National Affairs: The Rearguard Commander

It was appropriate that Georgia's Senator Richard Brevard Russell pronounced virtually the last words in the week that smashed the civil rights bill. For courtly Dick Russell had also had the first important words in the civil rights debate. In the interval the words, thoughts and plans of this extraordinarily influential Senator had been echoed, magnified, repeated, debated in both houses of Congress, at the White House, in presidential press conferences, on radio, TV, and in newspaper editorials across the land. When the time came for his resolute Southern rearguard to do battle...