News
After Court Restores Research Funding, Trump Still Has Paths to Target Harvard
News
‘Honestly, I’m Fine with It’: Eliot Residents Settle In to the Inn as Renovations Begin
News
He Represented Paul Toner. Now, He’s the Fundraising Frontrunner in Cambridge’s Municipal Elections.
News
Harvard College Laundry Prices Increase by 25 Cents
News
DOJ Sues Boston and Mayor Michelle Wu ’07 Over Sanctuary City Policy
"When they burn a cross on your lawn that's not much; you just put it out. But when they call you up on the telephone twenty or thirty times a day and say, 'We're coming to get you, Jew bastard,' it begins to bother you a little."
Abram Eisenman, editor of the weekly Savannah, Georgia Sun, described his ordeal as a Southern supporter of integration at a Harvard-Radcliffe Liberal Union forum Tuesday night.
During the worst part of his harassment by Ku Klux Klan and White Citizens' Council members, "the only people in Savannah who were of comfort were three Protestant ministers," Eisenman related. "The police would say, 'You're a good guy, Abe, and you shouldn't take up for niggers.'"
Almost no one in Savannah seriously challenged the city's pattern of racial segregation until the sit-in demonstrations of 1959, Eisenman declared. Then racial tension rose to the point of "un-civil war." Demonstrators were arrested, street riots took place, and gun stores sold their entire stocks, he said.
Heavy-handed police action and a "probably unconstitutional" ban on picketing averted a crisis, Eisenman stated. But city merchants, who had unanimously refused to integrate, are still suffering heavy losses from a Negro boycott, he said.
Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter.