The mythology of the Civil Rights movement holds that the organizers rejected violence and that their moral superiority and willingness to suffer injustice without using the tools of the oppressor eventually wore down the racist traditions of the South. As with the British Raj, so with Jim Crow. The truth, of course, is much different. Non-violence was a public relations tactic that worked best to attract and allay the fears of Northern Whites, particularly women and that number of young men returning from Vietnam with a distaste for violence. In reality it was armed Black men who drove off the night riders, shot back at those who murdered voter registration workers and spoke to the violent supporters of the status quo in language that they could understand and not ignore.
Lance Hill has written what may be the definitive history of this in The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement. A more-or-less factual movie of the same name is available for those who enjoy pictures with their stories
In the end groups like The Deacons for Justice and Defense lost their way and self-destructed as most movements eventually do. For a few critical years they were essential in securing civil rights and protecting Blacks in Mississippi and Louisiana against the Klan and tyrannical civil authority. The appeal to defense of home and family worked to galvanize Black men to defy White ones in ways they otherwise would not have done. They certainly saved lives.
I find it odd that this important chapter has been written out of history. Popular examples of armed citizen resistance to oppressive government action tends to stop with Athens Georgia in 1948. Even if one's sympathies lie more with the segregated South of Jim Crow than the Deacons or Dr. King it is hard to deny the impact that armed defense made in parts of the South.
Lance Hill has written what may be the definitive history of this in The Deacons for Defense: Armed Resistance and the Civil Rights Movement. A more-or-less factual movie of the same name is available for those who enjoy pictures with their stories
In the end groups like The Deacons for Justice and Defense lost their way and self-destructed as most movements eventually do. For a few critical years they were essential in securing civil rights and protecting Blacks in Mississippi and Louisiana against the Klan and tyrannical civil authority. The appeal to defense of home and family worked to galvanize Black men to defy White ones in ways they otherwise would not have done. They certainly saved lives.
I find it odd that this important chapter has been written out of history. Popular examples of armed citizen resistance to oppressive government action tends to stop with Athens Georgia in 1948. Even if one's sympathies lie more with the segregated South of Jim Crow than the Deacons or Dr. King it is hard to deny the impact that armed defense made in parts of the South.
