The Wednesday March

MONTGOMERY, Ala.--The civil order of this town is going fruid, slipping and sliding about, ready to course into anarchy. The melting force is the Student Non-Violent Co-ordinating Committee, led by James Forman, who day after day emerges from the Jackson St. Church to urge the drifting worshippers of Martin Luther King to "settle down and think for yourselves. Don't be led by anyone--lead yourselves."

Slowly the message is penetrating. On Tuesday a small group of new converts joined a large group of Northern whites and marched to the capitol building without a parade permit. They were scattered and beaten by mounted troopers. Today, more marched and, after the glamor of next week's Selma extravaganza fades, more and more will march, and someday these growing people will slip through the benevolent grip of their secular god.

But at present, Dr. King can still mesmerize them and on Wednesday he did just that. King's "plan for Alabama" is a matter of steps and stages, and the present protests in Montgomery do not fit that plan. And so he hurried here from Selma to channel the frustrations of his home city into a giant parade.

Wednesday morning the sky clouded and cleared in easy rhythm. The black around the Jackson St. Church, dark and scrawny the day before, was fat with happy humanity. De Lawd had called and everyone had come--the old wrinkled women, the young, prim schoolgirls, the respected morticians, and the baggy-eyed drunks. Brightly painted umbrellas twirled in the foggy sunlight as on each doorstep a preacher stood and taught nonviolence and the ways of peace.

At 12:30 King emerged from a nearby house, surrounded by aides and photographers. The Negroes burst into applause. They followed to the police lines that sealed the end of Jackson St. and taunted the sullen white faces, not out of anger, as they had the day before, but out of pride and cockiness, for it was they and not the troopers that owned Dr. King.

He brushed past his followers, nodding greetings, squeezing a familiar hand or two, reflecting the glare of admiration with infinite majesty, and disdain. His aides lined up behind him and the people behind them. The first five rows seemed uncomfortable on Jackson St. Their ties were knotted, their nails polished, their smiles distant, their cuffs pinned with large pearl links. A cordon of yellow-helmeted aides formed a wedge, King motioned, and the police lines--so immovable the day before--melted. The march began.

Flanking King was Forman, his face twisted in a faintly childlike grimace. Again and again the photographers shoved him aside to snap a closeup of the doctor. Finally the SNCC field secretary stepped back a foot or two and plucked a shabby suit coat from a friend. With a huff of disgust, he yanked it on and buttoned it on over his soiled blue overalls. For a moment he lagged behind, morose and contemplative. Then, clapping his hands together, he lunged forward, linked arms with King and began to sing. "We Shall Overcome" echoed back through the ranks out into the streets and into the shabby grey houses.

I walked ahead, along the sidewalk, to get a better view. An elderly Negro lady with gold teeth and a faded grey suit pulled me aside and whispered. "Thank you all, thank you. The good Lord has sent you down here to save us all. We all of us want to thank you." On her porch three more ladies were sitting on a grey wooden swing. They waved timidly and nodded.

The march turned a corner and passed a local hospital. Two white-coated men stood silent, each with a foot resting manfully on an iron railing. "You one of 'em?" they at one asked. "What do you think of the march?" I asked. "Bunch of shabby Communists," he said. "Look at them white men out there. Look at 'em. Why would any nigger associate with them?" The thin one nodded. "We gonna find out who's jumpin' up then niggers if it takes all year," he said, "and we gonna kill 'em."

As the parade headed up the hill toward the capitol building, gusts of wind began whipping at the trees and tall weeds. A blast of icy rain swept across the demonstrators. Behind the marchers now, I looked up the line, across the 2000 bobbing heads. At the front were two huge flags, one of the United States and one of the United Nations, flapping in the wind. Higher up and to the right loomed the very white dome, topped by a Confederate flag and the modified Confederate flag that Alabama has chosen for its own.

The sky blackened and rain began falling straight down, too heavy now to be shifted by the wind. White onlookers retreated from the curbs and onto nearly porches. Most chewed gum, spitting angrily every few minutes. A few tried to laugh, but ridicule didn't work in this weather and most chose silence.

The parade reached the county courthouse and the sheriff emerged--the short, squat man who, the day before, had donned a white cowboy hat, mounted a horse, and galloped through a-panicking band of Forman's pickers. He shook hands with King. The crowd cheered the triumph. "We Shall Overcome" rang one again, and then a chorus of "I Love Everybody in My Heart."

The marchers smiled at the hundreds of state troopers who ringed the building. They waved at the county employees who lined the building's windows. They sing in joyful, Christian defiance. There was no anger, only infinite patience. King blessed his people and went inside to negotiate a truce with the whites.

The crowd sang and clapped for four hours, as the wind and rain swirled into a minor tornado. The temperature dropped into the low 40s but they all stayed. An old preacher pulled me under his umbrella. "You gonna freeze, be said. We linked arms and sang to keep warm. Up front a fat Negro boy in blue overalls led the chanting, bellowing and smiling into a huge red megaphone. A small boy near me started shivering. Finally a spasm of exhaustion shook through him and he fell face down in a puddle. His father picked him up and straightened his hair. "You OK, boy?" "Yessir, the boy answered. "I'm being baptized in the water of freedom." The words were King's.

"I'se free," lisped an old farmer nearly. "I'see free." The preacher whose umberalla I shared leaned over and whispered "That Sam Paris. First time for him. He's been a Tom. But everybody's joinin now. Everybody." I asked why "Because of Dr. King, that's why," the preacher said. "Is that all?" I asked "Yessir," he said, for now, at least, that's all."

"I'se free," lisped an old farmer nearly. "I'see free." The preacher whose umberalla I shared leaned over and whispered "That Sam Paris. First time for him. He's been a Tom. But everybody's joinin now. Everybody." I asked why "Because of Dr. King, that's why," the preacher said. "Is that all?" I asked "Yessir," he said, for now, at least, that's all."