Group Review #2

Alexa Calomiris, Sam Clark, Keeley Frost, Chip Olges, Blaire Smith

History 345 - Civil Rights in Memphis

Dr. Charles W. McKinney

9/30/16

Group Review #2

            “Everything about American society, from entertainment to education, ensured that the black body was not associated with humanity and citizenship” (Mitchell). Similarly to the aforementioned quote by Koritha Mitchell, we believe that the American society in which we live was founded on white supremacy. Systematic racism fostered and continues to foster an environment to which the Negro is suppressed and overlooked. The Civil Rights Movement offered an opportunity for separate dynamic groups to have a voice in a society where they were silenced. Although various associations were set in place for the progression of the black race, military veterans, women, and students are particular groups that stand out as large contributing factors to the further advancement of African Americans in society. This essay will attempt to break down these advocating groups by analyzing their specific methods in attaining greater freedom.

When speaking of influential groups, one must begin by analyzing the dynamic impacts of the military during the Jim Crow era. After the attacks on Pearl Harbor, African Americans were drafted into the military like their white counterparts. However, despite the desperate need for educated and willing volunteers, the military still practiced segregation and prohibited African Americans from holding certain positions. For instance, when a black, published, college professor enlisted in the Army, they refused to accept him. If they had let him enlist, they would have been forced to give him a reasonably high rank because of his education and background, meaning he would have outranked white soldiers. The military refused to let this happen, and the only way he could join the Army is if he entered as a private (and therefore would be unable to use his education to help the military). Instead he refused to be belittled on the basis of racist policies. This displayed the United States Government’s dedication to institutionalized segregation, despite a desperate need for young, hard-working, intelligent soldiers.

Once they were active in the military, the uniform did not stop segregation. While German POWs could eat inside many restaurants, the Black MPs guarding them could not enter the establishment. In the eyes of these southern white business owners, Nazis are more fit to eat in their restaurants than a local black patriot. Despite being sent all over the world to fight and die for their country, the white men who were killing Americans were treated more like citizens. This treatment is what sparked what is known as the Double-V movement. This was described as victory overseas, as well as victory for greater freedom at home, or “victory over Fascism abroad and racism at home” (Green 48). While soldiers fought bravely on both fronts, they questioned what they were fighting for. While they wore uniforms with the stars and stripes on the sleeves, their own country seemed not to want them or think of them as first class citizens. The United States was upholding the same inequalities that the soldiers were supposedly fighting against in Europe and the Pacific.

As they were sworn to fight injustice, both foreign and domestic, African American soldiers and citizens turned their attention to fighting the blatant inequality that was running rampant in the south by politically mobilizing and creating organizations like the American Veterans Committee. Upon returning from service in World War II, African Americans in Memphis faced a myriad of struggles. They had defeated the Nazis and the Japanese, but they still needed to defeat the segregation and racism common and legal at the time. Despite some of the institutionalized racism in the military, it was even worse when they made it back home, especially when they returned to southern cities like Memphis. The veterans were unique to the movement because they were patriotic to an America that all of society loved. They had a special voice that defended white America while being suppressed by the same white America. There is no doubt that African American veterans called into question the legitimacy of segregation and racial inequality on a national level.

While black men were overseas fighting, African American women fought a different, arguably more important, battle at home. In 1941, President Roosevelt “issued an executive order banning racial discrimination in war production industries” (Green 47). This caused employment levels, especially mass production industries, to spike significantly in Memphis. Most places that hired African American men only allowed them to perform unskilled or semiskilled jobs. In addition, major defense contractors hired thousands of white women, but refused to hire women of color. If they were hired by places such as Firestone, they were sent to do work separate from white women further ingraining the idea of segregation in the American labor force. Black women's exclusion from industrial jobs associated with "Rosie the Riveter" images become a symbol for women wanting to join the work force during the war.

While black women sought to create more equal opportunities in the production industry, their presence dominated the laundry and dry cleaning work force as many white employers believed it was one of the only jobs they were deemed fit. Black and white women were slated for specific jobs and with the formation of unions and organizations the voices of African American women were heard, as they expressed their discomfort and anger with domestic service. Letters were written to federal officials and even President Roosevelt with points emphasizing their dedication to the war effort; however, the view of the “washer-woman” remained rooted in American culture.

The petitioners and the laundry owners had different ideas for the representation of this image; the laundry owners claimed that it represented “the kindly old negro mammy who is loved by people of both races such as the one featured by Aunt Jemima.” As we already discussed in class, Aunt Jemima is a slave woman and glorifying her is suggesting that slavery was acceptable. The laundry workers perceived this image as “mocking the laundry worker by sexualizing her” (Green 64). These letters demanded the “washer-woman” be stripped of its sexualization and made respectable. With that being said, the laundry workers faced sexualization on a daily basis. Black female workers struggled to protect themselves from sexual abuse by white male employers and had few options besides quitting. When the war ended, hospital laundry workers “protested to the FEPC that they had been fired because they refused to concede to their white male supervisor’s demands for sex” (Green 64). This injustice only continued when O.E. Myers, director of the Fifth U.S. Civil Service Region, declared that the cases were not racial discrimination. From the unequal job opportunities to the over sexualization of the black woman, African American females much like African American veterans had specific circumstances driving their fight for civil rights.

Even though African American veterans and females shared the same sentiment regarding the progression of the black race, students in the new generation felt the need to expedite the advancement of civil rights. In 1946, when Edward H. Crump refused to allow the Freedom Train to stop in Memphis, the LeMoyne College NAACP branch called onto students to distinguish themselves as leaders in the black struggle for freedom in Memphis. The younger and new generations of African Americans in Memphis were less patient in regards to their inferior status, lack of opportunity in the United States, and desire for social equality. The Crump political machine had a strong hold over African American leaders in Memphis, but LeMoyne students did not cooperate with the racial paternalism. Instead, they challenged its prejudice (Green 132). On January 6, 1946, LeMoyne students and faculty rented a bus and traveled over ninety miles to Jackson, TN to visit the Freedom Train. Their actions signified “a fugitive journey from the stifling confines of Crump-dominated thought to a nationwide dialogue centered on freedom” (Green 129). LeMoyne students, who were frustrated from of their lack of freedom, continued to push back against the Crump machines oppression of civil rights.

In the fall of 1947, faculty and students at LeMoyne College and Southwestern organized the Memphis Community Relations Committee (MCRC), in efforts to emphasis the “human relations” between African Americans and whites postwar. The organization launched public meetings with speakers that discussed ways in which the relationship between the two races need not be seen as genetic superiority and inferiority, but instead how African Americans could achieve greater freedom. The LeMoyne students’ participation in the MCRC “exposed them to local, national, and international discussions about postwar politics, race, and democracy; however, as writers and leaders of their own organizations, they were pursuing distinct ideas of freedom based on independent thought and action” (Green 135).

Although many LeMoyne students traveled to see the Freedom Train when it could not stop in Memphis, some African Americans felt like they had lost against Crump and his political subordination. Therefore, during the election of 1948 students protested the Crump machines’ concept of freedom. LeMoyne students “distinguished themselves not only by attending political rallies and encouraging students to vote but also by weighing in on proposed federal civil rights legislation and potential judicial decisions favoring civil rights” (Green 136). Attending rallies and hearing what other African Americans living inside and outside Memphis were saying about the status of blacks exposed the students to different ideas about freedom, which they could use or build upon to promote civil rights in their city. The LeMoyne students urged African Americans in Memphis to vote during the primary and general elections in 1948. The idea of placing black votes on the side of freedom created a surge of black activism, which energized black Memphians and unsettled Crump. The political actions and sense of urgency taken by the LeMoyne students helped African Americans gain civil rights in Memphis and distinguish themselves generationally from black veterans and women.

In conclusion, although the battle for freedom continues to be fought in Memphis and throughout the rest of the United States by African Americans, the various groups - i.e. veterans, women, and students - offered new methods of activism through their roles in the Civil Rights Movement. While differing internally from each other, veterans, women, and students utilized their specific experiences within their organizations in order to confront the problems of systematic racism as a collective unit.