Secession from Civilization

Closing down the schools, Editor Jonathan Daniels of the Raleigh, N.C. News & Observer once told fellow Southerners, is "something beyond secession from the Union; [it] is secession from civilization." Last week Virginia's Governor J. Lindsay Almond Jr. and Arkansas' Governor Orval Faubus ordered certain public schools closed in answer to a Supreme Court ruling that Little Rock's Central High School must proceed immediately with its program of integration.

The essence of the Supreme Court ruling (see The Supreme Court) was that the law does not retreat from violence. Yet it was through fully arrayed state laws that Virginia's Almond closed the Warren County High School at Front Royal and Arkansas' Faubus closed all four high schools in Little Rock. The irony is that the court's ruling was brought about by and is the answer to the violence built up a year ago in Faubus' wild bid for political power. This year the South's defense is one of legal stratagems. And though both federal and state governments are pledged to avoid violence, few could doubt that the cause of integration is far worse off than it was last year.

This fact, more than any other, pointed up the need for a change in the Administration's position. Dwight Eisenhower, honorably intending to stay above the battle and base his case on the enforcement of law and order, had overlooked the fact that the U.S. needed moral leadership in fighting segregation. Without it, Southern moderates had no place to go. Without it, some of the most patient, effective integration programs were weakened as Southern die-hards mobilized their own legal resources to fight the battle for segregation in the name of states' rights.

It was time for the President to perceive that law enforcement must be accompanied by active effort in behalf of the principle behind the law. It was likewise time for sober Southerners to realize the enormity of the school-closing acts.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.