Interview with Robert Parris Moses, February 11, 1964

Partial Transcript: Now, if you will just announce yourself, your, your name and your organization...

Segment Synopsis: Moses details his education, from prep school at Stuyvesant High School through a graduate education at Harvard. He also briefly describes his teaching career.

Keywords: Hamilton College (N.Y.); Harlem (N.Y.); Harvard University; New York City (N.Y.); Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

Subjects: African Americans--Education; Preparatory schools; United States--Race Relations; Universities and colleges

Partial Transcript: Now, how did you make the shift to active participation in, in, um, civil rights operations?

Segment Synopsis: Moses describes his reasons for joining the movement for civil rights. He talks about the dehumanization and alienation African Americans felt, even when they attained the sophistication and pedigree that Moses had. Moses also describes his father and his career.

Keywords: Atlanta (Ga.); Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; Great Depression; Sit-ins; Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC); Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

Subjects: African American families; African Americans--Conduct of life; African Americans--Segregation; Childrearing; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights movements--United States; Civil rights workers

Partial Transcript: Let me read you a quotation from, um, Dr. Kenneth Clark on Dr. King, and see how you respond to it.

Segment Synopsis: Moses details the differences between SNCC's brand of nonviolence and that advocated by Martin Luther King Jr. and the SCLC. He describes SNCC's strategy as a more "tactical" approach to nonviolence, rather than a passive, ameliorative approach.

Keywords: Dr. Kenneth Clark; Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.; Pathology; Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC); Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

Subjects: African American leadership; Black Muslims; Black universities and colleges; Civil rights movements--United States; Nonviolence; Passive resistance; Protest movements.

Partial Transcript: Somehow that the question of, that in the end, everybody has to live together.

Segment Synopsis: Moses reflects broadly on the implications of integration, both in how he hopes SNCC workers can incorporate themselves into the communities where they serve, as well as how American society as a whole will be changed when segregation is eliminated.

Keywords: Howard University; Integration; Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

Subjects: African Americans--Social conditions.; African Americans--Societies, etc.; Black universities and colleges; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights workers; Neighborliness; Social movements; United States--Race relations.; Voter registration--Mississippi

Partial Transcript: There's another, uh, person who says that.

Segment Synopsis: Moses speaks on the notion that the more pressing issue of segregation actually occurs in the northern states rather than the southern states, noting that successes made by the black community in the North can provide a helpful blueprint for how an integrated society can operate and improve itself.

Keywords: Busing; Housing segregation; James Baldwin

Subjects: African Americans--Segregation; African Americans--Social conditions.; African Americans--Southern States.; Discrimination in housing; Segregation in education; Segregation--United States; United States--Race relations.

Partial Transcript: Back to your personal experiences.

Segment Synopsis: Moses describes his personal experiences of violence while working with the movement in Mississippi, in which he has been attacked by white people and seen friends attacked and killed. He also discusses how he maintains his relationship with his wife in such a perilous endeavor.

Keywords: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI); Liberty (Miss.); Medgar Evers; United States Commission on Civil Rights

Subjects: African Americans--Segregation; African Americans--Social conditions.; African Americans--Southern States.; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights movements--United States; Civil rights workers; Civil rights workers--Violence against; Discrimination--Law and legislation; Extrajudicial executions; United States--Race relations.; Violence--Mississippi; Voter registration--Mississippi

Partial Transcript: You try--you have to overcome that fear.

Segment Synopsis: Moses discusses Albert Camus, whose works he read while in jail in Mississippi. He talks about Camus' philosophy on political resistance, and his thoughts on how much change the civil rights movement can rationally hope to achieve.

Keywords: Albert Camus; French literature; Hattiesburg (Miss.)

Subjects: Civil rights movements--United States; Nonviolence; Passive resistance; Philosophy; Social movements; Terrorism; Universities and colleges

Partial Transcript: --What are the actual criticisms?

Segment Synopsis: Moses comments on issues related to white people participating in civil rights movements, specifically their roles within the organization compared to those held by black participants, and the identification some white participants feel with African American culture more strongly than their own.

Keywords: Chain-of-command; Hierarchy; White workers

Subjects: African American arts; African American experience; Civil rights movements--United States; Civil rights workers--United States; Social movements; United States--Race relations.

Partial Transcript: This is something of a ambivalence that is said to exist, I suppose exists in all societies...

Segment Synopsis: Moses gives his philosophical views on how separate he wants black culture to be from white culture, noting the tension between rejecting an American bourgeois society that discriminates against black people while also desiring that middle class lifestyle.

Keywords: 'Uncle Toms'; Black bourgeoisie; Clarence M. Mitchell Jr.; E.U. Essien-Udom; Malcolm X; Ralph Bunche; Ralph Ellison; W.E.B. Dubois

Subjects: African American leadership; African Americans--Conduct of life; African Americans--Race identity.; African Americans--Social conditions.; Black Muslims; Middle class; United States--Race relations.

Partial Transcript: What about the relation, if any, between, uh, the student movement and beatism?

Segment Synopsis: Moses contrasts SNCC and other organizations involved in the civil rights movement with the Beat generation of recent years. He does note, however that the Beats' refusal to appear professionally groomed in their protest has manifested in civil rights meetings and demonstrations.

Keywords: Appearance; Beatism; Beatniks; Beats; Dress

Subjects: African American leadership; African Americans--Race identity; Beat generation; Civil rights movements--United States; Protest movements.; Social movements

Partial Transcript: Why did communism never make any headway with the American negro?

Segment Synopsis: Moses describes the reasons he believes Communism never attracted a significant amount of African American participants. He notes that African Americans are far more interested in practical political movements rather than grand, abstract political philosophy.

Keywords: "Commies"; Communists; Compromise; U.S. Communist movement

Subjects: African Americans--Social conditions.; Civil rights movements--United States; Communism; Communism--United States--History; Political science--Philosophy; Protest movements.

Partial Transcript: Tell me this.

Segment Synopsis: Moses speaks at length about the differences between the generation participating in SNCC and other civil rights organizations, and the generations of African Americans that have preceded them. He notes that the World War II generation made significant gains and created a social infrastructure that civil rights relies on.

Keywords: 'The New Negro'; Brown vs. Board of Education; Integration; Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC); Wartime industries; World War II

Subjects: African Americans--Conduct of life; African Americans--Social conditions.; Black Muslims; Civil rights movements--United States; Race, class, and social structure; Segregation in education; Social movements; World War, 1939-1945

Partial Transcript: What about Freedom Day in Canton, say, what would it be like?

Segment Synopsis: Moses gives a brief description of an upcoming protest in Canton, Mississippi, where SNCC is attempting to build a coalition of religious organizations for a public demonstration.

Keywords: Canton (Miss.); National Council of Churches; Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)

Subjects: Boycotts; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights movements--United States; Civil rights workers; Picketing; Protest movements.

Partial Transcript: Do you find any irony, even a mild irony, in the fact of the March on Washington being directed at the Lincoln Monument?

Segment Synopsis: Moses responds to Warren's observation that holding a March on Washington at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial is somewhat ironic, since Lincoln did not intend for African Americans to have equal footing with white citizens.

Keywords: Abraham Lincoln; March on Washington, 1963

Subjects: African American--History; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights movements--United States; Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865 --Views on race relations; Lincoln, Abraham, 1809-1865--Views on slavery; National Monuments

Partial Transcript: Tell me this.

Segment Synopsis: Moses comments on SCLC's slogan "Freedom Now," and how it translates to a desire for immediate rather than gradual change. He discusses with Warren how this philosophy can be interpreted as brinkmanship, or demonstrating so radically as to invite violence from the opposition.

Keywords: Brinkmanship; Freedom Now; Gradualism; Howard University; Jackson (Miss.); Mississippi Democratic Party; Mississippi Freedom Summer; Newspapers; Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC)

Subjects: African Americans--Conduct of life; African Americans--Social conditions.; Black universities and colleges; Civil rights demonstrations; Civil rights movements--United States; Law enforcement; Nonviolence; Protest movements.; Race relations--United States; Social movements; United States--Race relations.