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The Bill of the Century: The Epic Battle for the Civil Rights Act

Page 43

by Risen, Clay


  89 Minutes of the Senate Republican Conference, May 19, 1964, U.S. Senate Historical Office; New York Times, May 19, 1964, 1.

  90 New York Times, ibid.

  91 Chen, Fifth Freedom, 185–86; Herbert Liebenson interview with Raymond Wolfinger, July 29, 1965, box 22, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  92 Moreno, From Direct Action, 154.

  93 Letter from Walter Carey, May 12, 1964, box 17, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library; Chen, Fifth Freedom, 185–86.

  94 Graham, Civil Rights and the Presidency, 78; Whalen and Whalen, Longest Debate, 186; May 21, 1964, 11:30 a.m. presession meeting notes by Raymond Wolfinger, box 23, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  95 Los Angeles Times, May 20, 1964, A5; New York Times, May 20, 1964, 1.

  96 Washington Post, May 21, 1964, A8; Loevy, Civil Rights Act, 285; New York Times, May 25, 1964, 1; Wilkins and Mathews, Standing Fast, 301.

  97 “Ray’s Running Journal,” May 25, 1964, box 23, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  98 Baltimore Sun, May 27, 1964, 1; Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 9:11917–43.

  99 Baltimore Sun, ibid.

  100 Washington Post, May 28, 1964, 1.

  101 Atlanta Daily World, June 3, 1964, 1.

  102 “Notes on June 2,” by Raymond Wolfinger, box 23, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  103 New York Times, June 6, 1964, 1.

  104 Chicago Tribune, June 6, 1964, 3.

  Chapter 8: Breaking the Filibuster

  1 Washington Post, June 7, 1964, 1; Humphrey, “Memorandum,’’ 91.

  2 Washington Post, ibid.

  3 Ibid.

  4 Washington Post, June 8, 1964, 1.

  5 Atlanta Daily World, June 10, 1964, 1; notes from June 9, 1964, by John Stewart, box 23, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  6 “Final Dictated Thoughts on the Civil Rights Debate,” by Raymond Wolfinger. June 11, 1964, box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  7 Chicago Tribune, June 11, 1964, 1; Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 10:13125–219; “Memorandum Dictated Shortly After Cloture,” by Hubert Humphrey, n.d., box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  8 Loevy, To End All Segregation, 278; Baltimore Sun, June 11, 1964, 1.

  9 http://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/minute/Key_Pittman_Barely_Elected.htm, accessed July 11, 2013; Jack Biedler interview with Raymond Wolfinger, n.d., box 22, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  10 Thurber, Politics of Equality, 144; Humphrey, “Memorandum,” 91.

  11 Woods, Fulbright, 330–31.

  12 Washington Post, June 11, 1964, B5; Chicago Tribune, June 11, 1964, 1.

  13 Baltimore Sun, June 11, 1964, 1; Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 10:12855–68.

  14 Ibid.

  15 “Civil Rights Speech,” June 10, 1964, Civil Rights 1963–1965, Everett M. Dirksen Papers, Dirksen Congressional Center; New York Times, June 11, 1964, A1.

  16 Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, 87, 10:12853–64.

  17 Ibid.

  18 Mudd, Place to Be, 155.

  19 Baltimore Sun, June 11, 1964, 1.

  20 Thompson II, ‘‘The Civil Rights Act of 1964,’’ 681–91.

  21 John J. Synon interview with Raymond Wolfinger, September 7, 1965, box 22, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  22 Thurber, Politics of Equality, 144.

  23 Kotz, Judgment Days, 151.

  24 Larry O’Brien interview with Michael Gillette, February 12, 1986, Lyndon B. Johnson Library.

  25 Bipartisan Civil Rights Newsletter, June 11, 1964, box 32, series 18, Mike Mansfield Papers, University of Montana Library.

  26 Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 10:13330–419.

  27 Stewart, “Strategy,” 130–31.

  28 Humphrey, Education, 284.

  29 Stewart, “Tactics I,” 130.

  30 “Final Dictated Thoughts,” by Raymond Wolfinger, box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library; Stewart, “Tactics I,” 131.

  31 Stewart, “Tactics I,” 131.

  32 “June 16, 1964, ‘‘by Raymond Wolfinger, box 23, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library; Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report, June 19, 1964, 1205.

  33 Chicago Tribune, June 14, 1964, 26; Baltimore Sun, June 14, 1964, 1.

  34 “Final Dictated Thoughts,” by Raymond Wolfinger, box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  35 Chicago Tribune, June 17, 1964, 7.

  36 New York Times, June 16, 1964, 18.

  37 Notes from June 16, 1964, by John Stewart, box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  38 Ibid.

  39 “Final Dictated Thoughts,” by Raymond Wolfinger, box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  40 Ibid.

  41 Ibid.; New York Times, June 17, 1964, 1.

  42 Whalen and Whalen, Longest Debate, 210.

  43 Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 11:14240; Atlanta Daily World, June 16, 1964, 1; Chicago Tribune, June 18, 1964, 4.

  44 Thurber, Politics of Equality, 145.

  45 For the entire proceedings of June 18, see Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 11:14275–336.

  46 New York Times, June 19, 1964, 18.

  47 Time, June 26, 1964, 20; Chicago Tribune, June 19, 11.

  48 Ibid.; Washington Post, June 28, 1964, E7; Newsweek, June 29, 1964, 17.

  49 Los Angeles Times, June 19, 1964, 10.

  50 Washington Post, June 20, 1964, 1.

  51 For the entire proceedings of that historic day, see Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 11:14432–511.

  52 Stewart, “Independence and Control,’’ 181; Thurber, Politics of Equality, 181. Late that evening, the Senate’s celebratory mood was derailed when news arrived that two of its members—Edward Kennedy and Birch Bayh of Indiana—had been in a plane crash in Massachusetts. Though the pilot and one of Kennedy’s aides died, Bayh and his wife survived relatively unhurt, while Kennedy was seriously injured but managed to recover quickly.

  53 Chicago Tribune, June 23, 1964, 6; Baltimore Sun, June 23, 1964, 8.

  54 Baltimore Sun, June 8, 1964, 8; New York Times, June 23, 1964, 14; memo from Bill Moyers to Lyndon Johnson, June 29, 1964, box 112, Statements, Lyndon B. Johnson Library.

  55 New York Times, July 1, 1964, 1; Wall Street Journal, July 1, 1964, 3.

  56 Wall Street Journal, July 1, 1964, 3.

  57 New York Times, July 3, 1964, 9.

  Chapter 9: A Bill Becomes a Law

  1 Chicago Tribune, July 3, 1964, 1.

  2 See various drafts and memos in box 125, Bill Moyers Office Files, Lyndon B. Johnson Library.

  3 Chicago Tribune, July 3, 1964, 1; Dierenfield, Keeper of the Rules, 198.

  4 Memo No. 44, from Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, July 6, 1964, box 37, part 1, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Papers, Library of Congress; Congressional Record, 88th Congress, 2nd Session, 1964, 110, pt. 12:15869–97; Washington Post, July 3, 1964, A1; Los Angeles Times, July 3, 1964, 1
.

  5 Los Angeles Times, July 3, 1964, 1.

  6 New York Times, July 3, 1964, 1.

  7 “Civil Rights: President Signs Historic Bill,” Universal newsreel, July 2, 1964, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaRUca7FyAc, accessed July 16, 2013; Los Angeles Times, July 3, 1964, 3.

  8 “Radio and Television Remarks Upon Signing the Civil Rights Bill,” July 2, 1964, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=26361, accessed July 16, 2013.

  9 Shesol, Mutual Contempt, 165.

  10 New York Times, July 3, 1964, 1; memo to the files by Lee White, July 4, 1963, box 2, Ex Gen HU 2, White House Central Files, Lyndon B. Johnson Library.

  11 Stewart, “Independence,” ii and 289.

  12 Webb, Fight Against Fear, 109–11; Reporter, August 13, 1964, 44.

  13 Reporter, ibid.

  14 Time, July 10, 1964, 27; Time, July 17, 1964, 39.

  15 New York Times, July 7, 1964, 20; New York Times, July 7, 1964, 1; New York Times, July 10, 1964, 10; Washington Post, July 4, 1964, 1; Washington Post, July 5, 1964, 1.

  16 Los Angeles Times, July 5, 1964, D1.

  17 Tuscaloosa News, May 1, 2011, http://www.tuscaloosanews.com/article/20110501/news/110439984, accessed July 19, 2013; “Compliance with Title II: A Summary of Field Reports from Southern States,” box 27, Burke Marshall Papers, John F. Kennedy Library.

  18 “Compliance with Title II.”

  19 Congressional Quarterly Weekly Report, July 10, 1964, 1454.

  20 Ibid.; Reporter, August 13, 1964, 44; press release from Bill Fulbright, July 8, 1964, box 110, part 1, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Records, Library of Congress; text of radio address recorded by Senator Allen J. Ellender, July 4, 1964, box 110, part 1, Leadership Conference on Civil Rights Records, Library of Congress.

  21 New York Times, July 3, 1964, 9.

  22 New York Times, June 24, 1964, 23; New York Times, July 4, 1964, 1.

  23 Wall Street Journal, May 13, 1963, 1.

  24 “Compliance with Title II”; New York Times, July 4, 1964, 1.

  25 “Compliance with Title II”; Washington Post, July 30, 1964, A5.

  26 Christian Science Monitor, February 8, 1964, 4; Christian Science Monitor, April 30, 1964, 11.

  27 For an excellent review of the white South’s experience during the civil rights movement, see Sokol, There Goes My Everything.

  28 Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States, 379 U.S. 241, 1964, Supreme Court of the United States, http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0379_0241_ZS.html, accessed July 19, 2013.

  29 New York Times, July 4, 1964, 1.

  30 Stern, Calculating Visions, 184.

  31 Sovern, Legal Restraints, 205 and 80. Years later, Sovern admitted, in an interview with the author, that he had been too hasty in his criticism of Title VII, and that he later developed a much more positive view of it. See also Berg, ‘‘Equal Employment Opportunity,’’ 311–43.

  32 Berg, ibid.; interview with Jack Greenberg by the author, November 28, 2012; Osterman, ‘‘Origins of a Myth.’’

  33 Farhang, ‘‘Political Development,’’ 1.

  34 Los Angeles Times, July 3, 1964, 3.

  35 New York Times, July 5, 1964, 1; Baltimore Afro-American, October 24, 1964, 1.

  36 Larry O’Brien interview with Michael L. Gillette, February 12, 1986, Lyndon B. Johnson Library; “Memorandum Dictated Shortly After Cloture,” n.d., Hubert Humphrey, box 15, David B. Filvaroff and Raymond E. Wolfinger Civil Rights Act Papers, University of Buffalo Library.

  37 Washington Star, April 22, 1964. See article in box 65, LE HU 2, White House Central Files, Lyndon B. Johnson Library.

  38 Frank Valeo interview with Donald A. Ritchie, September 18, 1985, Oral History Project, U.S. Senate Historical Office.

  39 Stewart, Civil Rights Act, 197; Schlesinger, Robert Kennedy, 674.

  40 Bill Moyers, “Second Thoughts: Reflections on the Great Society,” New Perspectives Quarterly, vol. 4, no. 1, 1987, http://www.digitalnpq.org/archive/1987_winter/second.html, accessed July 17, 2013.

  41 Warren, Segregation, 23.

  42 Schlesinger, Thousand Days, 974–75.

  43 Speech by Secretary Wirtz before the National Conference on Negro Policy in Chicago, July 2, 1964, box 465, Thomas Kuchel Papers, University of California, Berkeley; remarks at the University of Michigan, May 22, 1964, http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/speeches.hom/640522.asp, accessed July 19, 2013; commencement address at Howard University, June 4, 1965, http://www.lbjlib.utexas.edu/johnson/archives.hom/speeches.hom/650604.asp, accessed July 19, 2013.

  Children being sprayed with fire hoses while demonstrating for civil rights in Birmingham, May 4, 1963.

  Photo by John Duprey/New York Daily News Archive via Getty Images

  Alabama governor George Wallace confronts Deputy Attorney General Nicholas deB. Katzenbach at the University of Alabama, June 11, 1963.

  Library of Congress

  President John F. Kennedy and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson at a meeting on civil rights legislation with American business leaders, June 4, 1963.

  John F. Kennedy

  Presidential Library and Museum President Kennedy discussing his forthcoming civil rights legislation in a nationally televised address, June 11, 1963.

  John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum

  Protesters demanding an end to employment discrimination at the March on Washington, August 28, 1963.

  Library of Congress

  Leaders of the March on Washington meeting with President Kennedy after the event. From left: Whitney Young, Martin Luther King Jr., John Lewis, Joachim Prinz, Matthew Ahmann, A. Philip Randolph, Kennedy, Walter Reuther, Lyndon B. Johnson, Roy Wilkins.

  Library of Congress

  Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and Representative Emanuel Celler (N.Y.) during Kennedy’s October 16, 1963, testimony on the Civil Rights Act before the House Judiciary Committee.

  Rogers Photo Archive

  President Johnson addresses a joint session of Congress on November 27, 1963. Behind him are House Speaker John McCormack (Mass.) and Senator Carl Hayden (Ariz.), the president pro tempore of the Senate.

  AP Photo

  President Johnson meeting with civil rights leaders on January 18, 1964. From left: Martin Luther King Jr., Johnson, Whitney Young, James Farmer.

  Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library

  Southern senators meet to discuss their historic filibuster against the Civil Rights Act. From left: Sam Ervin (N.C.), James Eastland (Miss.), John Stennis (Miss.), obscured, obscured, Richard Russell (Ga.), Spessard Holland (Fla.), Russell Long (La.), Allen Ellender (La.), Willis Robertson (Va.), Strom Thurmond (S.C.).

  Ted Russell/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

  Theological students stand vigil in support of the Civil Rights Act in front of the Lincoln Memorial.

  Francis Miller/Time & Life Pictures/Getty Images

  A meeting in a Denver church to discuss local activism in support of the Civil Rights Act, March 10, 1964. Meetings like this were common across the Midwest that year.

  Photo by George Crouter/The Denver Post via Getty Images

  Senators Mike Mansfield (Mont.) and Everett Dirksen (Ill.) during the Civil Rights Act filibuster.

  Rogers Photo Archive

  Pro–civil rights senators celebrate the defeat of the Southern filibuster, June 10, 1964. From left: Kenneth Keating (N.Y.), Clifford Case (N.Y.), Everett Dirksen (Ill.), Jacob Javits (N.Y.), Leverett Saltonstall (Mass.), John Pastore (R.I.), Hubert Humphrey (Minn.), Warren Magnuson (Wash.), Hugh Scott (Penn.).

  Time & Life Pictures via Getty Images

  President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act as senators and civil rights leaders look on, July 2, 1964.

  Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library

  Some businesses, like Lester Maddox’s cafeteria in Atlanta, closed shop rather than integrate after the passage of the Civil Rights Act, but most acquiesced quietly.

  R
ogers Photo Archive

  A Note on the Author

  Clay Risen is a staff editor for the New York Times op-ed section. Previously he served as an editor at the New Republic and as the managing editor of the noted quarterly Democracy: A Journal of Ideas. His journalism has also appeared in a wide variety of publications, including the Atlantic, Smithsonian, and the Washington Post. His first book, A Nation on Fire: America in the Wake of the King Assassination, published in 2009, received much critical acclaim; he is also the author of American Whiskey, Bourbon and Rye: A Guide to the Nation’s Favorite Spirit and a coeditor of The New York Times: Disunion: Modern Historians Revisit and Reconsider the Civil War from Lincoln’s Election to the Emancipation Proclamation. He lives in New York.

  By the Same Author

  A Nation on Fire: America in the Wake of the King Assassination

  The New York Times: Disunion: Modern Historians Revisit and Reconsider the Civil War from Lincoln’s Election to the Emancipation Proclamation (coeditor)

  American Whiskey, Bourbon and Rye: A Guide to the Nation’s

  Favorite Spirit

  Copyright © 2014 by Clay Risen

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