Alarmingly prescient

Record, Jane Cassels

[AFRICAN AMERICANA]. [WHITE SUPREMACY]. [COMMUNISM]. "The Red-Tagging of Negro Protest" (offprint from "The American Scholar" vol. 26, no. 3)

New York: NAACP, 1957. 8vo. [2], 325-333, [1] pp. Original self-wrappers, stapled as issued. Some toning around the edges but the paper stock is strong and crisp. Very good. Item #3813

Written 65 years ago, this little-known article is just as thought-provoking today, as Americans respond to the Black Lives Matter movement and related protests by African-Americans throughout the United States. Our offprint was reprinted by the NAACP with the permission of the author and "The American Scholar" in October 1957.

"Red-tagging" relates to the attempt by White supremacists to blame Communism for African American protests; the author explains:

"A recurrent theme coming out of the South these days describes desegregation as part of a gigantic Communist scheme to subvert the American way of life. Almost every occurrence of racial friction produces its quota of speeches and editorials labeling Negro protest a Communist inspired or, at the very least, Communist tinged. [...] Why is there such receptiveness to the suggestion that current agitation for desegregation is all part of a grand left-wing conspiracy?" [...] The Red-tagging of Negro protest fills a gaping hole in Southern logic. It purports to rescue a cherished Southern axiom from the reaches of cold fact. The white Southerner has long insisted that he understands Deep-South colored folk and knows them to be happy with their lot. Now he is confronted on every side with demands, by Negroes themselves, that the basic pattern of Southern life be changed."

Another belief of the Southerner, she writes, is the notion that Black Americans "are incapable of leading a protest movement." That notion, along with the thinking that Black Americans were "inherently inferior and therefore congenitally unsuited to responsible behavior on their own," causes some white Southerners to believe that "There must be some guiding white hand behind it all [...] And what kind of white people would stoop to this? Why, Communists, of course -- or cynical, Red-tainted, Northern politicians ready to sell their souls for the Negro vote." Scary how similar these sentiments are to right wing extremists spewing forth their hate online 24/7.

The author, Jane Cassels Record, was born in Georgia and lived there until after World War II, attending Southern schools and colleges. She authored many articles published in academic and literary journals, including some on social problems in America (such as "Little Rock USA").

Price: $200.00