"It's not that the FBI is stupid or malicious," said Zinn, "they're just cold.--They just don't care." To solve this problem he proposed a special federal police force, designed to enforce the Constitution in the South, to stand armed at the polling booths, and to follow civil rights workers wherever they go in the Second South. This force should not only enforce the law, but should try to act before--not after--people are shot.

Negro White Unity

Over one-third of the students at the Atlanta conference were white, in sharp contrast with past meetings. "It was encouraging to see so many whites, especially those from southern colleges," said Robert E. Wright '65, chairman of the Harvard Civil Rights Coordinating Committee and a summer SNCC field-worker.

In addition to the physical closeness of whites and Negroes, there was a constant stress on interracial cooperation. On the first night of the conference, the students joined in singing "We Shall Overcome," the themesong of the movement. After the group sang three verses of the song, James Forman, SNCC'S executive secretary, quickly made his way up to the stage and whispered in the ear of one of the song leaders. The singer nodded, and shouted out the next verse, "Black and white together."

In line with this stress on Negro-white cooperation, SNCC workers constantly emphasized the importance of white participation in the summer project. Frank Smith, a Negro field worker from Mississippi, explained, "The average Negro in Mississippi hates everybody white--they've never met a white person on their side." He paused and then continued, "No Negro can build up a Negro's confidence in a white man; the cat has to come down and do it himself. It's a very tender process."

Besides fostering interracial friendship, conference members contended that the white has a special role in the movement. "The Negro rights worker must convince the Negro sharecropper to believe him," one field secretary said, "but the white worker is believed by virtue of his color. This is one of the real tragedies of the South."

SNCC's emphasis on interracial cooperation, is leading toward an expansion of its activities to an entirely new area--the poor white community. One field worker expressed this change saying, "We aren't a Negro movement--we're a movement of the poor."

This theme was repeated throughout the conference, Forman echoed it when he said that SNCC must go into white communities, the labor unions