Don Mitchell - The Freedom Summer Murders

Segregated public facilities were a fact of life throughout the South.

But white officials in Mississippi dug in and refused to desegregate their schools. The white supremacists were determined to detect and destroy any effort to end segregation.

A July 1954 meeting of concerned whites in Indianola, Mississippi, led to the creation of the first Citizens Council. By October 1954, the council claimed to have more than twenty-five thousand members. The council was dedicated to preserving Mississippis social order of white dominance and the organized resistance to any federal government efforts in support of integration. Its membership was comprised of white citizens, many of whom were businessmen who believed that segregation could be preserved through legal, nonviolent means. The council simply relied on the use of threats, coercion, and economic retaliation against those who sought to change the status quo.

The most effective way for Mississippis white elites to deprive blacks of their voice in government was to deny them the right to vote. Individuals who tried to register blacks to vote, or encourage others to do so, could find themselves out of a job and labeled as virtually unemployable. Local banks could refuse to extend them credit, loans, or home mortgages. The council would take out advertisements in newspapers and list the names and addresses of individuals who were, or were suspected of being, civil rights activists. The white community would react quickly to these postings. Insurance policies could be canceled. Boycotts were arranged against merchants who were sympathetic to the civil rights movement.

In January 1964, at a courthouse in Mississippi, black applicants attempt to register to vote. The wall sign warns of the public exposure applicants will experience in order to intimidate black citizens.

The government of Mississippi felt so strongly about the need to protect segregation, it created its own spy agency to deal with the threat of integration. By an act of the Mississippi legislature, the Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission was created on March 29, 1956. The new organization was granted extensive investigatory powers. Anyone, black or white, who expressed support for integration, was involved in civil rights, or even had suspect political affiliations was a fitting target for commission investigators. The Sovereignty Commission exercised far-reaching authority on the people of Mississippi. It banned books, censored films, and closely examined school curriculums. It even censored national radio broadcasts and television programs.