SNCC Launches Black Power

Introduction

1. SNCC Creates Black Voting Power in the Rural South, 1961-66

A. The Council of Federated Organizations (COFO) in Mississippi, 1962-64

One of the first voter consolidation campaigns in Mississippi was the Council of Federated Organizations (COFO). COFO brought together all of the civil rights organizations working in Mississippi to plan joint strategy, pool resources, distribute work, and minimize conflicts over territory. Participating national organizations were SNCC, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).

SNCC’s Bob Moses became the COFO director, and Dave Dennis from CORE became second in command. SNCC organizers made up 90 percent of COFO’s staff. COFO became the base from which SNCC launched all of its voting campaigns, including the Mississippi Freedom Summer program that brought hundreds of northern, mostly white, student volunteers into the rural counties to register Black voters and conduct Freedom Schools.

White-led violence against the students intensified during the summer of 1964, resulting in beatings, arrests, and the murder of three summer project volunteers: William Chaney, Andrew Schwerner, and Michael Goodman. Despite the climate of fear, the volunteers registered hundreds of voters who would take part in the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP) elections.

Later in 1964, COFO was defunded by the Atlanta-based Voter Education Project (VEP), which claimed that the results were not worth the money. There was an underlying fear that SNCC’s influence in the state was too large and too radical.^[2]

B. Freedom Day” Mass Voter Registration Campaigns, 1963-65

SNCC organized the first “Freedom Day” mass voting registration campaign in Selma, Ala., in 1963. The Freedom Day action plan called for the registration of hundreds of Black voters from a single city or county in a single day. SNCC volunteers would contact all potential Black voters by telephoning, canvassing, or distributing flyers and invite them to register on the same day at selected locations in the Black community. The first Freedom Day voter registration campaign succeeded in registering several hundred voters in Selma and was replicated in several key cities and states where SNCC was organizing.

C. The Mississippi “Freedom Vote” Mock Election, 1964

Under the COFO umbrella, SNCC organized the Mississippi “Freedom Vote” mock election campaign (also known as the “Freedom Ballot”), which was held throughout the state of Mississippi. Over 78,000 Black people were registered to vote at sites in Black communities. Then they cast mock ballots for the candidates who campaigned on the issues most important to Black voters, “electing” Mississippi state NAACP president Aaron Henry as governor and Rev. Ed King of Tougaloo College as lieutenant governor.

The vote disproved allegations by the national press and white opponents of the Freedom Vote that Black people were not interested in voting and were incapable of handling the voting process. The Freedom Vote built confidence in the Black people who were voting for the first time in their lives. It also gave them a voting experience free from the intimidation that took place in many state elections, where Blacks who registered were threatened with beatings if they tried to vote, faced reprisals from their white employers, and were sometimes even murdered. Finally, the Freedom Vote provided new Black voters an opportunity to select and run candidates who represented their interests and aspirations.

Under the COFO umbrella, SNCC organized the Mississippi “Freedom Vote” mock election campaign (also known as the “Freedom Ballot”), which was held throughout the state of Mississippi. Over 78,000 Black people were registered to vote at sites in Black communities. Then they cast mock ballots for the candidates who campaigned on the issues most important to Black voters, “electing” Mississippi state NAACP president Aaron Henry as governor and Rev. Ed King of Tougaloo College as lieutenant governor.

The vote disproved allegations by the national press and white opponents of the Freedom Vote that Black people were not interested in voting and were incapable of handling the voting process. The Freedom Vote built confidence in the Black people who were voting for the first time in their lives. It also gave them a voting experience free from the intimidation that took place in many state elections, where Blacks who registered were threatened with beatings if they tried to vote, faced reprisals from their white employers, and were sometimes even murdered. Finally, the Freedom Vote provided new Black voters an opportunity to select and run candidates who represented their interests and aspirations.

James Forman, SNCC
Executive Secretary

D. The MFDP Challenge to the Democratic National Convention, 1964

Building on the momentum of the 1963 “Freedom Vote,” Black people in Mississippi wanted to take a strong stand against the all-white Mississippi “Dixiecrat” Democratic Party that had systematically denied Blacks access into the mainstream party. COFO decided to form a new, parallel party organization, which was named the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP). The founders included Bob Moses, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Ella Baker. Lawrence Guyot was elected chair, and Mrs. Hamer was elected vice-chair. Immediately, they set about organizing what has come to be known as the “MFDP Challenge,” bringing 68 MFDP-elected delegates to the 1964 Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Atlantic City, N.J., to challenge the legality of seating Mississippi’s all-white “Dixiecrat” delegation on the grounds that it did not allow Blacks to participate in selecting the party’s delegates.

The MFDP Challenge was heavily covered in the press and gained the support of party delegates from other states who were sympathetic to the MFDP’s case. Success seemed to be within their grasp; however, after much heated debate, trickery, and threats made by President Lyndon Baines Johnson, the DNC party regulars (including some Black elected officials who chose their political interests above solidarity) voted with the Democratic Party establishment and refused to seat the MFDP delegates.

Without ever negotiating with the MFDP delegation, the DNC offered two “consolation” at-large seats and even selected the two MFDP delegates who they wanted to fill the seats. After this unacceptable proposal was made to MFDP, the women delegates played an important leadership role in keeping the MFDP delegates unified. Remember the names of Fannie Lou Hamer, Victoria Gray, Unita Blackwell, and Annie Devine.^[4]

E. The Significance of the MFDP Challenge

The challenge to the DNC signaled an important shift in the relationship between SNCC and the traditional liberal wing of the Democratic Party. James Forman summed up SNCC’s changing relationship with the white liberal establishment after the MFDP Challenge:

“At the Democratic Convention of 1964, SNCC had demonstrated not only that it sought political power in the national arena, but also that it had power and the capacity to use it. The small group of [SNCC] organizers who had cooperated with the Justice Department in obtaining information about voter discrimination had become a determined, greatly enlarged, organized political force opposed both to the policies of the Democratic Party and the liberal-labor establishment….This drive for power for poor people signaled danger to the officials of the Democratic Party, especially President Lyndon Baines Johnson and vice-presidential hopeful Hubert Humphrey. Therefore, the destruction and neutralizing of SNCC’s power became a must for the Democrats…”^[5] (Emphasis added.)