The Augusta Courier

Meredith, Forced Into Ole Miss By Troops, U. S. Marshals Now The Most Segregated Negro In The Entire World

Kennedy Talks About His Problem To Reporter For London Newspaper

The most segregated Negro in the world is James H. Meredith who was forced into the University of Mississippi by thirty thousand troops, four hundred United States Marshals, the federal judges and the Kennedy brothers.

It is true that Meredith is at the University of Mississippi, but he's guarded night and day by marshals and soldiers are standing by near the University to be sure that he stays at Ole Miss.

In a recent interview with Henry Brandon, Washington correspondent for THE SUNDAY TIMES of London, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, in discussing Meredith, said:

"It's a tough problem. He's a fearless man, but we will have to guard him probably as long as he remains at the University. And obviously he will want to go home to Jackson occasionally and be with his wife and child, and that will present an even more difficult problem for the Federal marshals than protecting him on the campus. I don't know yet how many we will have to assign to him indefinitely. We'll look after him, but he'll be living uncomfortably."

Firecrackers Are Thrown

THE ATLANTA CONSTITUTION, on Tuesday, October 30, 1962, carried an Associated Press story from Oxford, Mississippi, as follows:

"Firecracker-throwing students touched off a disturbance in front of the University of Mississippi cafeteria Monday night while James H. Meredith was eating supper.

"One firecracker - of the type known as cherry bomb — was tossed into a military police jeep. The loud blast scattered three armed soldiers.

"A continued barrage of firecrackers caused the three MPs and two federal marshals to race into the crowd with drawn nightsticks. Students fled into nearby dormitories and no one was arrested.

"Just as Meredith, the first Negro ever knowingly admitted to Ole Miss, finished eating and stepped into a marshal's car, one soft drink bottle was hurled at a jeep nearby. Several more firecrackers also exploded.

"Meredith, 29, was whisked away to his apartment in Baxter Hall.

The crowd, estimated at more than 100, dispersed when Burns Tatum, chief of the University police force, appeared and asked students to leave.

"It was the first disturbance since students tried to block Meredith's exit from the student union grill last Wednesday."

Meredith Is Ignored

The students have nothing to do with Meredith. They won't speak to him and they won't associate with him and wherever he goes the marshals must go along, too.

The students taunt and insult Meredith on every occasion and they make no bones of the fact that as soon as the marshals leave that Meredith will leave too.

Meredith is twenty-nine years old and is not interested in getting an education at the University of Mississippi. He's only a tool being used for the sole purpose of trying to break down the pattern of segregation at Ole Miss and, in doing so, he himself becomes the most segregated Negro of all.

Always Be Segregated

He may stay at Ole Miss a year, or two years, but however long he stays he will still be segregated, protected and guarded by United States Marshals.

Then, when he gets through, the marshals will still have to guard him or else Meredith will be forced to leave the State of Mississippi.

If he intends to stay in Mississippi he will be forced to live a segregated life the rest of his days, not only segregated from the whites but segregated from the blacks as well, and his only associates will be United States Marshals.