Judge Tom Pickens Brady served as the ‘intellectual leader’ of the White Citizens’ Councils, not as famous beyond the South as the KKK perhaps, but just as set on preserving white supremacy. Eyes on the Prize, which documents the civil rights struggle, had a few excerpts from this little number to show what they were up against. Judge Brady first delivered Black Monday as a speech to the Sons of the American Revolution, then expanded it into a 92 page booklet, which is excerpted here. I almost want to read all of it, but it is hard to find, and I am not spending a dime on something like this. It was a best seller in its day though.
The Black Monday in question was Monday, 17th May 1954. The date the Supreme Court gave out its decision in Brown v Board of Education to integrate schools. I don’t know if this helps me any in understanding this crazy, deep-rooted fear that seems so alien, but it helps show some of the web of ‘civilized’ rationalisations built around the fear, and the violence and hate that emerged from it. This may be from the deep South, but permutations of these arguments could be heard everywhere, and it’s not like you won’t hear them today, though perhaps worded just a little differently than they were in 1954.
“Black Monday” is indeed symbolic of the date. Black denoting darkness and terror. Black signifying the absence of light and wisdom. Black embodying grief, destruction and death. (83)
The violence and hurt in these words, that alone is unbearable. I’ve been thinking so much about the white gaze since reading Hilton Als and June Jordan, this right here is how some people look at into the world, it is the hate that fills their stare. And they are pointing it right at human beings like a weapon. This lies underneath all of it, so it is confusing when Brady suddenly swerves into his kind-but-firm and I-know-what-is-best-for-all-of-us slave master talk:
“Black Monday”is not written primarily in behalf of the white people of the seventeen States affected by the Segregation decision, though it is hoped it will be beneficial to them. It is, however, written with the fervent desire that it will be of material benefit to both the white and colored people of this country, wheresoever situated. It is written to alert and encourage every American, irrespective of race, who loves our Constitution, our Government and our God-given American way of life….It is dedicated to those who firmly believe that socialism and communism are lethal messes of porridge for which our sacred birthright shall not be sold. (84)
I am still not sure how this connection between Socialism, Communism and race equality were forged with such lasting bonds, I know communists worked hard and well for it for a brief time before Moscow decided different. Of course, these are also versions of Socialism and Communism that bear no resemblance to real theories or beliefs, being a caricature of Stalinism (though impressive to caricature what is already a caricature) as far as I can tell. But this connection and the straw-man of socialism standing in for equality of all kinds continue strong as ever.
There is some rewriting of history here:
…the saddest and most terrible of all American dramas was enacted–the Reconstruction period–the pious greed of the New England slave trader had brought the negro to our shores and now his insatiable hatred and envy was to be placated. (85)
A lot about how whites won the country, it is stated clearly that ‘negroes’ played no conceivable part in that effort. Not that genocide and conquest are much to be proud of, but Buffalo soldiers played their part. There’s a little hymn to Booker T Washington:
the first great American negro this country has produced. His wisdom transcended his time…(90)
Followed by more about how the wisest of his race knows their place, labouring manually rather than writing poetry. Or worse. A judgment on Mr. Washington, just read Up From Slavery and it’s pretty clear why.
Back to Brown v Board, Brady quotes Major Frederick Sullens’ editorial in the Jackson Daily News. We are back to chilling threats emerging from ‘common sense’…
Members of the Nation’s highest tribunal may be learned in the law, but they were utterly lacking in common sense when they rendered Monday’s decision, common sense of the kind that should have told them about the tragedy that will inevitably follow.
**
Human blood may stain Southern soil in many places because of this decision, but the dark red stains of that blood will be on the marble steps of the United States Supreme Court building. (92)
It is a kind of hysterical ‘common sense’, which to me makes it no kind of common sense at all. One that already feels besieged, threatened. One that denies others their humanity, which at bottom people must know is wrong — nothing common about that at all. Yet the wrongness is turned outwards, Brady calls the decision ‘the creation of this Frankenstein’s monster’ by the Supreme Court (92). A reference that threw me a little, but of course so much of this is around terror and the psycho-social drama of miscegenation. I once thought racism was all just about power and status and wealth and privilege, but there’s definitely some deeper psychological shit going on here. Which helps explain, along with the power and status and etc, the power of this strange formulation of racism to endure, along with its enduring links to some strange straw man of communism, and definitions of white liberty and freedom that depend on the absence of freedom and liberty among all those who are not white.
Communism disguised as “new democracy” is still communism, and tyranny masquerading as liberalism is still tyranny. The resistance of communism and tyranny, irrespective of whatever guise they may adopt, is not treason. It is the prerequisite of freedom, the very essence of liberty. (93)
This is still the mantra of the Tea Party and others, still fighting for states rights and racial integrity. Seems like most of it is the fear of having others do unto them as they have done unto others. That might be at the bottom of all of it.
[excerpt from Carson, Claybourne, David J. Garrow, Gerald Gill, Vincent Harding, Darlene Clark Hine eds. (1991) Eyes on the Prize: Documents, Speeches, and Firsthand Accounts From the Black Freedom Struggle. New York: Penguin.]
