FREEDOM SUMMER

BY: Desiree D. Norwood

    Freedom Summer was a program that was founded by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. In 1964 SNCC decided to send volunteers into Mississippi during the summer. Bob Moses came up with the objectives of Freedom Summer to volunteers at Stanford University:

1. to make black voters register in the state

2. to make a Freedom Democratic Party that would stand up to the white-only Mississippi Democratic Party

3.to start freedom schools to teach reading and math to black children

4.to open community centers where poor blacks could get legal and medical help

    Eight hundred students gathered in Oxford, Ohio at Western College for Women in June for a week orientation session. They were mostly white and around 21 years of age. The students learned that they would have to face a lot of difficulties, such as being arrested and bombed.

    On June 21, three volunteers disappeared. Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman,and James Chaney had been taken to jail for speeding charges but were later killed by the K.K.K. with the help of two policemen.

    Meanwhile,Freedom Summer kept going. The volunteers helped provide services to the blacks in the South. They provided Freedom clinics,Northern lawyers, and Freedom schools.

    Several projects were established during Freedom Summer. The most important was the founding of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. It was a group formed to challenge the all-white original Democratic party in the state. It was actually founded before Freedom Summer, but it grew during Freedom Summer. In June, the names of four MFDP candidates were on the Democratic primary ballot as delegates to be sent to the Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, but all four lost.  At the convention, Fannie Lou Hamer gave a speech to the committee:

"If Freedom Democratic Party is not seated now, I question America. Is this America? The land of the free and the home of the brave? Where we have to sleep with our telephones off the hook, because our lives be threatened daily?"

    This outstanding speech moved people around the world, but it didn't move President Johnson. He denied the MFDP seats at the convention.

    The blacks didn't get seated, but they didn't let anyone turn them around. They stood for what was right. Even though the MFDP didn't win they did win. MFDP didn't accomplish as much as they should, but they didn't give up. It showed blacks how to strive for their goals and to never give up.  Because of the outstanding people, inspiring speeches, and exciting organizations, Freedom Summer was made a success.

Good Will To All Those Who Fought,

May God Bless You.