of four black members of the congregation to learn about the night that
the church was burnt down. They learned that they were being looked for by a group of white
men. The Neshoba County Sheriff, Lawrence Rain, and his deputy Cecil Price were both
members the Klan Around 3:00 PM the three men were heading back to Meridian and had to
decide which of two ways they wanted to head. There was route 491through a more obscure area
of forest and clay roads where an ambush would be easy or there was route 16, the supposedly
safer route that was an indirect route back to Meridian. The path they chose, route 16, would
forever change their lives. The men did not think that they would get into much trouble heading
through route 16. They thought it was the safest route. However by telling a fellow CORE
worker to call the FBI if they weren’t back by 4:30 PM, Schwerener showed that he already
believed or at least suspected a real chance of danger along the way. Longdale was in fact a
“High Risk” area for all civil rights workers during this time. Along the road the men met their
first spot of trouble. The CORE workers car was well known and easy for KKK member, and
deputy sheriff, Cecil Price to spot along his way. At first he only spotted Chaney driving the car,
for both Goodman and Schwerener were ducked low in their seats, and he was immediately
pulled over for supposedly speeding along the road. He found Goodman and Schwerener in their
seats and they were arrested for a “suspicion” that they were involved in the arson attack upon
Mount Zion. After booking the men and throwing all three in jail, Price went to Edgar Ray
Killen, the Klan Kleagle, to tell him he had caught Schwerener. Indeed Schwerener and his two
aides were going nowhere very quickly.
Schwerener did try once to get a phone call, as is the usual right, but was denied. Perhaps
the three men were aware at this time what was happening around them but it was far too late to
change anything. The entire police station was corrupt at this point and when a call was made to
ask about the whereabouts of the three workers jailer Minnie Herring lied. In the meantime
Chaney, Goodman and Schwerener could only sit and wait for the conclusion to their night. At
10:00 PM Price showed up to release the three men and send them on their way. He took them to
their car and then trailed them in his own vehicle. By this time the KKK members were already
collecting together, getting newer members to aid in the events that would take place later in the
night. A group of the new recruits of the KKK were told to go and buy rubber gloves while
Edgar Ray Killen went off to secure an alibi, attending his uncle’s funeral. This was merely the
beginning of the night that would follow.
Chaney, Goodman and Schwerener had made it to route 19 when two cars of Klan
members came into view. Deputy Sheriff Cecil Price was also speeding down the road after the
car. Chaney saw the three cars and attempted to run, pulling down route 492 with Price hot on
the trail. For reasons unknown Chaney decided to end the chase mere seconds after they had
pulled onto the new road. They were surrendering to a group of KKK members with foul play on
their minds. All three were pulled from the car and placed in Price’s car before heading out to an
unmarked dirt road known as Rock Cut Road where things were about to turn even worse for the
three civil rights workers.
When the three civil rights workers did not show up at headquarters in Meridian
CORE workers grew nervous. One worker finally called John Doar, the Department of Justice’s
“point man,” who had just been in Oxford Ohio to warn workers about the dangers they faced.
He had been very aware of the corruption in the local police departments and knew that if
anything happened to the workers “there was no federal police force that could protect them.” He
then placed a call to the FBI and gave them the power to investigate a possible disappearance
and violations of federal laws. The next day, June 23rd, John Proctor who was a Meridian-based
FBI agent, was in Neshoba and had men interviewing people such as Sheriff Rainey and Deputy
Price as well as Community leaders and blacks around the area. A leading tip came when
someone called in about a car that was off to the side of the road in bushes. FBI agents quickly
went out and found the blue CORE ford station wagon in the northeast corner of Neshoba. It had
been gutted and scavenged by Choctaw Indian’s by the time the agents arrived there. Two days
later, June 25th, President Johnson ordered in 200-300 sailors to help the FBI in their search.
Many in the county seemed to think that the three men were in hiding, trying to give the police a
bad name. However with the Neshoba County Residents silent, for half of them were participants
in the crime and the other half afraid to open their mouths, there was not much information
gained except for the children who were persuaded by candy to let slip any thing they knew. Yet
finally patience, and a 20,000 dollar reward, paid off and the FBI received the biggest tip of all.
August 4th, 1964 the bodies were uncovered at the Old Jolly Farm. The location of the
three bodies came from the tip called into the FBI, one so precise that according to some cases
they only had to dig one hole in order to uncover the men. They were buried twenty feet into a
dam which was being built even after the bodies were buried there. The bodies were then sent to
the University of Mississippi Medical Center where an autopsy was conducted. Two of the men
had been shot point blank in the heart by a .38 caliber. The third man had been shot more then
twice after being severely beaten. It was proven afterward that the three men were in fact
Schwerener, Chaney and Goodman. After six weeks of searching the men had finally been
found.
Throughout Neshoba there was shock at the finding of the three bodies. Many could not
believe that people could do any such thing in their community while others were even more
shocked that someone ‘ broke code’ and spoke to the FBI. However as talk flooded the area FBI
agents were searching the grounds where the men had been buried for any clues. They found
beer cans, buttons, scraps of cloth and ciggerates all around the grave site that could be used as
evidence. Yet to think of this why would people do this? Were voting rights really that
dangerous in the hands of people just like their murderors, except for their dark skin?
It seems that indeed voting rights were important. Important enough to kill these three men
because of their involvement, to bury them in a dam, to leave families grieving. Once again
voting rights were a stepping stone, a way for African American’s to open their windows to
opportunity and freedom. Voting rights were a way to become equal and be respected and treated
the same way white men and woman were. That was why these men died. That was why they put
their lives in the hands of KKK members that fateful night. To bring about a new age where what
they were fighting for could actually be achieved.
Civil Rights Voting
2/11/08
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