Mightier than the Sword by Rodger Streitmatter

Author:Rodger Streitmatter [Streitmatter, Rodger]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
ISBN: 9780813349879
Publisher: Westview Press

A Birmingham police officer held this young man in place so the attack dog could rip into his stomach—and the television networks saw to it that the whole world was watching.

© Associated Press/Bill Hudson

The specific scene from that day that caused the most reaction was of a police dog, with its fangs bared, tearing at the stomach of a black schoolboy. The officer controlling the dog grabbed the young man’s sweater, holding him in place so the dog could maul him. One historian went so far as to credit the success of the Birmingham campaign to that one image, writing, “If there was any single point at which the 1960s generation of ‘new Negroes’ turned into a major social force, the appearance of that photograph was it. Intense pressure on President Kennedy to initiate federal action began to be applied the moment that image appeared.”22

An editorial in the New York Times spoke for millions of TV viewers when it stated, “The use of police dogs and high-pressure firehoses to subdue school children in Birmingham is a national disgrace.” Americans around the country demonstrated their solidarity with the protesters by organizing public marches in forty cities.23

In Alabama, negotiations that previously had failed now succeeded. The day after the images of the firehoses and police dogs were televised, Kennedy sent a Justice Department official to Birmingham to mediate between city officials and the demonstrators. And exactly one week after the shocking images had aired, the leaders reached an agreement that allowed, for the first time, African Americans to shop at city stores and eat at city restaurants.24

The TV images prompted action on the national level as well, propelling Kennedy to propose civil rights legislation of a scope and boldness that a few months earlier wouldn’t have been possible. In a speech televised live during prime time, the president said what African Americans had been waiting generations to hear, “We preach freedom around the world, but are we to say to the world—and much more importantly, to each other—that this is the land of the free, except for the Negroes? The time has come for this nation to fulfill its promise.”25

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