Iran, coverage of bookfairs and festivals from across the country and the best sellers from this year and let us know what you think about the programs youre watching. Call us at 2026263400, or you can email us at comments at join the cspan conversation, like us on facebook, follow us on twitter. Charles cobb, former field secretary for the student nonviolent coordinating committee, or sncc, reef count tuesday the possession of and use of firearms by civil rights activists for selfprotection during the 1950s and 60s. This is an hour and 15 minutes. Thank you. Its always good to be in the mississippi delta, especially this changed mississippi delta. Perhaps i should say somewhat changed mississippi delta. This is an appropriate place to speak about this book, because i have vivid memories of hiding from police along this particular street, the county courthouse is over there, and i have even more vivid memories of posses and city police here, and i have memories in this is really what much of the book is about the very, almost exceptionally strong, people of greenwood who history doesnt include i tell the story of some of them in the book, and i wont do it here. I will just announce some names. The green family here in greenwood, mississippi, almost a legendary family for their strength. The magees, laura magee, ran the sheriff off the farm outside of greenwood with her winchester. There were exceptionally strong people, and much of the Southern Movement is lodged in these strong people who protected us, and in fact, taught us. Very much. Ill get back to that thought. Im often asked, well, charlie, why did you do this particular book . And when you read the book, is a trust all of you will, youll see that this is really much more than a book about guns. I have been, one, working reporter most of my life since leaving mississippi. I as a working reporter have primarily been a Foreign Affairs reporter. Thats what my working life, say, at National Geographic was very much like. I helped establish when i left all africa. Com, an Internet News Service concerning africa, which is now the largest Internet Service on africa in the world. I recommend if youre interested in africa, you click on the allafrica. Com, and its almost the only way to keep up daytoday with news that is and its a news site. Not a feature site. Its a news site. This is what is happening in nigeria. This is what is happening in ive been a working reporter, and one of the thing is learned almost immediately as i inch entered into the field or the craft, is a think of it, as reporting, is that news and i think news is most more often distorted by what is left out more than any bias that creeps in a report. You can spot bias. And but if something is left out, you dont know its left out unless you study the field yourself. And the average person this is a problem with history, too. And it is a particularly a problem with history of the Southern Freedom Movement or the mississippi Freedom Movement, the peoples opinions or thoughts about what took place in mississippi or what took place in alabama or what took place across the black belt south. Is mostly shaped by what hasnt been told. So thats what drove the writing of this book, essentially my dissatisfaction with the history of the movement, and its been presented, and that problem operates at several different levels. Ill tell you one story, all reporters have one or two stories in think back pocket. When hi did the bob moses book, when was that 2001, think, that book came out, and i brought the book the book is a book about education. When i brought the book to give it to some people in mississippi, who had helped me, including a principal and a middle school in medgar evers Old Neighborhood in jackson, i gave it to the principal and was coming humaner to the delta and sitting on the stepped of the school with these middle school students, half a dozen of them. And as it happens, the school is across the street from the medgar evers Public Library im sorry the Fanny Lou HamerPublic Library. So i decided to engage these middle school kids in what i only half jokingly called old guy talk, and asked them if they knew anything about mrs. Hamer, and if theyve did they should tell the other students setting on the steps what they knew, and they didnt know anything. Not a one of these kids. And my ride came, and i told them, as i rose, pointing at the library, that she was important to what mississippi is today. They needed to know about her. And i told them, i would be back in a few days and i will tell them some things about mrs. Hamer, and i was about to tell them a story about mrs. Hamer, and i was pointing at the library across the street. And i said, i knew her, and when i said i knew her, one of these kids, maybe 13 years old, leapt to his feet, stared at me in totele amazement and said i never will forget mr. Cobb, you was alive back then . [laughter] and on one level, im talking about lady whose name is chiseled on to the library, and how could i know, you know, somebody famous enough or old enough to have their name, and i put aside my saying something like, yeah, me and freddy douglas, and harriet, used to sit around and try to decide what to do in the struggle against slavery. And just dropped it. But it did place in my mind i was still doing mainly Foreign Affairs reporting that it did place in my mind the necessity of doing the history, and if anybody was going to begin to meet that necessity, it probably should be me, said. Youre a writer, charles. Self, youre a writer. And i literally shifted gears. Ive done very little Foreign Affairs writing since the book equations came out. I really concentrated on trying to figure out how to convey in writing what i think is important to know about the Southern Freedom Movement. What write is not the whole story, not even moats of the story. Its just some of the story that is trying to fill in what has been absent from the movement. A lot of things you know, you may or may not know right now that this is the 50th 50th anniversary of the mississippi freedom summer, and that is being commemorated in jackson right now, and thats what brought me to mississippi on this particular trip. I have a problem with the way that is looked at because in some respects its looked at as if it came out of nowhere, just not connected to anything, and people in peoples thinking, a bunch of kids from the north came down to free the downtrodden mississippians and did so. Julian has a quip where he when i was talking to him when i worked on the book and we talked about the problem of hit and he said the public understanding of julian bond said the public understand offering history can be boiled down to one sentence. That is rosa sat down, martin stood up, the white folks saw the light and saved the day. And then you can say, Stokley Carmichael shouted out, black power. This kind of oversim my fix indication is what over oversim preliminary fix indication, and im saying what Movement People thought. People did more than act. They acted for a row. Students sitting in, in 1960 in greensboro, did so because they were thinking about how to challenge the segregation. The people in mississippi you know can the Mississippi Movement was mostly led by mississippians. Wasnt led by charlie cobb or by bob moses, wasnt led by anybody came from the outside. It was let by the mississippians. They range from Fanny Lou Hamer to aaron henry to Hollis Watkins to sam block, who worked the city, and wont tick awful the name is could all the name is could but the point is the mississippians led the Mississippi Movement, and southerners held the Southern Movement, and they were thinking about what kind of society they wanted to live in, what kind of action they should take to get the kind of society they sought, and that point is missed. I even read hoyt history book that quote my idea of that Freedom School and then proceed to tell me what i thought. Never asked me. Said charlie cobb wrote the proposal for the Freedom School. And he was thinking and i said, nobody asked me. And so this its an old problem. Read you a i think i can find it without even a bookmark. Frederick douglass in one of his autobiographies in his 1855 autobiography, complained about abolitionists, i wrote about it in the book. Ill read you how i wrote about it. Frederick douglass complained that other influential white abolitionist thought this intellectual weakened their cause. They only want him to narrate wrongs. Although after escaping from slavery, quote, i was now reading and thinking, end quote. However, if he did not have, quote, the plantation manner of speech, endends, john away collins, of the massachusetts antislavery society, wants council douglass, quote, people wont ever believe you are a slave. Advertise not best to seem to have learned. The abolitionists then win went ton state, quote, give us the facts. Well take care of the philosophy. Thats in 185 and that is still with us when it comes to how the movement is understood. So im spending time with this because its important for you to understand the context in which this book sits. Its not a story about cowboys or gunfighters or shootouts on broad street. Its a movement story. A story of the Freedom Movement, what people are thinking and why they chose to take actions they took. I often get asked about the title of the book, this nonviolent stuff will get you killed, it comes from a farmer who had a small farm next to a neighbor in Holmes County. A legendary figure in the Mississippi Movement, erased from his story of the Civil Rights Movement unless guys like me write about it. He met Martin Luther king in 1964 and after the usual courtesies of introduction hartman turn, never known to be shy about expressing his opinion, looked at reverend king and said this nonviolent stuff is no good, it will get you killed. Tragically he was absolutely right. Such a sentence is too long for the title of the book so i contracted it to what you see here, this nonviolent stuff will get you killed. I feel compelled after the camera grinds away, looking at me to give his props. A lot of ways, the other people like him who shape the movement, and shaped the movement in mississippi. I will elaborate little bit on guns and the movement and how to understand. And contradictory, and i will tell people as about italian no. And people, one way to think about the movement to divide it into two sections and non moving protests and lunch counters and the like. And seeking desegregation. The other part of the movementthe most important part of the movement, grounded in Grassroots Community organizing in the rural south. What occurred in 1960 in greenewood is part of a very old tradition that goes back to the days of slavery. Slaves were not seeking a seat at the plantation or dining room table, they were not organizing on the auction blocks. What were they doing . They were organizing. What where they organizing . Sometimes revolts, sometimes sabotage, sometimes assassination and sometimes it was just escape. In most cases it was just organizing the ways and means of surviving and a living in what had to be a very strange world, far distant from their regional homes. If you look at black history in the United States, you see a stream of organized efforts that take various forms to gain freedom, the sudden movement that erupted in places like greenewood, mississippi in 1962 when sam bloch from cleveland, mississippi came over to begin organizing or when the first bunch of slick people entered in there to begin the registration, part of the organizing tradition that began far earlier than the naacp. The shape it takes very much depends on the circumstances people find themselves living in but the one Common Thread running through it is the desire for freedom. That is important to understand and what i am trying to portray in this book. They use guns in many instances. Obviously weapons reused in slave revolts, weapons were used in the post civil war, the reconstruction period, they had to fend off the ku klux klan, the paleface brotherhood, a white knight and other organizations that were seeking to to dismember these fledgling attempts at creating democracy in the south that followed the civil war. Black veterans in world war i and world war ii, very large presence in this book. After world war i and especially after world war ii, veterans led the way in the fight for freedom in the south. This is matt grabbers, and the more, told snake into mississippi. This is aaron henry, the pharmacist who became state president of the naacp and president of the council on federated organizations. All in the south. Changed the climate of the south. He may tell in another book about the slaughter of black veterans, in number of them were killed by refusing to knuckle under White Supremacy. And black veterans, and take off being people like myself. And 21 years old, bob moses, perhaps the old guy in the group, these veterans had their weapons ready and i described in this book how and why they had those weapons ready. And korean war veterans. And the Freedom Movement, and came to organize and protect corps workers who were organizing in louisiana. Some cultures a part of the south, i lived in many homes in the mississippi delta in 19621967, and i never was in a home that didnt have a shotgun in the corner. The men would pull 45 white table, and i got four shotguns, shotguns in every corner to quote it exactly. The first cracker tries to throw some dynamite on my porch wont write his momma again. Martin luther king during the montgomery bus boycott had pistols in his home, the journalists rights of going to interview Martin Luther king, beginning to sink down in an armchair and byron yells out bill, old it there are a couple pistols on that shares they ask Martin Luther king and he said adjust yourself. When the night riders blew up his home in 1956 in the montgomery bus boycott he went to the Sheriffs Office to apply for a concealed gun permit. He didnt get it but the representative from the federal, from the fellowship of reconciliation, a pacifist organizations that was helping Martin Luther king said kings else is an arsenal, dont you understand nonviolence . Alive in this gathering here, and the guy who plotted Martin Luther king to a full understanding, nonviolence as a way of life. Taking note of the fact, when he was alive, young people is what he did. So this easiest way to understand this is all you have to do, you dont have to think of this in sharp political terms. What you have to understand is black people are human beings and they are going to react to terrorism or violence directed at friends, family, community, the way anybody reacts, do the best they can to protect them and in greenewood or Holmes County over here, or all these other counties in mississippi, grabbing a rifle or a shotgun, protecting ones home or family or friends or community and you have to understand this. From durham, a person in arkansas and other places, i quote him in the book, you can pray with him or you can pray at him. If you are did you wont make and effected of the organizer. That is the real wealth. All i am trying to do in the book is provide some portraits of black people, human beings, in this real world, mississippi, what did they are in greenwood or washington d. C. Dont realize how murderous the state was and how murderous much of the black belt in the south was, murderous People Killed you for trying to register to vote. Herbert lee, the first of the naacp leaders to take us in in mississippi, southwest mississippi, the strongest bastion of the ku klux klan was gunned down in broad daylight at the cotton gin by a member of the Mississippi State legislature who was never brought to trial and the man who witnessed the trial the murder and word got out he was black, that he might be willing to testify. He was killed getting out of his truck one night in front of his house. This was a murderous place here and nobody was paying attention to it and these guys, many of them world war ii veterans, ones who said we are not going to accept this anymore and i discussed in the book why i think the war had this effect on people like medgar evers or alan henry. The point i am trying to make is this is not a book about black guerrilla warfare. This is not a romance about guns. It is simply a portrayal of the life in the black belts out that i witnessed although this is not a memoir and it is not an autobiography. Is a history. The other thing i should say i am trying to do in this book again has to do with my grievances with how history is presented. I tried to connect the dots in American History that explain why White Supremacy emerged. What the founding contradictions of the country are. And why they carried over all the way into the 20th century when we began working in the south. You know, bob moses when he speaks likes to have the audience join him in a recitation of the preamble to the United States constitution. As you undoubtedly know, the first three words of the preamble are we the people and the point bob makes in having people recite the preamble is we the people. Doesnt say we the white people, it doesnt say we the southerners, it does not say we the new englanders, it says we the people and he like