American Experience; Freedom Riders; Interview with Harris Wofford, 1 of 3

OK let's talk about the importance of Gandhi, and why was Gandhi important to this beginning of the civil rights movement? The civil rights movement had tremendous power through the lawyers, the courageous lawyers of the NAACP. But it needed to reach the mass of the people, and the one person in the world in the twentieth century that showed how you can reach the mass of people with an idea and make it move, "cracked the atom" of people power, is Mahatma Ghandi. It's important today because in part our relationship with India is taking on a great new life by the excitement there is in India of the connection between Gandhi to Martin Luther King, and Martin Luther King to Barack Obama. "Why" he's saying that the courts had influence, but it had to be taken to the masses. Why? Why did it have to be taken to the masses? The courts needed help, and part of the help was to get large numbers, the

mass of the Americans, African Americans, they're showing that they would not take it any longer. Saying "No" the way Rosa Parks did on the bus. She said "No, I won't move." And that message needed to get across. The courts can do only so much and they did, ultimately, but so did finally did the people, black and white. You told me this story, and I need a shorter version, but what about black leaders going to see Gandhi in 1935. In 1935. What did Gandhi tell them? In 1935, they went and said "Come to America, point the way for us." Want me to say who was there? You can just say black leaders. We definately don't need a bunch of names. So part of our history is that in 1935,

1935 a group of significant black leaders went to Mahatma Gandhi and said, "Come to America we need you there." And Ghandi said, "I haven't made good my message here yet. You must deliver that," and he heard some spirituals sung by one of the leaders of it, and he said it maybe be through the American Negro that the unadulterated message of nonviolence will be delivered to the world. Ok, we're going to have to do that again. He said right. I did speak. Hold on one second. Oh sorry, so So we did start that story over. So you had did tell me that some black leaders went to see Gandhi as far back as 1935 in India. Tell me that story again. Black leaders in 1935 went to see Gandhi in India and said come to America. Come and help deliver your method in America and Gandhi said. Excuse me, let me start again please? Please. In 1935 black leaders

a group went to see Gandhi and said, come to America, not for the The groups asked Ghandi to come to America, not for the white people of America but for the black people of America, and he replied...[repeated takes for editing] if there's the .. again, speak In 1935, black leaders came to Ghandi at his ashram and said, "Come to America. Come to America for Negro america not for white america, and in the ...we don't say negro anymore.. it doesn't matter - we don't say "Negro" anymore. That's fine, that's what they said then. it certainly did. They ...we're going to edit and and and and, we're cuttin out right?" [Repeated version] Way back in 1935, a group of black leaders went to Ghandi and said, "Come to America. Help us help the blacks of America. I keep getting stuck on that.

say? It doesn't matter, anything is OK. I don't know this story... OK [yet another try to tell the same story] In 1935, a group of black leaders went th Ghandi in India, and said, 'Come to America. Come and show the way for Negro Americans to win their rights." And Ghandi said, "I can't come because I haven't made good my message here, but it may be that you, where you're a minority dealing with a majority, you can deliver the unadulterated message of nonviolence to the world. (Host) What was that mise. (Host) lesson why were you're a minority dealing with a majority (Host) would that be the unadulterated message of non violence? Why? Ghandi felt that his work in South Africa, where Indians were a hundred thousand to (ie, versus) a million whites, was more a test of nonviolent action

then in India where 99% of the people were Indians and they needed just to say "No." And he thought that was an easier job than the American blacks had as a minority in the United States, (which) would be a great test for nonviolence. "[Host]: Can I ask you to do that again, but instead of saying South Africa to say to say in the United States?" [Different speaker] Ok. "[Host] Because, do you know what I mean?" [Different Speaker] "Yeah" [Host] " Ok, because it's kind of confusing [Host] "people, most, a lot of people don't understand. [Different speaker] "don't even know it was 20 years or so" don't even know it has done it twenty years and [Different speaker] "Ok" [Host] so, so inaudible?" [Host] "so, why would that be the United States and the again, the black situation?" [Different speaker] "Do you want me to do the Gandhi quote again?"you want to do the Gandhi quote again?" [Different speaker} "again?" [Host] "yeah, you don't have to do it again" Would the black situation in the United States would be the ultimate test of nonviolence? Ghandi thought the test was a test were a minority was dealing with a majority, which was the case in the United States. In India, ninety nine percent of people in India, all they needed to do, Gandhi said,

he said is to learn nonviolence, and he's saying, no, and they haven't won, it's not that easy, but but he thought the bigger test of his technique would be in the United States of America. [Host] Why? why Because there, the majority had to be moved, and that his technique was designed to move people that were deeply stuck in saying no to human rights. And if his technique could win through to the white people, reach, it would show that there was a technique available anywhere in the world where a minority is seeking to establish their rights. '[Host] OK great' I want to move on. To I just want to tell a little about the Kennedys. Um, I know that one thing you mentioned is that, um, JFI his main concern as he is running for office, first comes into office, was not

civil rights, was not domestic politics. Talk about what were JFK's main concerns. What was JFK really interested in? [Different Speaker] Well, from his childhood, his main answer. Is John Kennedy's [retake] Let me start again. John Kennedy from his childhood was primarily interested in foreign policy, in the world. He was brought up in part in England while his father was (US) Ambassador, follow his whole life, it was in his inaugural address, not a word on a domestic issue except human rights at home, and in the rest of the world. The rest of it was dealing with the world, that was his primary interest and in the spring of 1961, as the new president, on the one hand he was dealing with the crisis of the fiasco in the Bay of Pigs and on the other hand he was preparing for his trip to Europe to meet Khrushchev. It was a major major showdown, and his mind was focused on those international issues, when the Freedom Riders started riding.

[Host} Is something happening with the camera. No, I thought I heard So he was not focused on the Freedom Riders? Was that? Kennedy had in his campaign delivered one major speech on the all-out leadership a president that was needed for civil rights. He ran on the strongest civil rights platform the Democratic Party ever adopted. But when he took office, it foreign issues became the central focus of those first six months. He was supported by John Patterson, governor of Alabama. Governor Patterson says that he was one of the early Southern supporters. Let's talk about this kind of support that he (JFK)got from Patterson, and what that meant.

In 1956, I stayed up all night opposing John Kennedy for the vice presidential nomination at the convention, because he was supported by a lot of people in the party, the political bosses of the North and and some Southern Democrats. So it was no surprise that in the campaign of 1960, he would be amazed.. um, let st.. let me, I'm not on track on that i don't think the 1956 is probably something you (need here). [Host] No, we won't use it. you can use what you want.. [Host] we can cut.. so, as you're talking [Host} f I can I'll start you over, just kind of roll with it. [Repeated take] In 1956, I stayed up all night opposing Kennedy running for Vice

President because he was supported by people in the (Democratic) Party I didn't approve of,, the political bosses of the city and some Southern Democrats. In 1960, by then I had become an all-out supporter of John Kennedy, campaigning for him on civil rights and foreign policy issues. To win that election, he picked Lyndon Johnson (as Vice Presidential running mate) in the hope he would win some southern states. We were yet approaching the crisis of the Democratic Party in the Southern Democratic Party being on the edge of becoming Republicans. They had walked out of the Truman 1948 convention because it had a strong civil rights plank in it. The Party looked as if there was going to be no chance to win the presidency if you couldn't hold part of the

South. And so Kennedy campaigned very hard to get both southern senators and congressmen and governors to support him. And he had very considerable success, except that we who were in the civil rights section, under Sargent Shriver and Robert Kennedy, caused them a lot of trouble. The call to Mrs. King at the time of his [her husband's] arrest, what the southern leaders of the party called bomb throwing by the civil rights section of this campaign. And the support of King was such that there was a point where three southern governors said "If you support Martin Luther Ki,ng we're going to oppose you." One of them said. "If you support Khrushchev, Castro, or Martin Luther King, we won't support you."

There was undoubtedly a problem for Kennedy politically, then and in the thousand days he had as president, there would be no control of Congress if you lost the Southern votes in Congress. That has all changed now. Building a Democratic Party in the South is a new challenge that a new Democratic leader in the White House is going to deal with. low Was Governor John Patterson of Alabama one of those? Governor Patterson was a relatively moderate segregationist governor who was attracted to John Kennedy and because of his youth. They were both relatively young. He was considered a very strong coup to have

Governor Patterson support him, and there were a number of other Southern governors that supported Kennedy. They were all worried about losing their states because of the civil rights plank of the party, but as they did, most of them, come along and support Kennedy. We didn't have the kind of walkout of that had previously lost an increasing part of the South. Why was... Talk about how civil rights, and you said that Kennedy was really interested in foreign policy, and was soon going to have this meeting with Khrushchev, why did civil rights, how did that relate to civil rights? Why were those two things related? There's no question that part of what convinced Kennedy that you had to move

on civil rights in this country was, it was viewed, as rightly in my opinion, as the scandal of America. It was a blight on the American soul and in the way the world saw America. And a lot of us within America saw it that way, too. And it was a majority of the world is of color, and it's poor, and it was looking at American segregation as a complete violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations. When I went to India as a student of Gandhi in 1949, with my wife, Indians were asking me, "What are you doing, what have you done, to end this racial segregation in your country?" It was viewed by most of the world the way we in this country viewed apartheid in South Africa. It was America's apartheid, and it's not an illogical that with

two thirds of the world, practically, of color, that there will be a lot of people would hold that rightly against the United States. and here is I want to talk about the Cold War and how civil rights or lack of civil rights, or segregation was used by the USSR, or was thought that it could be used by the USSR. So there was something else going on. There's no doubt the Kremlin in its propaganda and its agents around the world uses the racial segregation United States as a big card against the United States. But most of India, most of South Asia, most of Latin America, were not really interested in the Russian-American arms race or the Cold War. They were interested

in their own development and what the country was going to really help them. And how they can move forward and the fact that the United States was discriminating so scandalously against Americans of color, it didn't go well with a crucial part of the world. It wasn't related directly to what they or we think about Russia, it was related to their own interests. It was related to the Cold War, it's related to our relations with two thirds of the world. In Africa, all of these countries are becoming independent, and their ambassadors of color were being we're being discriminated against. Others, and Bobby Kennedy said too, JFK is about to go to go to Russia, and you guys gotta stop.

well That's a wholly different matter. At least I see it as wholly different. Indeed, the freedom riders suddenly erupting at a time when Kennedy is briefing himself for the meeting with Khrushchev, is dealing with the fiasco of the Bay of Pigs and its impact in Latin America, to have the leading story about the United States be the kind of violence that took place against the freedom riders, was a matter of embarrassment anywhere. And he was going to Europe, and democratic Europe was shocked by what it read. It wasn't so much whether Krushchev was going to be bothered by what was going wrong in the United States; he probably enjoyed it. But it was our friends and allies in Europe they were appalled that this was going on in the United

States of America almost a hundred years after the Civil War had settled that question. your show that only do Do you remember how you and RFK and the Justice Department was notified that the freedom rides were going to go on at all? Do you remember that? [Different speaker} I know that we didn't know didn't know that the freedom rides were going to go on. It came as a complete surprise. What we now know in 1980, the eighty, NY Times got a document that shows that their informant, their paid FBI informant, was part of the attack on the freedom riders and

reported the planned attack. [Host] Ok, lets cut [Second Speaker] All the way Tell me that that fact, um um J. Edgar Hoover, the intelligence that he was getting, about the freedon riders. J. Edgar Hoover, the director of the FBI, FBI had a paid informant who was encouraged to be a part of the Ku Klux Klan and the people planning violence against the freedom riders. Right up to - he was intimately involved and whether he had actually was involved in the beatings, nobody is sure, and he was reporting to FBI the attack that was being planned. He he continued to do it until he finally was kicked out by the FBI. There isn't a question in the world that he would have taken action to stop it. It would have precipitated a total crisis with J. Edgar Hoover.

No wonder Hoover didn't let anybody know, and it's part of this its one of the darkest stories in American political history that this man, who was viewed as the most respected American in many polls for many, many years was in fact in cahoots with the Ku Klux Klan and the the worst elements in the South to put down the effort to win civil rights. And it was a long-standing story for him, for a decade and a half {Host} Ok, tell me that story Tell me what Hoover knew, how he knew it, and when he knew it. What did Hoover know? what and when he knew it, what did Hoover know. [Second speaker} Hoover got Hoover got reports days in advance from an informant paid by the FBI that there was going to be the attack to destroy the freedom riders, and he knew the details of the planning and the cahoots of the Birmingham police and the Montgomery authorities.

And hoover did nothing about it. In fact there's no reason to think he in anyway discouraged it. And if the Attorney General United States, or the President of the United States, had known that that was going to erupt, that was going to happen, you can be sure they would've taken action. We were all blindsided by the fact fact that they were, the freedom riders were, about to ride, and to think that J. Edgar Hoover knew that, which we discovered in due course, long afterwards. [Host} So you at the Justice Department [Second Speaker} I was at the White House so you add that i was in the white House (Host] I'm sorry the White House.. Did the White House and RFK, didn't even know... know that the freedom rides existed? that this was even happening? Is that? [Second Speaker] James Farmer had sent letters in regular mail addressed to the post office to the President, the Attorney General, the various, oh I guess maybe the FBI, I don't

know who he sent... James Farmer, in Gandhi fashion, let his opponents know that he was going to do this. The rides were going to take place. But he did it in a way that got to some, but didn't get to others. He'd, he got a letter in the mail to the President and to the Attorney General, what happened to those letters, I have no idea. But I and the White House and the authorities on civil rights in the Justice Department, had no idea there's this was going to take place and... that that made it even more of a crisis to try to figure out what was going to happen. So you didn't even notice that the freedom Rides were taking place? Remember, my question is [Interjection. "Until they started riding."], my question is so you didn't even know that the Freedom Rides were taking place?

The moment they started, there was publicity on the ride beginning, and that's one that's when I heard about it. but{Host] But until that moment what did you know? Until it was public I had heard nothing. [Didn't reach] the president, didn't reach the Attorney General. Talk to me about whatever form it did, it didn't reach you. Is that true? There was no knowledge, nothing nothing came to the President, to the Attorney General, or myself, until the until the riots began. That's why it was you know, an immediate emergency of "What's happening?" and that's why Kennedy called me on the phone and fairly soon said get your friends off those buses. And I said they wouldn't be my

friends, probably, if we tried. I said it is probably, nobody's going to get them off those buses. The Congress On Racial Equality, CORE, is well dedicated to Ghandian action and they tried a version of this many years before, and they're dead serious. And that they're willing to die. I don't know how much I said about that I like I made clear if in fact anyone's call was going to get them off the buses Whether it was Gandhi, and he made-- he was very anxious that people knew that he let them know I'm he, he, he umm [Interviewer] But I think that's kind of not the way that you let the Attorney General-- [Wofford] It isn't clear when he dropped the letters in the mail either.

and says we don't have the letters it's hard to know whether that's and whether that accurate or not that he did, but I believed him.. he's an honest man. [Interviewer] Let me just go back a minute..what did-- What did Kennedy say, I guess RFK, or was it JFK, I can't remember which one, what did they say, what did Kennedy say when he {host} found out about the Freedom Riders? {fairly soon after, he called..} fairly soon after Kennedy found out about the freedom rides (riots?), he called called me and said "get your friends off those buses, I'm about to go to see Khrushchev, um, this is embarrassing to the United States before the world, this isn't the right time for that," and I explained to him why this was a very dedicated group of people, and they probably wouldn't be my friends if i tried to get them off because they weren't going to get off the buses the

question is "what are we going to do about it?" Now, step two, the Freedom Riders were riding and it was a front page story at the time the first peace corps advisory council met with Harry Belafonte and Ben Mays and black leaders and others and they berated me for the President not having come out with a strong message supporting the right, the right to travel without racial discrimination. He had come out with a statement calling for law and order ending the violence. And I said "tell him when Kennedy come in..." This was at the White House White House-- "he's going to go around and talk to you, tell him what you're saying to me, because he already knows what I think." He came in. They sort of respectfully said that "you've doing so much on civil rights, we'd like a little more." I didn't think they'd put the heat on the way I had hoped they would, I was berating them

afterwards for "why not use that opportunity more vigorously?" and the White House marine came up and said "the president wants you in his office right away. I got in the President's office, and Kennedy is saying "what are they think I got in the President's office and curious and whenever i I could do?" I thought he had gotten very little pressure, and he came and Kennedy said, "I've done more," he listed the things we've done, and I said, "a little stronger on the moral issue and the right to travel is what they want," and we did craft a stronger statement. Still not as strong as he later was required to be. And and, um, but it shows you how a little just a little message directly to a President can-- How often they don't actually feel the pressure

and what I thought was no pressure, for him, it was way more-- most people respectfully with all the President, uh it's their word words. He heard it. There's a picture of both of Harry Belafonte, us looking angry with the President, and he may have gotten more from the look than he did from the words.