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Subscribe to RSSAfter coming under fire yesterday for his remarks about the civil rights movement, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour has issued a statement to clarify his recollections of "Citizens Council" groups and segregation in the South.
Barbour said that the council groups were "indefensible" and called segregation "a difficult and painful era for Mississippi."
Here's Barbour's full statement:
“When asked why my hometown in Mississippi did not suffer the same racial violence when I was a young man that accompanied other towns’ integration efforts, I accurately said the community leadership wouldn’t tolerate it and helped prevent violence there. My point was my town rejected the Ku Klux Klan, but nobody should construe that to mean I think the town leadership were saints, either. Their vehicle, called the ‘Citizens Council,’ is totally indefensible, as is segregation. It was a difficult and painful era for Mississippi, the rest of the country, and especially African Americans who were persecuted in that time.”
In the article in the Weekly Standard released yesterday, Barbour described a distinction in his hometown between the "Citizens Council" organization and the Klu Klux Klan. "Where I come from it was an organization of town leaders," he said. "In Yazoo City they passed a resolution that said anybody who started a chapter of the Klan would get their ass run out of town. If you had a job, you’d lose it. If you had a store, they’d see nobody shopped there. We didn’t have a problem with the Klan in Yazoo City.”
Speaking about the height of the civil rights movement in the piece, Barbour said, "I just don’t remember it as being that bad."
The comments drew skewering from historians, who noted that the Citizens Councils were anti-integration entities founded in opposition to the Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954.
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Firedoglake Facts:
Why is everyone making such a fuss about Haley Barbour’s comment that life in his home state “wasn’t that bad” during the Jim Crow era? During Barbour’s teen years, Mississippi was a perfectly fine place to grow up.
1960:
In the Deep South considerable pressure was put on blacks by Klansmen not to vote. An example of this was the state of Mississippi. By 1960, 42% of the population were black but only 2% were registered to vote.
1961:
Herbert Lee, a Negro who had been active in voter registration, was shot and killed by white state representative E. H. Hurst in downtown Liberty. No prosecution was undertaken, the authorities explaining that the representative had shot in self-defense.
1962:
Two people have been killed and at least 75 injured in rioting at the University of Mississippi campus in Oxford.
Hundreds of extra troops have been brought in to join Federal forces already stationed in the nearby town of Oxford as the violence spread to its streets.
The protesters are angry at the admission of James Meredith, a black American, to the university.
1963:
On June 12, 1963, a day after President John F. Kennedy’s speech on national television in support of civil rights, [Medgar] Evers pulled into his driveway just after returning from a meeting with NAACP lawyers. Emerging from his car and carrying NAACP T-shirts that read “Jim Crow Must Go,” Evers was struck in the back with a bullet fired from an Enfield 1917 .303 rifle that ricocheted into his Jackson, Mississippi home. He staggered 9 meters (30 feet) before collapsing. He died at a local hospital 50 minutes later. [...]
On June 23, 1964, Byron De La Beckwith, a fertilizer salesman and member of the White Citizens’ Council and Ku Klux Klan, was arrested for Evers’ murder.
1964:
The bodies of three civil rights workers missing for six weeks have been found buried in a partially constructed dam near Philadelphia, Mississippi.
Agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation found the three young men – two white and one black man – about six miles from the town in a wooded area near where they were last seen on the night of 21 June.
They were Michael Schwerner, aged 24, Andrew Goodman, 20, both from New York and James Chaney, 22, from Meridian, Mississippi. All were members of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) dedicated to non-violent direct action against racial discrimination.
1965:
Allie W. Shelby is shot to death in the Hinds County Jailhouse in Jackson, Mississippi after having been arrested, convicted, and sentenced to six months on charges of making indecent gestures towards a white woman.
1966:
Ben Chester White, who had worked most of his life as a caretaker on a plantation, had no involvement in civil rights work. He was murdered by Klansmen [in Natchez, Mississippi] who thought they could divert attention from a civil rights march by killing a black person
1964:
The bodies of three civil rights workers missing for six weeks have been found buried in a partially constructed dam near Philadelphia, Mississippi.
And during the search for the mising civil rights workers, the bodies of 9 black men were pulled from the Pearl river in Jackson Miss.
here's what Barbour said earlier:
“Because the business community wouldn’t stand for it,” he said. “You heard of the Citizens Councils? Up north they think it was like the KKK. Where I come from it was an organization of town leaders. In Yazoo City they passed a resolution that said anybody who started a chapter of the Klan would get their ass run out of town. If you had a job, you’d lose it. If you had a store, they’d see nobody shopped there. We didn’t have a problem with the Klan in Yazoo City.”
here's what he said a few minutes ago:
"When asked why my hometown in Mississippi did not suffer the same racial violence when I was a young man that accompanied other towns’ integration efforts, I accurately said the community leadership wouldn’t tolerate it and helped prevent violence there. My point was my town rejected the Ku Klux Klan, but nobody should construe that to mean I think the town leadership were saints, either. Their vehicle, called the ‘Citizens Council,’ is totally indefensible, as is segregation. It was a difficult and painful era for Mississippi, the rest of the country, and especially African Americans who were persecuted in that time."
That's a pretty remarkable about face in less than 24 hours!
What a bigot!
Sorry Republicans, but this is another "Lott" moment, when the true racist callings of the Republican party show through. Never forget, the South USED to be Democratic, but the bigots all moved into YOUR party after Kennedy and Johnson moved the Civil Rights movement forward.
So you hired these white power thugs, YOU take them, all of them, the Southern Strategy backlash, public condemnation and, of course, all the public humiliation which comes with being the party of segregationists like former Democrat turned Republican powerhouse George Wallace, who kept a Black Mistress, had children with her, and didn't mind being seen with his 'concubine', while selling bigotry and hate to REPUBLICANS,
Barbour is only guilty(er) of being caught, just as Trent Lott was caught saying America could have 'avoided trouble' if only we had voted SEGREGATIONIST PARTY in 1964 and put Strom Thurmond into the White House.
You people are despicable.
Way to mis-represent history. "Hatemail" you are pathetic. Atleast try to incorporate some facts to support yourself. To the day he died Senator Byrd was a proud democratic leader in the Senate voted in time and again despite previously being a member of the KKK and one of the key Senators who stood against the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights legislation. In fact, I don't recall him, or the other democrats who filubustered this key piece of legislation for over 50 days ever becoming republicans.
Sorry "hatemail" you are just another diluded party member who can't see the truth; there are no more racists in the Republican Party then in the Democratic party...sry for every Wallace there was and is another Byrd.
Miscegenist? Hmm, misspelled malapropism?
Haley Barbour still has his white sheet in his closet neatly pressed........just waiting. If a Mississippi politician walks like a racist, talk like a racist, and vote like a racist, then; they must be a racist. Haley Barbour and his close knit " good ole buddies" is the reason why many people do not take vacations in MIssissippi, because nothing has really changed that much and I use Haley Barbour's on words to prove it.
MSNBC is where I spend my entire evening, Starting with Ed Schultz
barbour is lying. yazoo county as other counties were a hotbed of activity for the KKK right on the edge of the delta of mississippi. Barbour has done nothing for the state of mississippi but put its residents on the tax bill for major companies doing business there. Mr Barbour's southern drawl makes me sick at my stomach !!
Well of course it wasn't bad for a good ole white boy........what a flippin' idiot. Haley, did you attend the North Carolina secession ball (apparently, honoring treasonous traitors who were pissed they couldn't own other people is a noble thing in the South)? i'm waiting for Sarah Palin's hubby, Toddo, to hold his secession ball too (since he was also part of an organization that wanted to secede from the US).
What else could you expect Haley the Snorting Hog to say them was some dam good ole days he had and wants em back like the sheep that follow him.
OK, so there was no problem with the Klan in Yazoo City. Money, Mississippi is only approximately 1.5 hours north on Hwy. 12...it is from Money that Emmitt Till was kidnapped in 1952 prior to being beaten, shot in the head, killed, mutilated, wrapped in barbed wire, and dumped in the Tallahatchie River. He was 14 years of age, and his "crime" was whistling at a white woman. A jury of their white peers refused to convict the accused murderers. ONLY an hour and a half away - how many Yazoo City citizens cheered the acquittals???
I am sure what Barbour meant was that the Klan wasn't a problem to him growing, white boy that he was. The Klan was nothing more than a bunch of ignorant white rednecks who were controlled by the likes of the White Citizen's Council. While the WCC may have apperaed to be the face of reason (many times they were not), it was the ignorant KKK who did the WCC's dirty work. Nothing much has changed. Today you have tea partiers doing the GOP's dirty work.
I grew up around Washington in the late 50s early 60s when this was going on. I remember seeing a group of KKK burning a cross in the yard of a black family because they had the nerve to move into a white area. I know my relatives all were very prejudice and when a black family moved into the neighborhood we had to move out and we were not the best class of white people either. I was in fourth grade before I had a black kid in my class and I couldn't believe they were as smart as I was. I was so influenced by the cross burning I have gone out of my way to change how I felt about all people. We are all equal. So don't tell me that it wasn't bad back then and don't tell me we got over it.
I too grew up in the south. I went to elementary school in the 1950's, and high school in the '60's. I also remember how confusing it was to go to the Atlanta Greyhound station to pick up my grandmother in 1956, and seeing drinking fountains labeled "colored" and "white's only". Being a somewhat aware seven year old, I asked my mother about it.
I'll never forget her answer. "Billy", she said, "there's a lot of strangeness down here". Just goes to show that not all southerners were so inculterated that they distorted reality.
...And this guy wants to run for President? A president who knows nothing about American History.
... to call Haley Barbour an "ass" or a "dick" is truly an insult to those who are. This man is a festering turd that should have been flushed years ago... just saying.
To quote S.J. Perelman: "It takes two to tango, but only one to squirm." What a surprise! another politician squirming out from under a ridiculous statement without actually admitting that the statement was based on false and inaccurate information. Way to go Haley!
@Janet: The "Democrats" you speak of left the party to become Republicans.
Thurmond and Wallace never became Republicans. Wallace became a member of a third party. Thurmond was always a democrat. To quote John Kerry "just because you say it, doesn't make it true."
I'm sure Mississippi in the 60s was idylic for Barbour he was not poor, black, Jewish or Catholic he was not female or gay and unlikely to be shot, hung or tarred and feathered. He may not have noticed that his fraternity was segregated and he may not have noticed that his work on Nixons 68 campaign for CREEP and the GOP Southern Stategy of sponsoring racial divide and recruiting the Dixicrats. Gee seems kind of like selective memory or just good old fashioned racial bias and lies.
JKH
Slobbering liberal welfare recipients sure like to throw the word "racist" around, but only if the statement is from a republican. Same type statement from a democrat is "gospel".
I love enablers like Janet. Quick to lash out, thus showing HER closeted racism by coming to this guys rescue. Barbour knows good and well what those councils wert. Therefore he was covering for them. By inference, he was covering for racists. Sound familiar? I DO live in the South, Janet. If you did your homework, you'd find this guy has made many remarks not unlike these. This year a town in Mississippi was called out nationally about banning blacks and whites from attending a school dance as a couple. IN 2010!! And only after it got national attention. Im sorry folks, but therea lot of 'Janets' down here who still secretly think the South is gonna rise again. Want proof? She called the person who posted this a racist. In what way was what he said racist? The famous comeback of a true racist.
DON’T YOU DARE CALL ME RACIST. You don’t know me or anything about me. I’m simply saying that you are taking his honest recollection of his youth completely out of context. He was honest in his response “I don’t remember it being that bad” He was a teenage boy for goodness sake. No wonder all politicians are liars.
I hope you became this upset over Obama’s racists statements about his “beloved grandmother, who was a typical white woman”
I don't live down there in the south anymore. I retired from the Air Force in 2001. I can tell you though as I live in Illinois how shocked I am at how racist this state is. Can you believe it, a state north of the mason/dixon line filled with racists and racism.
His statements however honest marginalizes a bloody past and the oppression and suffering of many Blacks during this era.
His truthful statement is tantamount to a rapist saying about a rape he committed: it wasn't so bad, she seemed to enjoy it.
Mike,
Do you seriously not see a component of racism in the politics of the American Right and specifically in Gov. Barbours depiction of his Mississippi. If he thinks Mississippi Citizens Councils were benign business groups you have a couple of he is either an idiot, a liar or a racist take your pick. If someone makes false or self benefitting remarks about their views on race relations that are so skewed as to be ludicrous how would you like them described?
JKH
People... to forgive is one thing, while to forget is another, however, to just continually allow disgusting and bigoted people like Haley Barbour say what they want to say, then give them a pass when they “apologize” is just unacceptable to me. How many times does a dog need to bite you before you realize he doesn't like you? He’s already said it… what really makes you believe that he didn’t mean it? He may not have meant to say it, but he did and he needs to be held accountable for saying it… every time he opens his mouth to say something he should be reminded what he said…
…"Because the business community wouldn't stand for it...You heard of the Citizens Councils? Up north they think it was like the KKK. Where I come from it was an organization of town leaders. In Yazoo City they passed a resolution that said anybody who started a chapter of the Klan would get their ass run out of town. If you had a job, you'd lose it. If you had a store, they'd see nobody shopped there. We didn't have a problem with the Klan in Yazoo City."
Well… Haley Barbour... the Ku Klux Klan by any other name…
As for his apology or whatever it was, it means nothing, nothing at all. My wife has family in Hattiesburg and Gulfport, Mississippi and this is state where you can go and STILL see rebel flags flying in front of business and if you've ever driven down Hwy 49 between Hattiesburg and Wiggens (in the Camp Shelby area) you've seen the what has to be the one of the largest rebel flags I've ever seen... so why hasn’t he committed himself and his office to cleaning up that kind of thing… ?
Once again this article only proves, based on the reader remarks, that the Progressive Left will rear it's ugly head at any opportunity to play the race card. It was the Left's unwarranted use of charges of racism that help defeat them on November 2nd, and based on their inability to refrain from lies and false accusation will most likely help defeat them again in 2012.
It is the only card they have left in the deck.
Haley is just another marble-mouthed goober!
When you are young, you don't remember things that didn't concern you. I was born in the late 60's and I can tell you what was happeing on the brady bunch but as for current events in the 70's not a clue. It is too easy to look back over 40 years and be able to form an opinion about things you have no first hand knowledge about. I had no clue until the 80's about Vietnam. It didn't have anything to do with my day to day life. So people, please put into perspective, instead of insults.
The 2 biggest racist in our government today live and at White House...Barry and Mickie.
Fred Flintstone strikes again!
if memory serves me wasnt it you haley barbour that said "blacks have no place in school" or was it the "white citizen council" that stopped people of color from a restaurant, or maybe you forgot all the racism in the 1960's, either way you are a lair and a deciever of man, just another lost soul on his way, to meet me, the man of color you sought to kill back in the day.