3. Strain, Christopher Barry. “Civil Rights and ... - Freedom Archives

exterminated by economic strangulation, by mass unemployment, poor housing in
ghettoes that breed disease and violence, by impotent education, by police bnrtality,
kangaroo courts and inadequate medical attention that produces a higher-than-natural
mortality rate . Every Afro-American is being shoR-changed out of a part of his life
because of [such] conditions . . ."~~
Williams also thought of the freedom swggle as a kind of war. He
conceptualized the movement in terms of net gain on the "battlefield," of strategic wins
and losses . "We [black veterans] had been taught to fight and you expect casualties in
war, you expect casualties in the Anmy, so pretty soon you start thinking in terms of
casualties ." They had learned, as soldiers, that they could expect to become casualties,
and this expectation "took away some of the fear," and led to "more resistance ." ~4
By August 1961, Monroe resembled a vial of nitroglycerine, ready to explode at
the slightest jog. The prosence of the Freedom Riders galled local whites . These "outside
agitators," comprised of northern-educated, white, college students (many of whom were
Jewish), as well as "uppity Negroes," played on a number of stereotypes, and led many
white southerners to perceive a conspiracy to undercut the "southern way of life ."
Politeness turned to viciousness as townspeople heckled demonstrators . Violence
~~Williams, untitled, unpublished manuscript, Hox 2, Undated Folder 1, Robert F.
Williams Collection, Bentley Historical ILibrary, University of Michigan .
~4Williams, interviewed by James Mosby, July 22, 1970, transcript, Ralph J. Bunche
Oral History Collection (Civil Rights Documentation Projat), Moorland-Spingarn
Reseaah Center, Howard University.
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