Wind Of Change Blows Over Deep South Too

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29177, 11 April 1960, Page 16

Wind Of Change Blows Over Deep South Too

(Special Correspondent N.Z.P.A.)

(Rec. 10 p.m.)

WASHINGTON, April 10.

The attack on Mr Verwoerd appears to have underlined for many here the fact that though the Senate could have done more in its civil rights legislation, it could not very well have done less in the circumstances existing here and in other parts of the world.

Much has been spoken and written about nationalism in Africa and the wind of change about which Mr Macmillan so recently warned South Africa’s Parliament —words which earned plaudits from the press in all four quarters of the United States. But few here have associated the American negro with that same nationalistic feeling which urges negroes in the northern half of Africa to seek selfgovernment and South African negroes to face rifle fire and whips in protest against the degrading social and political conditions in which they live. But to an increasing number of observers here, that wind of change is blowing in places other than Africa.

The Civil Rights Bill, passed is primarily a voting rights bill along with stiffer penalties for bombings of negro homes and the obstruction of court orders. It is not a strong Bill, but it is clear that compromises were essential if the entire Congressional session was not to be devoted to this one subject. Weak though the bill may be in the eyes of liberal legislators, the important fact is that it buttresses the right to vote with new machinery which promises to be effective. Liberals are reminding ' themselves that there is plenty of history to prove that changes via the ballot box may be slower than violence and revolution, but eventually even more effective and less damaging to the body politic. And they can congratulate themselves on finally achieving something with which the House will agree within the ’next 10 days and give the country moderate, constructive and reasonable provisions that have majority support. The outcome is a personal victory for a Presidential candidate, Senator Lyndon Johnson, who. over the last two months, has resisted all efforts by northern liberals to toughen the bill and by Southern conservatives to weaken it. It is a tribute to his parliamentary skill that the kind of measure he predicted two months ago is practically on the statute book.

The northern liberals feel they have got a quarter of the loaf they wanted and the Southerners feel they have successfully beaten off an all-out bill that would have created antagonism and bitterness in every - one of the former Confederate States.

The result is a civil rights victory of modest, even small proportions that represents a de-

gree of progress and exacerbates the feeling of very few. The “Washington Post” recently addressing aspirants to the Presidency on civil rights and other subjects that confront the nation, reminded them that in the year 1960 there is need to ponder and articulate the inner meanings and strivings of American society, which requires more inspiring goals than the universal distribution of electric can openers or even full stomachs.

It adds: “What the country now requires, we believe, is candidates who will set their telescopes on new stars and who will talk to the voters in terms of a directed and purposeful idealism” and warns' them that they will do themselves and the country a disservice if they seek to exploit either narrow selfinterest or narrow fear. .

The Civil Rights Bill has not, of course, quieted the urgency of Southern negroes to demonstrate for the things they want and clearly it will take statesmanship in both Federal and State Government to avoid unpleasantness at the best and any violence at the worst in the months ahead. Demonstration's