BATTLE OF CREDENTIALS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP70-00058R000300030034-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: November 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 24, 2000
• Sequence Number: 34
• Publication Date: September 7, 1964
• Content Type: MAGAZINE

Approved, For Release 20,00/05/23 : CIA-R
SEPTEMBER 7, 1964
had been canvassing nationwide supportimmediately. With Freedom pickets al
for seating a full delegation from the ready plodding the Boardwalk outside'
predominantly Negro Freedom Demo- Convention Hall, their sympathizers on'
cratic Party. To disregard. the Negroes". the 108-man Credentials Committee.
demands would be to repudiate the made clear that the "back-of-the-bus"
:-moral drive of the Negro revolution; to plan was unacceptable. :And while the
satisfy them would mean a, floor fight committee was polishing up its Alabama
almost certain to trigger a Southerners' ultimatum, state committeeman "Bull"
Battle of Credentials walkout. Connor, who$e police dogs once terror-
On Sunday, convention eve, the Presi- ized Birnihigham Negroes, casually
Beneath the Barnum & Bailey wh rl en was ready. As his chief agent, he strolled into a Convention Hall office and
f At1 _tic Cit L ndon Johnson a d :` had 38-year-old - Washington , lawyer ' picked up Alabama's credentials from
a
wit #nca cu a e imp ca
vember: could the quixotic force of t e Adla Stevenson and John F. Kennedy, turning to his ocean-front hotel and turn-'
Southern Ne o revolt be stitched i o and ad already handled one delicate ing a deaf ear to National. Chairman
y, y
o
} the Democratic Party faced a questi in':' nam Tom Finney, a lean, unflappable an unbriefed clerk. "Never been treated
:1, ' 1 1 ill 1. tions for ' ` former CIA man who had worked with as. nice in my life," twanged Bull, re-
the Democratic family patchwork wit missi n for Mr. Johnson-accompanying ' John Bailey's frantic telephone pleas to
out sacrificing the loyalist remnants f.'. - Allen Dulles to Mississippi after the dis- , return the badges and tickets.
the white South to Barry Goldwater? appe ranee of the three,. civil-rights . Bedside Manner: The next day
To millions of televiewers, the Dew:)- won rs.. In Mississippi, Finney had Humphrey and Finney went to work on
crats' painful struggle to find the ans r ' conic to . know the firebrands of the the Mississippi riddle at the White
looked like a tragi-comedy. of errorsfad . Free om Party, and understood their House command post,: the 'garish new
absurd game of musical folding chs turb lent and 'unpredictable approach Pageant Motel across from Convention
on the teeming convention floor - to politics. The President had also as- Hall. Plopping down on a bed in his
tween unreconstructed Southerners, sign 1 Hubert Humphrey to the ' prob shirt sleeves, Humphrey begged the.
transigent Negro demonstrators lem.. As. a veteran of Americans for' Rev. Martin Luther King and FDP lead-
'harried sergeants-at-arms. But bebi d De cratic Action, the senator was ` ers to accept the LBJ plan. They
the scenes, the drama was far m (re close to the white liberals spearheading'., wouldn't. "Negroes want Negroes to rep-
subtle, a heady blend of principle aid , the reedom Democrats' cause. , ..resent them," Mississippi vote worker
pragmatism unfolding in smoke-fill d' The Plan: And Mr. Johnson had a Bob Moses told Humphrey. "Wait, Bob,"
rooms, corridor conferences, and unt Id plan He had sweated out agreement Humphrey cried, "I thought we were
telephone calls. Before the week s with key Southern leaders on .a formula interested in ending discrimination."
out, it involved a constellation of pa y. to a ert a disastrous floor fight and, he With matters at an impasse, a spe-,
leaders-all the way up to LBJ. hop 1, pacify the Freedom -Democrats:. cial credentials subcommittee was put in'
In a year of unprecedented Ne o the ily-white regular Mississippi dele-' charge of the Mississippi question as
ferment and ominous talk of white ba k . gati , many of them! Goldwater- the convention opened. A weeklong
lash, the Democrats knew they were in min ed, would. be seated if they signed : stall appealed to some. "Hell," said one
for trouble over the pesky problem of a ld party loyalty oath; the party ?, 'big-city boss, "let's lock 'em 'up with a
'credentials long before they arrived at would pledge to open its Dixie conven- .. bottle of whisky and leave them there."
Atlantic City. The party loyalty of tion process to Negroes; and some ges- But Finney, for one, recognized the
the 36-vote delegation from Alabam - ture perhaps ""honored guest" status, folly of the easy out. "Coldwater,". he
where Gov. George Wallace had le 's- buto vote-would be offered the Free- ~ , argued, "would tell the country a hand-
lated a slate of unpledged. Democr ic dom Party, which did not legally qualify ful of illegally appointed Negroes had
electors-was sure to be challeng d.: for eating. The Alabamans would be brought this party to its knees." That
The Mississippi situation was even m re req ed to sign a stricter oath. night Connor and his' Alabama band-
explosive. For weeks, Northern libe B t t. the glue came unstuck' almost ? ;their loyalty oaths unsigned-bulled. their.