The NAACP will continue working actively until Negroes are "recognized as citizens and achieve all the rights to which they are entitled under the Constitution," Roy E. Wilkins, NAACP Executive Secretary, stated last night.
Speaking on "NAACP--Hindrance or Help," before a Harvard Society for Minority Rights audience of 250 people, Wilkins denied the charge by Richard Harwood, Louisville Times reporter and Nieman Fellow, that the NAACP had used force in trying to implement the Supreme Court's decision on integrated schools.
"If the machinery of a democratic society is regarded as force" he said, "then we cannot even agree at the outset. If one is robbed, he calls in the police, he does not try to negotiate."
"All we want recalcitrant states to do is to begin to make a beginning in the right direction. Whenever such a step has been made, the NAACP has taken no action, and has tried to help. No lawsuits have been filed in states such as Arkansas, West Virginia, Oklahoma, and Missouri," he pointed out.
Harwood, who described himself as a Southern "liberal" favoring gradualism, criticized the NAACP for its lack of moderation. "There are larger issues confronting society...barriers in men's minds which must be eradicated cannot come down by force alone."
"You have become institutionalized into a professional pressure group, and have taken on some of its unpleasant characteristics. No issue is too large or small for your focus. You complain about tin can labels, where the Navy parks its ships. Like the American Legion you seem to accept the conspiracy theory of history," he accused.
"It behooves us now to stop, and examine our prospect. The Citizens Councils want the NAACP outlawed; the NAACP wants the Citizens Councils outlawed. You cannot demand more than you can give. Your aims should be to reconciliate men, not to widen gulfs of human hatred," he counseled.
Wilkins countered, "we are willing to be moderates, if we can agree on what moderation means. Many people, including William Faulkner, have said "go slow" on the Lucy case. She waited five years after the original court decision. How long do you have to wait before you are not considered rash.
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