The Press: On the Spot

Mississippi officials feel strongly that the Northern press, through "sensationalism," has been misrepresenting the facts on segregation in their state. Last week Mississippi invited 20 small-town New England editors and publishers to come down at the state's expense to learn "the truth about what segregation is, and why." For seven days the editors toured the state as guests of the Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, set up by the legislature with $250,000 to protect the state's "way of life." The commission's pressagent, Hal DeCell, 32, promised "to show them whatever they want to see, because we have nothing to cover up."

Before the Yankee editors got started, Mississippi's Governor J. P. Coleman explained that segregation would continue in Mississippi "for at least the next 50 years. We don't intend to obey the Supreme Court's decision because it is not based on law." But, he assured the newsmen, "there is no tension or malice or ill will between the races. I have not heard of any trouble where [Negroes] have voted." Most Negroes do not vote, he said, because of unwillingness to pay the poll tax or failure to pass a literacy test.

As the chartered bus sped from Jackson along the historic Natchez Trace, some of the editors were surprised to find no segregation in places of business. Editor J. Clark Samuel of Massachusetts' Foxboro Reporter was struck by "fine colored schools" and the sight of Negroes and whites "living in compatibility." Publisher John C. Bond of Massachusetts' Rockland Standard noted "a real effort to lift the level of the Negro educationally."

But the editors found that Mississippi did not live entirely up to Governor Coleman's billing. Items: ¶Mound Bayou, the biggest (pop. 1,350) all-Negro town in the state, votes in every election, Vice Mayor I. E. Edwards said, but the ballots are never counted by election officials at the county seat.

¶In some areas, said Mound Bayou's Postmaster C. V. Thurmond, it "would be suicide for a Negro" even to attempt to vote. One minister who came to Itta Bena (pop. 1,725) to meet the editors said that when he had voted, his house was burned. ¶In Cleveland (pop. 6,747) wealthy Attorney Ben Mitchell earnestly told the group: "The Negroes are just naturally and inherently inferior to white people."

¶In Natchez (pop. 22,740) Negro leaders reported that the White Citizens' Councils have added to segregation practices. "We used to all pay taxes at the same window," said one, "but now they have one marked colored and the other white."